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[[Extract of a letter from New York]], July 15. 

"On the 4th of July there were a great many pretty exhibitions of one kind or another, but none in which address and management was more conspicuous, than in the letting off a [[underlined]] balloon [[/underlined]] in Broad-Street. A man, who for some time past has amused the vulgar in different ways, advertised last week, that on the Anniversary of Independency, a balloon would commence its flight from a place which is dignified with the name of the Academy: at the hour appointed, a vast crowd of every description attended with eager expectation, waiting the moment which was to crown their wishes - when unfortunately an under-sheriff appeared, with a writ against the showman for 500l. Nothing could equal the terror of the culprit, or the anger of the mob: - Knock him down! knock him down! was echoed from each corner of the place; and, notwithstanding the firmness of the sheriff, he certainly would have fallen a sacrifice to his untimely interposition, had he not agreed to suspend the arrest until the expectations of the public should be satisfied, or he should have double right to seize his victim, as an abuser of public as well as private faith.
"This matter being arranged, the balloon was soon filled with inflammable air; but the joy of the gazers was for a moment damped, by information that some of the inside apparatus had given way, which would take at least half an hour to remedy; the showman, in order to repair the supposed damage, stepped into the balloon, his assistants cut the cords, and he ascended with all the gaiety imaginable, to the unspeakable joy of the beholders; even the sheriff, who had left his prey, forgot his loss, and cried out huzza! when the balloon had ascended about fifty yards above the heads of the crowd, the navigator informed them, that as the wind was Easterly he should shape his course to Kentucky, where he should be happy to meet his friend the sheriff; he instantly arose with great velocity, and was soon lost to view."
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^[[1785 - handwritten in ink]]
AMERICAN NEWS.
New York, Oct. 6. A balloon was exhibited on the 28th of September last, at Philadelphia, by Mr. Buffelot.
 This balloon was in the form of a globe divided into eighteen ribs, between which was placed blue stripes, elegantly adorned with thirteen silver stars, the whole supported by a red crown fixed in the interior part of the balloon, with a dark ground, that had the most agreeable effect. At six o'clock, P.M. Mr. Buffelot began to fill the balloon, which exhibited the most beautiful appearance to a respectable and numerous company. It rose with some difficulty, on account of the breeze having entirely failed: however, it ascended most majestically about 3000 feet; which distance from the ground it constantly kept, until its fall on the Jersey shore, having in the course of thirty-five minutes vaulted about six miles in the air without any breeze.
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^[[1784 - handwritten in ink]]
Extract of a letter from Strasburgh, Oct. 16.
"A sublimer traveller, a new hero, enters the atmospheric theatre, and has deserved a superior degree of publick admiration for his unrivalled performance! Mr. Henri de Clermont, a Swiss adventurer, is the gentleman I am speaking of, and to whose descent I was this morning a witness. To please the citizens of Geneva he has far out-dived (if [I] may invert this expression) any of his predecessors, in a balloon of a new construction, and of uncommon power; but I had better tell you his story as I heard it.
"Myself, with Mr. Zolicoffer (the banker) to whom I am here recommended, were this morning walking in some vine-yards, and admiring the cheerful business of the vintagers, the welcome warmth of the south wind, and the unclouded face of Heaven, when a flitting shadow, that glanced along the ground before us, drew our attention to an immense balloon, about a third part inflated, which was descending with great rapidity before us. We ran up to the place, where it seemed likely to flop, and, when it was within about six feet of the ground, a handsome, florid young man, seemingly about twenty jumped eagerly from a gallery affixed to it, and catching us both with transport in his arms; "Am I again amongst men?" said he; and dropping some tears upon my shoulder, to which, from the natural sympathy of similar years, he preferably leaned, "God! God! I thank thee! I am again amongst men!" he repeated with such a voice, that I could not deny him some responsive drops.
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"After the first effusions of his joy were over, we turned to look for his balloon, which had remounted a few feet on his quitting it, but fell back almost immediately to the earth; and seating ourselves on the wreck, he took some biskets from a box it contained, whilst Mr. Zolicoffer purchased a basket of fine grapes from the vintagers, and we took a rural repast together. He then related to us the history of his tour, pretty nearly in the following words. Wishing, with the impetuosity of youth, to do something towards the improvement of these aerial vehicles, whose invention and progress I have attended to with all the enthusiasm of a lover; I adjusted to the summit of a common globe of oiled silk, a valve, pressed down with a spring that just yielded to a weight of half a pound, a pressing force which I knew, from trial, every square foot (so big was the valve) of the balloon was more than able to sustain. I then fixed a second sphere of silk above this valve, that the escape of inflammable air, which its increasing expansive force renders necessary in the upper regions of the atmosphere might, by inflating the superior globe, increase instead of diminishing the power of ascension in my machine. I then filled the inferior air skin, and with the usual appendages of a gallery, some sand bags, a flag, a barometer, a bottle of wine, and these biskets, the balloon was fitted for my expedition. The apparatus was so closely sewed that is remained exposed all last night without any sensible loss of air, and this morning about half after six, notwithstanding a night of sleepless impatience, I was quite in spirits to ascend, and mounted my car, which slowly rose amidst a crowd of admiring spectators. On the more rapid wing of vanity my soul was lifted to the highest pitch of exstacy and I waved my flag with exultation til my beholders were indistinct from distance. I then emptied one sand bag after another into the lake, and rose with inconceivable though almost imperceptible rapidity, whilst the earth seemed slipping under me with equal velocity southward. With what delight I now contemplated the grand scene below! The rugged mountains of Switzerland lying like a map beneath me, and protruding their long shadows into the plains of Burgundy! The lake of Geneva but a pond, and its city a point! The Po, the Rhone, the Rhine, and the Danube, streamlets, whose infant progress I could trace, but whose bolder flow the dim horizon hid! The sun scarce risen, and apparently below my level! Such were the grand objects that continued to elate me. My superior globe was now swelling apace, and my ascent redoubled in swiftness, if to it, and not the sun's warmth, I may attribute the swift change which the earth's appearance underwent. It was now a huge circular plane of a greyish green cast; the sun, a round blaze of glory, burned with the white etherial lustre of the other stars, which the refractions of this thinner atmosphere no longer concealed. My respiration grew uncommonly rapid and violent; my barometer, which I but now thought of consulting, was cracked, and my bottle of wine burst suddenly with a loud explosion, and its contents disappeared in vapour.
"I now began to be alarmed for my safety, and as I thought I might guess at my elevation by observing the swiftness of a body let fall from the balloon, I took a small pebble out of one of the sand bags, and let it slide down the side of the gallery. Judge of my terror, when I perceived my machine attracted it more strongly than the earth, and it hung suspended like a drop of water from one corner of the bottom. "And shall I never set foot again up in my native planet, but freeze slowly to death in the empty waste of space, far from my friends - my mother?" exclaimed I, casting myself on the floor in an agony of despair, and gnawing my seat with bitter rage; then casting a dry eye of imprecation towards Heaven, "Shall I never again return to earth?" and relapsed into the profoundest misery, swallowed up in the idea of being without the sphere of attraction of the world. At length rising with collected fury, and armed with the courage of despair, I slit quite across with my penknife the lower globe, and flung out some slips of torn paper, to see if I distanced them in my descent.  They remained suspended in the same level with myself, trembling and flickering, indeed, as if agitated by a wind, to which I was insensible, but apparently indifferent as to their direction, and my last ray of hope seemed extinct.  After a while they rose; I looked down at my pebble, it was fallen, the lower globe had collapsed, and with sobs of rapture I now thanked the Deity, whom in my fury I had dared to arraign.  The sun burned yellower, the stars vanished, the earth's surface grew distinct, and my respiration easy; at last I could fold you in my arms, and Heaven bless those whose embrace first convinced me I was still within the reach of men.
"We dined by ourselves at Mr. Zolicoffer's, but, before the coffee was brought, the vintagers had so far spread the report of an aerial traveller's arrival, that the house of the good banker was surrounded by a mob, eager to see him; and not an acquaintance of his, but, under one pretence or another came in to drink a cup of coffee with this new Icarus.  Mr. De Clermont is as affable and mild humoured as he is handsome; he gave every body his hand, went and spoke to the populace at the door, and accepts (during his stay) of a bed.  He sprained his ancle in the jump, which will confine him a good deal.  I remain, your's &c.
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^[[133 - handwritten in pencil at bottom of page.]]