Page:A Life of Matthew Fontaine Maury.pdf/39

Rh apologies that are becoming. Make advances on my part and meet him more than half way. I hope, though, that I may be mistaken about his feeling hurt at anything I've done or said.

Having been transferred from the 'Falmouth' to the schooner 'Dolphin', Maury performed the duty of first lieutenant on that vessel until he joined the frigate 'Potomac', on which he returned to the United States in 1834.

The ship was paid off at Boston, and the young officer returned to Fredericksburg, Virginia, and married his cousin, Miss Ann Hull Herndon, to whom he had been engaged for several years.

His fee to the clergyman who married them, the Rev. Dr. Maguire, was the last ten dollars he possessed in the world. Not long after his marriage he went on to Philadelphia to make arrangements with Mr. Biddle, a prominent publisher of that place, to bring out his "first-born," as he used to call it—his work on navigation. So great was his poverty while there that he lived on cheese and crackers, which he would eat at odd moments in his little garret chamber.

It was considered a bold step on the part of an officer of no higher rank than that of a passed midshipman to publish a work on navigation; but the book, like its author, had the ring of true mettle, and made its way in spite of all obstacles. It was favorably noticed by the highest nautical authorities in England, and it became the textbook of the United States Navy.

At about this time Maury's eldest child, Elizabeth Herndon Maury, was born.

A month after his work on navigation was published, he applied for sea service again, and was attached to the South Sea Exploring Expedition, then fitting out under the