Page:Matthew Fontaine Maury 1806-1873.pdf/18

 Washingtons, the Lees, and the Maurys, it is our proud boast that the grandeur of their character dims the glory of their achievements. But to return to Maury: there were weighty reasons for his acceptance of service in Mexico; he was now in his sixtieth year and in declining health. His property, accumulated during thirty-six years' naval service, had been swept away by the harsh fortunes of war; without a home or an acre of land to cultivate, he must provide for his wife and four minor children, refugees and in need. Moreover, his life was no more jeopardized in Mexico under the rule of the best of the Hapsburgs than in Virginia under constitutional government. Charles Francis Adams, United States Minister at the Court of St. James, had advised English friends of Maury to counsel him against returning to Virginia while passion still held sway in Washington. Were not Jefferson Davis and Alexander Stephens languishing in prison, and were not Mrs. Surratt and Major Wirz doomed to die?

Maury was soon established in Mexico as Commissioner of Immigration; here his son, Colonel R.[Richard] L.[Launcelot] Maury, soon joined him, and, as secretary to the Commissioner, could carry on the work; this enabled his father to obtain leave to visit his family in England, and, incidentally, to perform some governmental service intrusted to him by the Emperor.

Little did Maury dream when the shores of Mexico faded from sight, as he sailed eastward, that never again would he return to the proud Empire of the Montezumas, to cultivate his cinchona groves, and to help Mexico along on the rugged road to civilization. But so it was. He had not been long in England before a revolution in Mexico resulted in the tragic death of Maximilian; consequently, the plan of founding a Virginia Colony there was abandoned; but Maury remained two years longer in England, until conditions in the United States were somewhat improved. During those years, his English friends gave him hospitable welcome and timely aid; the failure of the bank in which he deposited the funds he brought from Mexico, with the loss of all of his American investments, made him poor indeed; then it was that, at a public dinner in London, he was presented with a testimonial of 3,000 Guineas raised by public subscription.

Nor were his friends in America less active in his behalf; they