HIS WIND AND CURRENT CHARTS 59 



the free city of Hamburg, the repubHc of Bremen, Chile, 

 Austria, and Brazil, all joined the enterprise; and the 

 Pope established honorary flags of distinction for the 

 ships of the papal states, which could be awarded only 

 to those vessels which kept the abstract logs of the 

 Brussels Conference. 



Maury took with him on this mission to Europe his two 

 eldest daughters and their cousins Ellen Herndon and 

 Ellen Maury, who were dubbed by acclamation on the 

 steamer the "Magpie Club". In England the party was 

 invited to Wrottesley Hall near Wolverhampton, by 

 Lord Wrottesley, then President of the Royal and Astro- 

 nomical Societies, with whom Maury had corresponded 

 for several years. Before returning to America, he and 

 his ''Magpie Club" traveled in France, Holland, and 

 Germany, and visited the great scientist Humboldt, 

 whose "Cosmos" had greatly influenced Maury's scien- 

 tific ideas. 



Back at home again, Maury took up his work with 

 renewed energy, and with the data which came in, 

 through the greatly increased cooperation, from all 

 quarters and in many different languages, he revised his 

 charts of the North and South Atlantic, and of the North 

 and South Pacific, and then charted the Indian Ocean as 

 well. Not only was the route to Rio definitely decreased 

 by one fourth, but also other passages began to be 

 shortened with the accompanying saving for all the men 

 and commerce that used Maury's suggested routes. The 

 gold rush to California, which began in 1849, vastly 

 increased the shipping from the Atlantic ports of the 

 United States to San Francisco. Time then became a 

 more important element in that passage than ever before, 

 and in 1850 clipper ships were launched for this particu- 



