208 MATTHEW FONTAINE MAURY 



would not go off, owing no doubt to defective arrange- 

 ment, for the instrument was new to him, and he had not 

 been posted up as to the virtues of the ladder-circuit. 

 The instrument used on this occasion was just such a 

 one as this before you. It was the first that had reached 

 the Confederacy. Here is then a most striking illustra- 

 tion of the importance of previous study and drill in 

 this new and important arm of defense". 



In addition to Wurttemberg, Maury offered this in- 

 struction in electric mining to her enemy Prussia, and 

 also to the Governor General of Canada for the sum of 

 1000 pounds sterling. These offers were not accepted. 

 His experiments had, however, been made known in this 

 way to a number of different governments, later infor- 

 mation concerning his discoveries leaked out through 

 his agent in London to other countries, and finally his 

 system became so generally known that his particular 

 contributions to the development of this weapon of war- 

 fare were lost sight of, and as a consequence Maury has 

 not been given the credit that is justly due him in his- 

 tories of the electric mine. 



The money which Maury received from these demon- 

 strations of mines came at a time when it was greatly 

 needed, for he had lost practically all his property in the 

 United States through the war and after his last arrival 

 in England he had had the further misfortune to lose, 

 through the failure of a banker, all he had brought from 

 Mexico. At about this time, however, assistance came 

 to him from another source. Indeed, before his depar- 

 ture from England near the end of the war, a "Maury 

 Testimonial" had been begun at the instigation of some 

 of his English friends, especially the Reverend Dr. 

 Tremlett, and by Commodore Jansen. While Maury 



