ith
Professors Redfield, Espy, Loomis, Joseph Henry, Dr. Increase Lapham,
and others, the honor of having been one of the first to suggest the
feasibility of our present systematic storm warnings.

Maury was born in 1806. When nineteen years of age he secured a
midshipman's warrant, and, as there was no naval academy at Annapolis
then, was immediately assigned to a man-of-war. Within six years he was
master of an American war vessel. Before starting on a voyage to the
Pacific he sought information on the winds and currents, and finding
that it was not available, determined himself to gather it for general
publication. This he did, issuing a book upon the subject.

When a broken leg, the result of a stage-coach accident, caused his
retirement from active service at sea, he continued his studies, and, in
recognition of his services to navigation, was given charge of the Depot
of Charts and Instruments at Washington. There he found stored away the
log books of American naval vessels, and from the vast number of
observations they contained, began the compilation of the Wind and
Currents Charts known to all mariners.

A monograph on Maury, issued by N.W. Ayer & Son, of Philadelphia, says
of these charts:

"They were, at first, received with indifference and incredulity.
Finally, a Captain Jackson determined to trust the new chart absolutely.
As a result he made a round trip to Rio de Janeiro in the time often
required for the outward passage alone. Later, four clipper ships
started from New York for San Francisco, via Cape Horn. These vessels
arrived at their destination in the order determined by the degree of
fidelity with which they had followed the directions of Maury's charts.
The arrival of these ships in San Francisco marked, likewise, the
arrival of Maury's Wind and Currents Charts in the lasting favor of the
mariners of the world. The average voyage to San Francisco was reduced,
by use of the charts, from one hundred and eighty-three to one hundred
and thirty-five days, a saving of forty-eight days.

"Soon after this, the ship _San Francisco_, with hundreds of United
States troops on board, foundered in an Atlantic hurricane. The rumor
reached port that there was need of help. Maury was called upon to
indicate her probable location. He set to work to show where the wind
and currents would combine to place a helpless wreck, and marked the
place with a blue pencil. There the relief was sent, and there the
surviv