CHAPTER XV HIS LAST YEARS IN VIRGINIA Maury arrived at New York on July 16, 1868, and was agreeably surprised at his treatment there. “The custom house authorities”, he wrote, “received me with marked consideration and passed all luggage without difficulty”. Early in August he reached Richmond, much pleased with his reception in his native state. “In the South”, he declared, “it’s been a sort of ovation.... My coming home to share the hard lot of these people instead of accepting French honors is looked upon as a high display of patriotism”. After spending a part of the summer at the White Sulphur Springs as a guest of the proprietors, he was installed, on the 10th of September, in his professorial chair at Virginia Military Institute. The ceremonies were held in the open air on a temporary platform in front of the Superintendent’s quarters. The faculty of Washington College, of which General Robert E. Lee was then the Rector, were present, as well as a large number of the citizens of Lexington. Superintendent Francis H. Smith welcomed Maury on behalf of the Institute, and Governor Letcher, as a representative of the Board of Governors of which he was the president, also made an address of welcome. Maury gave an “extended commentary” on the sciences, as the principal speech of the day. On this occasion, according to one of his daughters, Maury wore his foreign decorations, and “the cadets were mightily pleased and cheered till their little throats were dry”. [Illustration: _Courtesy of “The Journal of American History,” Vol. IV, Number 3 (1910)._ PORTRAIT TAKEN DURING THE LAST YEARS OF MAURY, WHILE AT THE VIRGINIA MILITARY INSTITUTE] Maury did not take up his residence in Lexington until the following year, on June 10, as his house there was not ready for his family until that time. With Richmond as his home during the autumn and winter, he was busily engaged in lecturing, in making preparations for the physical survey of the material and mineral resources of Virginia, in distributing cinchona seeds which had been sent to him from England, in trying to arouse interest in the establishment of an agricultural school in connection with the Virginia Military Institute, and in working in the interest of the Chesapeake and Ohio Railway and the establishment of a direct line of steamers from Norfolk to Flushing. The most important address that he delivered during this period was given at the Staunton Fair on October 28, 1868. In this speech he referred to the opinion which had gotten abroad in the North, and even in England, that the South had become lacking in energy and enterprise, and he advised that they make use of their water power, encourage German and Dutch immigrants to come to Virginia, and begin to construct better roads.