The work on this catalogue was carried forward industriously for several years, but the results were not ready to be published in the volume of observations for the year 1846 because of the continual drafts on the personnel of the Observatory for sea duty, which made it impossible for the computers to keep pace with the observers. Eventually, Maury was compelled to abandon the hope of ever finishing a complete catalogue of the stars, as at first planned. The observations continued to be made, however, and by January of 1855 the number of stars which had been so observed reached the grand total of 100,000; but these results were not published until 1873, long after Maury’s superintendency had come to a close. Maury would never have undertaken such an ambitious work, if he had realized the Herculean labor involved in the cataloguing of all the stars down to the 10th magnitude in all the heavens from 45° south to the North Pole, a colossal undertaking that was entirely beyond the capacity of any one observatory to accomplish in a generation. The appearance of the second volume of astronomical observations was delayed because of the inroads made on Maury’s staff by the demands of the Mexican War. Then when the work was on the point of being published it was destroyed by a fire which burned the printing office. So the volume did not appear until the year 1851; and as the years went by publications fell further and further behind the observations. There is no doubt but that Maury was greatly handicapped by the assignment of officers to the Observatory for irregular periods, and by the reduction of the number of his mathematicians as time went by. There was, besides, the hydrographical work of his office which made constantly increasing demands on him and his staff. When he was forced by this lack in personnel to make a choice between the more complete development of astronomical observations on the one hand, and hydrographical and meteorological research on the other, he wisely chose the latter as of more immediate and practical value to the United States, and indeed to the entire world. [Illustration: _Courtesy of “The Journal of American History,” Vol. IV, Number 3 (1910)._ DECORATIONS CONFERRED UPON MAURY (From reader’s left to right) First and fourth are the obverse and reverse of the decoration of the Tower and Sword conferred by the King of Portugal. Second is the diamond pin presented by Maximilian of Austria. Third and sixth are the obverse and reverse of the decoration, Cross of the Order of Dannebrog, given by the King of Denmark. Fifth is the pearl and diamond brooch presented to Mrs. Maury by the Czar of Russia, see page 65. (Maury was also made a commander of the Legion of Honor, and a knight of the Order of St. Anne by the Czar of Russia.) ] CHAPTER V HIS WIND AND CURRENT CHARTS