18
foreign countries for material and products ot manufacture, sent him abroad, invested with suitable powers, which he continued to exercise, with his usual ability, until the close of the war.
Then, in anticipation of a large emigration from; the Southern States to Mexico, with the view of aiding his countrymen there, he went to that country, where he was cordially received by the Emperor Maximilian, who appointed him to a place in his cabinet. Thence he was sent on a special mission to Europe. The revolution terminating his relations with that country, left him in straitened circumstances. Unwilling to accept aid without rendering an equivalent return, he resumed, as a means of support, his scientific and literary labors, pursuing those studies that to him were most congenial. To these he added experimental researches, having for their object the perfecting of new applications of electricity, in which he was eminently successful, and in preparing his Manual of Geography, subsequently published in this country. During this period the great University of Cambridge honored him with the degree of LL.D., and the Emperor of the French invited him to the Superintendency of the Imperial Observatory at Paris.
