Page:Dictionary of National Biography, Third Supplement.djvu/429

 . Later he made an offer to defray all other expenses of a four months' expedition on condition that the Norwegian government lent the Michael Sars and her scientific staff for the purpose. The offer was accepted, and in April 1910 this vessel of 226 tons left Plymouth with Murray on board and with Dr. Johan Hjort as leader of the staff. The immediate results of this expedition—including important physical and biological observations at all depths in the tracts traversed—were published in The Depths of the Sea by Murray and Hjort in 1912. A description of 1,426 samples of deposits from the floor of the Atlantic Ocean, gathered during thirty-five cruising expeditions between 1857 and 1911, was being prepared under Murray's supervision at the time of his death. This work was completed by J. Chumley, who added a discussion of the results, and the monograph was published (1924) in the Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.

Murray received honorary degrees from several universities, was elected F.R.S. in 1896, and created K.C.B. in 1898. He acted for nearly two years (1896–1898) as scientific member of the Scottish Fishery Board, and filled various offices in the scientific societies of Edinburgh. His recreations were yachting—during which he carried on soundings, dredging, and other observations—golf, and motoring. He was killed in a motor accident at Kirkliston, near Edinburgh, 16 March 1914.

Murray married in 1889 Isabel, only daughter of Thomas Henderson, shipowner, of Glasgow; there were two sons and three daughters of the marriage.

Edward Forbes [q.v.] was the pioneer of shallow-water dredging during the earlier half of the nineteenth century; the exploration of the deep sea we owe largely to Wyville Thomson and Murray. Murray has left an enduring mark on the science of oceanography which he brought practically to its present position and outlook. He was an original, suggestive, broad-minded thinker and did not hesitate to attack established views if they did not coincide with his conclusions. A strong and forceful personality, he was confident of his own opinion and somewhat brusque, occasionally domineering, in manner, but full of good humour, and most helpful and friendly to his assistants and to other investigators who sought his aid.

Portraits of Murray were painted by Sir Daniel Macnee in 1876 and by Sir George Reid in 1912.

 MYERS, ERNEST JAMES (1844–1921), poet and translator, was born at Keswick 13 October 1844, the second son of the Rev. Frederic Myers [q.v.], perpetual curate of St. John's, Keswick, and younger brother of Frederic William Henry Myers [q.v.]. His mother was Susan Harriet, youngest daughter of John Marshall, of Hallsteads, on Ullswater; and, spending there his summer holidays during many years, Myers retained throughout his life an ardent love of the fell-country. From Cheltenham, where he was head of the school, he went in 1863 as an exhibitioner to Balliol College, Oxford. He enjoyed college life to the full, rowed in the college eight, played rackets and tennis, gained a first class in classical moderations (1865) and the Gaisford prize for Greek verse (1865), but narrowly missed the Hertford scholarship and a first class in literae humaniores. In 1868 he was elected fellow of Wadham College, where he remained for three years as a lecturer; and here also he wrote and published his first poem, The Puritans (1869), a short drama intentionally reminiscent of the Persae of Aeschylus.

From 1871 to 1891 Myers lived in London, where he was called to the bar (1874) but never practised. During these years he published his prose translations of Pindar's Odes (1874) and of the last eight books of the Iliad (with Andrew Lang and Walter Leaf, 1882); some essays in magazines, and one, on Aeschylus, in the collection entitled Hellenica, edited by Evelyn Abbott (1880); an introduction to his selection of prose passages by Milton (‘Parchment series’, 1884); a short biography of Viscount Althorp (1890), whose services in connexion with the Reform Act of 1832 he thought to be insufficiently recognized; and three volumes of verse, Poems (1877), The Defence of Rome (1880), and The Judgement of Prometheus (1886), the last two containing also ‘other poems’.

Myers's activities, however, during his life in London were not confined to literature. From 1876 for nearly six years he acted as secretary to the London Society for the Extension of University Teaching. He was on the council of the Hellenic Society from its foundation in 1879. Later, after abandoning the idea of parliamentary life, he worked for the Charity Organization Society, serving on its central administrative committee until he left London.  403