NovEMBER 1, 1918] 
by one of his first pupils, W. J. Pope, who is 
now professor of chemistry at Cambridge. 
One of his adventures during the period of 
his assistantship at the British Museum was 
an attempt (in 1888) to make a balloon voyage 
to Vienna in company with Simmons, a well- 
known aeronaut, and a gentleman named 
Field. On approaching the coast of Essex it 
was thought prudent to descend, as the wind 
was in a too-northerly direction. The balloon, 
which was a very large one, was safely an- 
chored to a tree. and the occupants of the car 
fell about sixty feet. Simmons was killed and 
Field had both legs broken. Miers, although 
severely bruised, sustained no permanent in- 
jury. 
In 1895 a letter which he wrote to Sir Wil- 
liam Ramsay, immediately after the meeting 
of the Royal Society at which Ramsay and 
Rayleigh announced the discovery of argon, 
advising him to examine the mineral cleveite 
for compounds of argon, led to the unexpected 
discovery of helium. 
In the same year Miers gave some lectures 
for Story-Maskelyne at Oxford, and in 1896 
succeeded him, on his retirement as Waynflete 
professor of mineralogy, becoming thereby a 
fellow of Magdalen College, where he lived 
for the next twelve years. 
At Oxford he created a department of min- 
eralogy, developed a small school of research, 
and published a number of papers of which 
the more important (mostly in conjunction 
with Miss F. Isaac) related to spontaneous 
erystallization. Among his other pupils were 
Dr. Herbert Smith, of the British Museum, 
Dr. H. L. Bowman, who succeeded him as pro- 
fessor, Mr. T. V. Barker, now university 
lecturer in crystallography, the Earl of Berke- 
ley and his scientific colleague, Mr. E. G. 
Hartley. In 1902 he published a text-book on 
mineralogy which has been much used in the 
United States, 
He took a considerable share in the admin- 
istration of the university, and was a member 
of the Hebdomadal Council and a delegate of 
the University Press. In 1902 he succeded 
the late Sir E. B. Tylor, the anthropologist, 
as secretary of the University Museum, be- 
SCIENCE 
435 
coming thus responsible for its administration. 
In 1908 he became principal of the Univer- 
sity of London, in succession to the late Sir 
Arthur Riicker. During the greater part of 
his period of office the Royal Commission on 
University Education in London was taking 
evidence, and its report, recommending a 
large scheme of reconstitution, was only pub- 
lished in 1913. 
Among the many activities of the univer- 
sity he associated himself especially with the 
tutorial classes for working people, with whom 
his ready speech and never-failing humor 
made him exceedingly popular. His lectures 
at the Working Men’s College, which was 
founded some seventy years ago by Maurice, 
Tom Hughes (the author of “Tom Brown’s 
Schooldays”) Furnivall and Westlake, were 
events to be remembered. He also tried to 
gather up the scattered units of the very com- 
plicated University of London, such, for ex- 
ample, as the College of Household and Social 
Science for Women, the Officers Training 
Corps, and the University Club. 
He assisted Mr. Albert Kahn to establish his 
British Traveling Fellowships, and instituted 
a board of trustees, of which he became a 
member and secretary, consisting of the Lord 
Chancellor, the speaker, the Lord Chief Jus- 
tice with Lords Curzon and Milner as coopted 
members. Most of the American Kahn Travel- 
ing Fellows visited him in London at the 
commencement of their journey. 
He was mainly instrumental in bringing 
about the Congress of the Universities of the 
British Empire, which met in 1912, and was to 
have met again in five years. This was pre- 
vented by the war, but the universities bureau 
has come into existence as the result of the 
Congress and will organize the next Congress 
when the opportunity arises. 
In 1915 it was clear that the war would pre- 
vent any immediate reoganization of the Uni- 
versity of London, and Miers therefore ac- 
cepted the invitation of the University of 
Manchester to become its vice-chancellor. In 
Manchester he is already associated with many 
educational and civie activities outside the 
university; he is chairman of the Joint Matric- 
