Page:Notes and Queries - Series 12 - Volume 8.djvu/97

 i2s.vm.jAK.22 f io2i.] NOTES AND QUERIES. 77 -capable of handling books properly. Hence I have no desire to advertise nay own fairly -large collection of Yorkshire books. In addition to the collection in York Minster Library mentioned by ST. SWITHIN, DR. ROWE may like to know that the Wake- field Public Library has a large collection of local works. If my memory serves me correctly, these were once the property of Charles Skidmore, Esq., who had its con- tents catalogued by the late C. A. Federer. This catalogue, privately printed, is an extremely useful guide. Mr. W. T. Free- mantle's ' Bibliography of Sheffield Books ' may also be mentioned here, it is a model of what such a work should be, and it is to be hoped that we may see It completed, for as yet it only comes down to the year 1700. E. G. B. If I remember aright on the decease of Robert Davies, Esq., F.S.A. (a former Town Clerk of York) many valuable books and pamphlets relating to Yorkshire, from his collection, went to enrich the Minster Library^ T. SEYMOUR. Newton Road, Oxford. EARLY ASCENT OF MONT BLANC (12 S. viii. 30). Henry Humphrey Jackson, who made the thirteenth successful ascent of Mont Blanc, Sept. 4, 1823, was the only son of Henry Jackson of Lewes, Sussex. He was born Feb. 5, 1801, and was admitted to Westminster School, Jan. 10, 1815, where he remained until April, 1819. He matriculated at Oxford from Exeter Coll., June 2, 1819, but appears to have never resided there. I should be glad to ascertain the date of his death. G. F. R. B. It seems not unlikely that the eleventh of Mr. Montagnier's series was John Dunn Gardner, born July 20, 1811, died Jan. 11, 1903. He was educated at Westminster, and was M.P. for Bodkin, 1841-6. He died J.P. for the Isle of Ely, and D.L. for Cam- bridgeshire. He married: (1) 1847, Mary, dau. of Andrew Lawson, late M.P., of The Hall, Boroughbridge, Yorks ; and (2) 1853, Ada, dau. of William Pigott, of Dullingham House, Cambridgeshire. HARMATOPEGOS THE GREEN MAN : ASHBOURNE (12 S. viii. 29). I remember visiting this old country town and remarking what I believe is a unique feature. There is a strange local custom of plavinoj football there in the main ^street at certain fixed periods. In this sport all the natives old and young participate. I fancy the sign then gets badly used. What I wish to know is this, why was the house called The Green Man ? There are other "publics" of like nomenclature, for example, Leytonstone and Winchmore Hill, Neither of those taverns have any painted figures. M. L. R. BRESLAR. Percy House, Well Street, S. Hackney, E.9. CHARLES PYE, ENGRAVER (12 S. viii. 10). Charles Pye (not G. Pye) was born in Birmingham in 1777. He was apprenticed to James Heath, the celebrated engraver. He published a very interesting ' Description of Modern Birmingham, made in an Excur- sion round the Town in 1818.' In 1808 William Hamper the antiquary writes :- " Charles Pye the engraver has returned to Birmingham. He is m.uch improved (witness his plate of Malmesbury Cross in Britten's ' Anti- quities '), and is certainly an able artist. He has made drawings of the Birmingham Priory and Deritend Guild Seals, and will engrave them for me, and as he intends to follow the profession of a draughtsman (for which he is well fitted), in preference to an engraver, J shall find him very useful about Aston Church, its interesting monu- ments, &c." On Apr. 1, 1852, Pye writes from London to a friend : " Although my sight still continues very bad, I have managed to put together the coins I promised, and have sent them to you by rail addressed to the Stamp Office." He gives particulars, and says he still has the copper-plates cf the octavo edition and would be glad to sell them, but those of the quarto edition he has sold to Sir George Chetwynd, who, he believes, has " left them, together with the coins they illus- trated to trustee?, and having omitted to mention the subject or intention of the trust, the coins, &c., have been packed in a box, and will now be deposited in the cellars of his former bankers here ; where I suppose they will remain unseen and unknown until some future Sir George may feel sufficient interest in the matter to bring them to light again." The writer of the letter containing the above details (signed " J. M., 53 Gough Road, Birmingham ") hopes that the coins may be found. He says he has a small statuette of Pye, and speaks of a private token issued by the latter as a beautiful example of the die-sinker's art. Charles Pye had a younger brother John, who was a far more famous engraver than himself. He was a well-known man, and energetically advocated the admission of engravers to the honours of the Royal Academy. The particulars of his life will