Annual Report of the Council. 



XXXV 



He composed some very creditable poems, and the late 

 Dr. E. Watson and Mr. T. Darman Ward assisted and collabo- 

 rated in setting some of his verses to music. 



During the 50 years he resided in Stockport, he associated 

 himself with various movements of an educational, philanthropic 

 and social character. He found pleasure and delight in helping 

 others unostentatiously and by stealth, from the large fortune 

 which he accumulated through his genius and enterprise. 



He aided promising students by enabling them to obtain 

 University education : there is scarcely an institution in the 

 town which has not benefited by his generosity, and many large 

 gifts which were announced as anonymous were known by a few 

 to have come from him. 



Two institutions specially received his support — the Stock- 

 port Infirmary (of which he was Chairman at the time of his 

 death) and the Technical School (of which he was one of the 

 Committee who founded it at a cost of ^18,000), to which he 

 largely contributed. He remained a member of the Committee, 

 and during his Mayorality he laid the foundation stone of an 

 extension of the same building. 



He discovered and presented the original "Grafton Portrait 

 of Shakespeare " to the Rylands Library, 



In 191 2 he was unanimously elected Mayor of Stockport, 

 with his grand-daughter, Hilda Winifred Kay (who was in her 

 seventeenth year) as Mayoress. Till then he had taken no part 

 in municipal work. 



During his Mayorality his hospitality was shared by a large 

 number of people, including the school children and the Cor- 

 poration employees. 



He acted as Honorary Treasurer in raising ;£ 10,000 for the 

 King Edward VII. Memorial, and he himself contributed largely 

 to the fund. 



In 1902 he founded that splendid educational institution 

 the Maia Choir and Classes, which has been the means of 

 spreading a love of good music in hundreds of homes in 



