Plate, 9 inches diameter. Brown transfer with blue clobbering on molded rim. Impressed maker's mark for Pinder, Bourne & Co. The impressed "4/77" indicates a manufacture date of April 1877. This unnamed pattern is part of an undocumented series made by the firm featuring images of children in various settings partaking in various activities. Here a child at the top of stone stairs next to a house with a smoking chimney, seems to be standing guard with a small dog next to him. The border consists of a molded basketweave pattern painted in blue.

The partners were Thomas Shadford Pinder and Joseph Harvey Bourne. Thomas Pinder had previously operated from the Swan Bank Works from 1848 and the Fountain Place Works from c. 1852. In 1851 he was joined by two partners and they operated as Pinder, Bourne and Hope (Thomas Pinder, Joseph Harvey Bourne, and John Hope). In 1860 they moved to the already existing Nile Street Works. In 1862 Mr. Hope left the partnership and stayed at the Fountain Place Works - the Nile street works continued as Pinder, Bourne & Co. At some time, Joseph Bourne left the business. The '& Co.' were John Harris and Ernest Joban Berg. In 1877 notice for liquidation by arrangement was made by Thomas Shadford Pinder, John Harris, and Ernest Joban Berg, co-partners of Pinder, Bourne & Co. In 1877 Henry Doulton, of the Lambeth (London) pottery company Doulton & Co., was approached by Pinder, proposing he become a partner in the firm of Pinder, Bourne and Co. for an outlay of £12,000, but the money was unwisely spent and differences of opinion caused such a rift between the two concerns that only arbitration could resolve the matter. Pinder retired and Henry Doulton continued with the business. The name of Pinder, Bourne & Co. continued to be used until 1882 when it became Doulton & Co. Ltd.