Marks Antiques Mayfair, London A GEORGE III SILVER 'JOLLY BOAT' DOUBLE WINE TROLLEY JOHN EMES, LONDON, 1797 In the form of a clinker-built rowing boat on four revolving six-spoke wheels, complete with two circular bottle depressions, two circular stopper depressions and a ropework ring, engraved with a crest (Coock) and coat-of-arms (probably Hamelyn impailing another) within a scrolling foliage cartouche, the bow engraved: 'THE JOLLY BOAT', the underside inscribed at a later date Length 31.7 cm, 12 1 / 2 in previous / home

John Emes The jolly boat, a regular ship's small attendant all-purpose vessel, inspired the designs of a number of distinctive and attractive double wine trolleys in silver and other materials, the majority of which date from the late 18th and early 19th Centuries. Michael Clayton (The Collector's Dictionary of the Silver and Gold of Great Britain and North America, Country Life, London, 1971, pp. 163 and 165) mentions a silver-mounted red lacquer example without wheels, London, 1801, in the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich; a silver pair, also without wheels, John Scofield, London, 1793; and another silver pair (more in the form of a frigate hull than a jolly boat), London, 1821, formerly in the collection of Lord Fairhaven. A single jolly boat silver double wine coaster without wheels, Richard Cooke, London, 1800, engraved with the crest of Archibald, 9th Duke of Hamilton (1740-1819), was sold by Marks Antiques in 2005. A further pair of silver jolly boat silver coasters on wheels, William Burwash, London, 1813, was sold at Christie's, Geneva, on 27 April 1976, lot 201. The later inscription reads: 'Presented to / F.W. Bellamy, Esq: / Chairman of the Association of Public Wharfingers of the Port of London / and a Member of the Port of London Authority by his fellow Wharfingers / in appreciation of his services during the / General Strike. May, 1926.'