GOBLET'S HISTORY

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XXV, Issue 186, 25 July 1935, Page 13

GOBLET'S HISTORY

Treasured for Generations The largesf sum ever given at auction for a glass goblet was paid at Christie’s, London, recently. Certainty £5BO seems a good deal to pay, especially for a glass that cost only 15/- • when auctioned 70 years ago. But the Royal Oak Goblet is no ordinary piece of glass. It was made in 1663 at the Duke of Buckingham’s glasshouse, and carved upon it is Charles the Second hiding in the Boscobel Oak which saved him from capture after defeat at Worcester. The king gave the goblet to Rouse, his friend and the Speaker in the Short Parliament. For generations it was treasured. Healths were drunk from it at christenings and marriages, and it was put on the table empty ut funerals. Then came careless days. It stood in an open cabinet on a marble-floored hall, exposed to a danger which duly came. Romping children knocked over the cabinet, nnd everything in it was smashed except the goblet. On another occasion it was left on a railway carriage rack merely wrapped in paper. By good luck no one flung a portmanteau on to it. It was lost at a loan exhibition. It was dropped. It was R finally included !b a country sale with

odds-and-ends of no value, and sold for 15/-. At that time nobody realised its identity, but it was soon recognised. The late Mr. Joseph Bles gave £450 for Charles the Second’s gift, and loaned it to the Victoria and Albert Museum. Now it belongs to Mr. Arthur Churchill. The glass has entered on a new phase in its long life. It is strange to think that it will outlast mighty ships like the Queen Mary and the huge blocks of offices that are now being built in London. It is so fragile, and they are so solid, yet they will grow old fashioned and men will scrap them, while this rare and delicate bit of glass will be kept safe forever.