THE GOLDEN CLOCK.

Sun (Christchurch), Volume I, Issue 163, 15 August 1914, Page 3

THE GOLDEN CLOCK.

A GEM-STUDDED TIMEPIECE. A large golden clock stood on the solicitors' table in Mr Justice Scrutton's court (Loudon), the object of a special jury's admiration, comments an. English journal. It was studded, the jury was told, •with over a thousand real aquamarines and over nine hundred real amethysts.

It was made bv a Brighton mau as part of a golden suite of drawing-room furniture, of which the chairs and tables were also jewel-studded. Clock and furniture were bought bj Mr H. H. Payne, au antique dealer, of Victoria Street, at auction for £l5O. It was admired by one of Mr Payne's customers, a Miss King, now Mrs Coloniia, and, according to Mr Payne, he «old it to her for £SOO.

Miss King returned it after it was delivered, and her version of the transaction is that she had it on approval. She is now declining to pay the £SOO that Mr Payne claims. A £3OOO Suite. Mr Payne gave some enthusiastic evidence about the clock. Its maker, he said, had asked £.'5000 for it and the furniture, but he had refused to give this. When the maker died he bought it at auction for £l5O. Fortunately for him there were not many people at the sale, and these didn't know that the stones were real. "I told Miss King it would cost £IOOO to make," said Mr Payne, "and I say so now." . When Mr Duke, K. 0., cross-examined, Mr Payne gaVe some sharp answers. One of them was: — "Don't tell me what my wife told me, because you don't know. Let me tell you what my wife told me." The judge asked Mr Payne "to keep his temper even though the weather was so hot." i Mr Payne denied that the clock could be made for £l5O. It had stoics in it worth £SO apiece, he declared. A Lost Chance. Mrs Payne gave evidence about what happened when Miss King is said to have ordered the clock. Miss King said, "I must have it—it looks so beautiful.'' An expert from Hatton Garden said that the acquamarines were worth £:!.'!4 and the"other stones £156. The total value of the clock apart from the gilding was estimated by the witness at £6(57 12/3.

. Mr F. W. Weller, the son of the jeweller who made the clock, said that it took his father over 20 years to make it. He got the stones from various dealers.

The witness remembered someone offering £2OOO for the clock and furniture. Unfortunately his father was out, and ''the gentleman didn't come back any more." (Laughter.)

Mrs Cynthia Rosamond Colonna, the defendant, said in her evidence that Mr Payne had told her often that he would take back anything that she found she did not like. ITe said that he would not sell her anything that was wrong.