拍品專文
The sofa writing-table, with hollowed Apollo lyre-scrolled pilasters embellished with flute inlay, has its top of fine figured mahogany ribbon-banded with Grecian black-figured rosewood; while lily-white pearls enrich the drawers Grecian black handles. The pilasters correspond to those of an Apollo library-chair pattern in Thomas Sheratons, Cabinet Encyclopaedia, 1803-6; while the ornament reflects the Grecian taste for black library furnishings promoted at the period by George IV, when furnishing his Carlton House mansion as Prince of Wales with the assistance of the Mount Street cabinet-makers Messrs Marsh and Tatham (H. Roberts, For the Kings Pleasure; The Furnishing and Decoration of George IVs Apartments at Windsor Castle, London, 2001, fig 338).