CONFESSIONS OF A DEALER.

Hokitika Guardian, 2 January 1925, Page 4

CONFESSIONS OF A DEALER.

LONDON, Nov. 7. “Confessions of ;i Dealer,” just published. is the far too deprecating title under which Mr Thomas Rohan, a genuine artist in the antique, sets forth the pleasant story of his life-long quest —never primarily common hi!—of beauty and fine craftsmanship. Of course a good many people, knowingly or—not, have met Mr Rohan before—in Mr Vachell’s novel. “Qninncy’s.” In particular, his judgment of old glass is very highly regarded. Our heritage of old and beautiful things, though never more appreciated than now. is, Mr Rohan points out, likely to pass from us under this present stress of heavy taxation and high cost of living. The old owners cannot afford to keep their “antiques,” - and the well-lined American purse is making something like a clearance. I predict (Mr Rohan says) that within a century it. will he difficult to find a genuine piece of furniture of the sixteenth. seventeenth or eighteenth centuries in any private houses except those of the very rich. And where those “very rich” must he looked for he indicates in a second prediction : I foresee a time when the rich man in England will have to cross the Atlantic if he wants to buy any old English furniture in oak, walnut, or mahogany. lie mentions that thirty tons of old beams, doors, etc., which he had sold to an American were shipped and lost —in the Titanic. As showing the way a Ring working the Knock-Out among themselves—after the sale—keep down prices, he says that Lii his early days, when £SO was about his bank - balance. “1 made a hold hid for a. wonderful Chippendale carved screen, with a large panel of petitpoint. T went up to £10.” It fell to the member of the Ring deputed to hid for CI2.

Tor example, the screen was knocked down for £!l J ' in the Ring it won! tn£3o(), which the dealers would tell the private buyer that it cost .CRT-' and would base his demand for a profit on that sum. No one has explained the complications of the Knock-Out scandal more clearly than Mr Rohan in this hook, and. having always- refused to join a Ring, he could do so without any interest exeent that of the fair dealer, who wants to see lair play all round—even for the seller. In the furniture sales at Christie's there are now few, if any, activities of the Ring, hut in’London sales of pictures. the Ring is busy and the Krioci.Out still rules. Where the conspirators make their money is at country sales, and T am sure that there has been no considerable sale of countryhouse furniture for many years. in which iirices have not been deliberately depressed by those highwaymen of civilisation.