A FINE GEORGE II SCARLET JAPANNED QUARTER-CHIMING EIGHT-DAY LONGCASE CLOCK William Webster, London circa 1740 The substantial six pillar triple train movement with plates measuring 8.25 by 7.5 inches, anchor escapement regulated by seconds pendulum, chiming the quarters on a graduated nest of eight bells and sounding the hour on a further larger bell, the 13 inch brass break-arch dial with subsidiary seconds dial, high position calendar aperture and recessed shaped signature plate engraved William Webster, Exchange Alley, LONDON to the finely matted centre within applied silvered Roman numeral chapter ring incorporating Arabic five minutes to outer track, with scroll pierced steel hands and mask centred scroll cast spandrels to angles, the arch with subsidiary Strike/Silent selection dial flanked by dolphin and foliate scroll cast mounts, the scarlet-red japanned case with shaped floral panel and trellis decorated break-arch cavetto cornice and scroll-pierced gilt blind fretwork frieze over conforming alternating gilt floral trail and trellis band decorated hinged glazed dial aperture flanked by free-standing brass stop-fluted columns to front angles, the sides with break-arch windows and conforming quarter columns set against bargeboards at the rear, the trunk with grotesque floral trail and lattice panel painted throat over 'block-top' break-arch door decorated in raised polychrome and gilt with oriental figures within a stylised garden terrace landscape with pagodas, the surround with figural panel decorated upper quadrants and geometric trellis panel banded borders, the sides with panels painted with figures in oriental dress, the plinth base with raised shaped panel decorated with another garden landscape with figures to the foreground within conforming shaped gilt-painted panels to quadrants, on moulded double skirt and now raised on carved lions paw feet with leafy apron between. 229cm (90ins) high excluding later feet, 59cm (23ins) wide, 29cm (11.5ins) deep. Provenance: Formerly the property of the Swedish naval officer Carl Bertil Lilliehöök (1809-90). Lilliehöök participated in the large 1838-40 French Arctic expedition aboard the ship La Recherche. This was the first real scientific polar expedition which went to Northern Norway, but also Spetsbergen, which at this time was still a practically unknown and relatively uncharted area. Carl Bertil Lilliehöök later became head of Sweden's lighthouses, and as a pensioner first lived in Mariefred but then in Gränna, where he built a house that still remains along the Brahegatan. William Webster senior is recorded in Baillie, G.H. Watchmakers & Clockmakers of the World as apprenticed to Thomas Tompion and gaining his Freedom from The Clockmakers' Company in 1710, he initially worked as journeyman to Tompion later setting up business in Exchange Alley, London in 1711. Four days after Tompion's death on 20 November 1713 Webster placed a newspaper advertisement stating that he had worked for Tompion and was now working on his own at the Dial and Three Crowns in Exchange Alley. William Webster was elected to the position of Junior Warden in the Clockmakers Company in 1734 but died during his year in office on 13 August 1735. William Webster junior was apprenticed to his father in 1727 gaining his Freedom in 1734, he was appointed Master of the Clockmakers' Company in 1755. He was a fine maker who very much maintained his father's standards in his work.