GUEST: I brought a cup
that I had purchased
about 50 years ago in an
antique shop in Georgetown,

District of Columbia. It was
a present for my soon-to-be
husband. I paid about $50. And

I was told it was Vietnamese.
It was the first antique
I ever bought, but I
knew my husband-to-be

was interested in antiques,
so... It just appealed to
me-- the artistic design, the

dragon handle. I just liked it.

APPRAISER: Well, what you've
brought today is a really
interesting and unusual example

of a Chinese export silver cup
by Leeching in Guangdong, in
Hong Kong. So this qualifies

as Qing Dynasty. The form
is very interesting in
that it's very atypical
of a form the Chinese

would have been making for
export to England or America.
And perhaps the form could have

indicated that this was made
for export to either the Turkish
market or the Russian market.

So this is just a very
odd vase-y form, then
with the attached dragon
handle. And you mentioned

the scene drew you to
it. And what we have here
is a very interesting
interior and exterior

scene, the interior showing
preparations for a feast, and
the exterior showing guests on

their way to the feast. The
manner of decoration is what we
call repoussé decoration. And

you can see, if I tilt
this and you look inside,
that the decoration was
done by punching the

metal out. And not only is it
decorated in the full round,
the silversmith marked his

work, putting hallmarks on
the bottom. And the "LC" is
for Leeching. Examples come up

from time to time on the
secondary auction market, and
can sometimes also be found in

retail silver shops. If this
were in a retail silver shop
today, I would expect them to

have a price of $2,500 on it.

GUEST: Oh, my goodness. Oh!
(laughing): I'm so surprised.
My goodness. Wonderful. Well,

I'm very pleased. My
husband was worth it and
I'll keep it. (laughs)

APPRAISER: Keep him.

GUEST: And him.
(laughs) Very good