The design of this perfume burner corresponds almost exactly with one in Boulton and Fothergill's Pattern Book I, p. 171, illustrated in Nicholas Goodison, Ormolu: The Work of Matthew Boulton, London, 1974, pl. 161, no. 8. No entry corresponding to this model exists in either of the two Christie and Ansell's sales in 1771 and 1778. Goodison (op. cit., pp. 24-25) suggests that many perfume burners were bought simply as ornaments in view of the lack of literary or pictorial evidence for the custom. The simply represented yet another element of the early 1770's passion for the Antique. However, Mrs. Montagu did write to Boulton asking for the return of a silver perfume burner that the had lent him to examine "for my friends reproach me that I do not regale their noses with fine odours after entertaining their plates with soup and ragouts. The cassolettes used to make their entry with the dessert and chase away the smell of dinner" (op. cit., p. 25)