AN IMPERIALLY INSCRIBED INKSTONE-SHAPED INK CAKEQIANLONG SIX-CHARACTER MARK IN A LINE AND OF THE PERIOD (1736-1795)The ink cake is moulded on one side with two five-clawed dragons emerging from crashing waves, all within an archaistic kui dragon border at the rim. The reverse is inscribed with an imperial poem dated to Qianlong cyclical gengyin year corresponding to 1770, followed by two leisure seals reading bide, paring to virtue’, and langrun, 'bright and lustrous’. The sides are inscribed with a Qianlong six-character mark and another five characters reading Suichu tang xang mo, ‘ink cake stoned in the Pursue One’s Original Ambition Hall’.6 11/16 in. (17 cm.) long, cloth box