Came across this:
Can’t quite see how it will work with equal spaced one size fits all holes and the lower end closed but maybe it was meant to hang off your belt or something like that and unscrew the end before use. Too high a price on it (especially once postage added) to chance it just to satisfy my curiosity.
It looks like a bottle opener. Might be just the thing.
I had the same thought.
It had occurred to me too, I must admit. But it makes the whole whistle part obsolete doesn’t it?
C’mon, Mr.Gumby. Buy it. You know you want to. 
If you don’t want to buy it, where is it being sold. Someone else may decide it’s a treasure (or buy it just to easy your curiosity).
Best wishes.
Steve
Slide whistle of some type? Maybe an industrial whistle - steam, locomotive?
They’re all over Ebay.
I saw one in the flesh as it were. On that one, the whistle part didn’t connect with the tone holes — it was just a piece of solid brass.
Makes a noise! I don’t know if it’s playing right.
That’s reassuring…
Its pretty.
If the bottom end is permanently closed, it might be played ocarina-style. By this I mean that one or two fingers could be lifted at a time, with most holes kept covered.
I think something that odd needs to be hanging on the wall in a pub, so people can have a contest: you buy a “yard of ale” or a pint of premium ale, and you can have the beer free if you can figure out how to drink their beer in under 1 minute, using that contraption. Judges will be other patrons, who give the thumbs up or down. Laugh’s-a-plenty!
Speaking of instruments with strange round metal things on the bottom…
I’m still thinking it’s a bottle opener/ocarina
Bottle opener deifinitely but I don’t think working cylindrical ocarinas exist or are possible at all.
Stupid laws of physics!
Here’s a clip that demonstrates the bulbous bell a little more.
https://youtu.be/cjbWhCFbjIA