8-keyed Nicholson’s Improved cocus wood flute made by flute maker Thomas Prowse, Hanway Street, London, circa 1840. The maker’s stamp is vague but legible. The stamped number on the flute is 3570.
Nice looking flute:
http://cgi.ebay.com/Antique-8-keyed-wooden-flute-T-Prowse-London-/180615521980?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item2a0d8626bc
Item number: 180615521980
Item location: Portland, OR, United States
Hmm… I wonder who did the restoration work. The embouchure has a reddish insert in it that’s interesting, as is the lip plate. Nice looking flute.
I saw that one earlier as well, but was put off by the changes to the head, though the rest looks great. I find the partial lip plate not particularly attractive and would have the same concerns you do about an undisclosed repair individual cutting a new embochure (from all accounts one of the key elements in a flute’s “voice”). Might be a fantastic player, but that can’t be determined from an e-bay ad. Looks like there is plenty of interest though, wonder what the reserve is?
Peter Noy is in Seattle, the flute is in Portland…
Someone might want to ask about who did the work.
have I missed something in the listing or somewhere, but that headpiece does not appear at all original to Prowse’s work.
Is that a Noy replacement head?
Anybody else notice that this is NOT an 8 key flute? I remember reading somewhere that Nicholson did not like the long f there fore some Nicholson designed flutes have 7 keys and are missing the long f. This is the case with this flute but the seller claims it is an 8 key flute even though it is clearly a 7 key flute by looking at the pictures.
read 
I just sent the question. we’ll see what he says.
Also, Avery is correct, I don’t see a long F either. I asked about that as well in my message.
Is that a Noy replacement head?
The description says that the head has a repaired crack, so maybe it is original…?
On my screen, the head clearly has pins holding a repaired crack together. You can see them very clearly. The silver lip plate looks odd for the time though, doesn’t it? I mean, in that style. Could that have been added later? Plus, the insert does look like it might be new. Even so, it looks a beautiful flute. If money were no … non, no, stop it … but one more couldn’t hurt, could it?
No!!!
[Fortunately, impecuniosity deriving from previous over-indulgence in sibilant pulchritude will prove my saviour in this case.]
“Sibilant”? 
At least you didn’t write “pneumatic”, though “air-filled” would be more accurate than “hissy”!
And you’d better keep your saviour in the right case!
It’s not easy finding synonyms for “flutelike” y’know.
Save your sibilant synonyms for the silly season, sir! 
I bet “your”, “for” and “the” were disappointments …
they were for me
“Oh no, Anita, no!”
Sondheim
If it’s the same flute I was looking at, to me it looks like someone did a cast bore treatment on this flute similar in appearance anyway to the Revoil (sp) flutes. The tone holes also look similar in appearance to the embouchure if you look closely. Whatever was done I’m curious to know, but I would run not walk from this flute since there seems to be a lack of full disclosure.
It looks like it could be a nice flute. Surely the plate was added within recent times and the bushing as well. Old pin repair. Seller seems clueless, look at the shipping price. No, on second thought and further digital analysis, the flute appears to be complete sCrap. Noy is the closest culprit. Kinda not real elliptical cut.
Actually, it was Nicholson who didn’t like the Long-F key. Prowse (the elder, not the younger whose work this is) was merely the constructor using Nicholson’s name (at his agreement of course). Nicholson also hated pewter plugs as being too noisy.
I still say this is a replacement head and not at all original. Prowse headpieces were thinned at the embouchure, sort of like an hour-glass-like shaping. This one is tapered, as if a parabolic like the inside of a Boehm headpiece. And if it were with original lip plate, it would not be squared as this one is. Many were inlaid oval plates or simply, as many Rudalls, a band around the embouchure area.
And the embochure insert appears to be the resin that Noy favors, not the ivory or mother of pearl that Prowse would have used.