Buttons is surprised there has not been a response to the lawyer question. On vacation or working on the Treasure Hunt? Feedback appreciated.
4 Replies to “Everyone on Vacation?”
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For me, I’m working on the doctors in the Canon still (I’ll send you my notes in a week or so); I’d like to hear Dash’s results from the NYC library on the honeydew question (I think that would make an interesting paper if we get enough information); I’m also giving serious thought to a “Laughing Doctor” paper (thanks to Faith, I’ve started work on it). I could have tossed off a few names (John Hector McFarlane, Godfrey Norton), but I didn’t want to give a half-heart response (again).
As to the Treasure Hunt, it ascends to such rarefied heights of pure complexity that it is beyond my ken. I look forward to reading the answers.
Pippin, I haven’t gotten to the NYPL yet, but hope to soon. I’m finishing a paper on Watson’s personal effects at Baker Street, a follow-up to a Quiz question; I note you and Roxy for input in the byline. Have been out of town preoccupied with family matters lately, but now have time to write again.
I hope the family matters were of the pleasant variety. No hurry on the honeydew. I did have one further query to put to the NYPL: what type of tobacco products were in cardboard boxes instead of tins? I see tobacco tins from the Victorian/Edwardian era online. Cardboard boxes, not so much. Was a certain type of tobacco more likely to be sold in a box? Cigarettes as opposed to pipe tobacco? Was freshness a consideration in the choice or affordability? If it was 1888, answers to such questions would be common knowledge. Now I feel like a mediocre archeologist trying to make heads-or-tails of the singular contents of an ancient British barrow
Hello, Pippin,
Good question! I expect the cardboard boxes were bulk supplies, and not the best tobacco. You probably don’t see these because they were thrown out, or just self-destructed after a while, unlike the tin containers, which had durability and usefulness (the same reasons I save Altoids boxes, I guess). Take a look on eBay, under “Belle of Virginia” and even Honeydew Tobacco, and you’ll see a couple repro labels which were likely used on these boxes.