"rappee," familiar in
snuff-taking days as the name for a coarse kind of snuff made from the
darker and ranker tobacco leaves. The list of prices and names given
by Wimble, a snuff-seller, about 1740, and printed in Fairholt's
"History of Tobacco," contains eighteen different kinds of
rappee--English, best English, fine English, high-flavoured coarse,
low, scented, composite, &c. The rasps for obtaining this _rape_,
continues Larwood, "were carried in the waistcoat pocket, and soon
became articles of luxury, being carved in ivory and variously
enriched. Some of them, in ivory and inlaid wood, may be seen at the
Hotel Cluny in Paris, and an engraving of such an object occurs in
'Archaeologia,' vol. xiii. One of the first snuff-boxes was the
so-called _rape_ or _grivoise_ box, at the back of which was a little
space for a piece of the root, whilst a small iron rasp was contained
in the middle. When a pinch was wanted, the root was drawn a few times
over the iron rasp, and so the snuff was produced and could be offered
to a friend with much more grace than under the above-mentioned
process with the pocket-grater."

The tobacconists' sign that for very many years was in most general
use was the figure of a highlander, which may still perhaps be found
in one or two places, but which was not at all an unusual sight in the
streets of London and other towns some forty or fifty years ago. Most
men of middle age can remember when the snuff-taking highlander was
the usual ornament to the entrance of a tobacconist's shop; but all
have disappeared from London streets save two--I say two on the
authority of Mr. E.V. Lucas, who gives it (in his "Wanderer in
London") as the number of the survivors; but only one is known to me.
This is the famous old wooden highlander which stood for more than a
hundred years on guard at a tobacconist's shop in Tottenham Court
Road. About the end of 1906 it was announced that the shop was to be
demolished, and that the time-worn figure was for sale. The
announcement created no small stir, and it was said that the offers
for the highlander ran up to a surprising figure. He was bought
ultimately by a neighbouring furnishing firm, and now stands on duty
not far from his ancient post, though no passer-by can help feeling
the incongruity between the time-honoured emblem of the snuff-taker
and his present surroundings of linoleum "and sich."

Where Mr. Lucas's second survivor may be is unknown to me. Not so