I see them often on eBay, but somehow never snagged one. Imagine my joy when TAO shipped me one he’d had lying around in a drawer. (In the same package he also packed a bottle each of almond butter and cashew butter; to a girl who grew up thinking only peanuts could be pounded into butter, this was a culinary revelation.)
In the 1800s, dip pens with mother-of-pearl handles were all the rage. I find the slimness of the handle pleasingly disproportionate to the size of the nib slotted in on the other end. It makes me think of a toucan’s beak attached to a flamingo’s slender neck.
The pen came in a box covered with a velvet-like material. Someone impressed “Jane” (I think that’s what it says) into the cloth.
The box’s lining is ink-stained, as it should be.
The nib says “Ferris & Willis” and “No. 3.”
Every pen affects the way you write. This one, because of its slim handle, forces me to loosen my grip and hold the pen closer to the nib than usual.
The ink is Noodler’s Judicial Black. It’s a substantial ink, almost like India ink in the way it latches on to the nib and sparingly flows to the tip. Discovering the rhythm of dip, write, dip, write with pens like this takes time, but fortunately for the impatient, not much.
