Show A LONDON CURIOSITY the tobacco flox of st abor birti Pitr lili jn 1713 one and ono years ago a certain henry a genial soul took homo with him from st Bartholo mews fair a horn tobacco box for which ho had paid tho sum of four pence this wag one of alio forty overseers of the parish of st margarets westminster aud it is not difficult to picture him a full bodied jovial good fellow fond of his pipe and glass so the happy thought occurred to him to present it to his thirty nine colleagues and year after year it was produced at their meetings well filled tho choicest and most fragrant leaves of the tobacco plant forty overseers relaxing after w u over cacci pulling from a long church warden must leavo been a goodly it docs occur to one that the tobacco box which ia about two inches square must have had somo of the properties of tho widows cruso if the ghost of alio llio genial ever walks alio earth and looks in on the con M kiil of liia brethren in tho acar of our 1881 the custom now Is to ico alio box twice a year he would feel highly and perhaps a surprised at the growth of his gift for to put it plainly what could once bo canica to tho meeting in his breeches pocket is now a goodly burden for a four wheeled cab and even then it is said the driver asks for 0 double fare at tirel a modest silver rini with moncks bamo inscribed thereon was placed around tho old box and year after year it became the custom to record on a silver plate or a silver band alic im Nr tant event of the year sometimes national sometimes purely local sometimes an device limas a portrait of the hero of the hour then n dainty tobacco stopper of mother of allach cd by a silver chain to alic box was added time rolled on vestryman vestrymen vestry men were born vestryman vestrymen vestry men were laid quietly in their graves and a velvet lined silver caan was added in which reposed alio original now a coruscation of sah or ornaments richly chased and embossed then another and and now aliis singular trophy consists of distinct parts cacci fitting into tho liko alio llio pieces of a japanese puzzle of these one is biorn four are silver and two of oak the last one it is estimated will cover a period of eighty or ninety years alio earlier plates and various inscriptions are most exquisitely engraved in later days alic art seem to have been lost lu tho second cao ca o the famous who oddly enough was a churchwarden church warden of st margarets in 1759 squints up at one from the bottom of lie box then we have a medallion of georgo III an altarpiece altar piece an engraving of the overseers administering 0 oihi door westminster abbey m engraving garth lidded navala engage nien ts ruch a sila i t and other fatuous iho queen and tho members of her family figuro prom m later days and one of ho last plates is an engraving of air belts statue of lord but in tho small space at our disposal it would bo impossible to give even a catalo bic of alio curious records here to be found As we have said it is produced twice a year to alio body of assembled and during his one of them is responsible for its safe custody this box so runs the cli arge and the several cases arc alic properly of the past overseers society and delivered into all y an care pa condition that they aro produced at nil parochial which you shall be in macd to and shall contain pipes of tobacco at least under tho penalty of b 0 cinc clarca ia tho i but no instance is recorded of a failure to obey tho draconian law once or twice indeed the relic 1 been rodco w its i ys aiom a thief a second timi from a rp calci rant and angry vestryman in it would not down for much As a curiosity it is to be cliar SH i fill jiuu |