This no-number Leverless looks to me to be one of the earliest, so it probably dates to about 1933. It’s a big pen: 13.5cm capped and a very long 17cm posted. These pens had quite a few price gradations and this one isn’t at the top of the scale, having only one narrow cap ring and a medium-sized No3 nib. It’s a serious and imposing pen, all the same. It has survived the passage of time well. There’s some fading of the black hard rubber cap top and turn-button.

The ridges that were once on the turn-button to make rotating it easier have worn down, and there’s quite a bit of plating loss and even pitting on the clip. The pattern on the cap and barrel is still there, though, and the barrel imprint is nice and clear.

It’s a superb writer, smooth and semi-flexible. It’s solid but not heavy, and even with that large cap, the balance in the hand is good. Though it perhaps holds a little less ink than a button-filler of the same size, you’ll still get several pages out of a fill with this pen, and when you do have to fill it, it’s easier than either a button-filler or a lever-filler. All your activity takes place at the end of the barrel, far away from that messy ink bottle.

These 1930s Leverless Swans, like Swan lever-fillers, have never been surpassed, whether for elegance, utility or durability.