This is a great little piece! It is an original slightly post Civil War pencil eraser. You often see these listed as a surgeon's scalpel but what they really were used for is for writing. At that time they didn't have erasers like we know them today. Instead when they made a mistake they would take a scraper like this and scrape off the ink or pencil on the paper. What makes this one stand out is the original gutta percha handle intact with a pretty tone all over. At the base of the blade we have the maker's Mark of the J. Rodgers of Sheffield, England. Since it has the England Mark below Sheffield we know it was made after the Civil War but it didn't miss it by much. The overall length of the scraper is 6-1/8th inches with the blade making up 2-1/4th of those inches. This is a great post Civil War era ink scraper.