Portrait of Smoking Man, Fine 19th C. John Henry Sylvester British Watercolor Drawing documentary photograph About as pure and poignant

About as pure and poignant as it gets

I've had a couple of old climbing toys of this manner in the shop

I believe there may be something carved in the bottom but I can't make it out if so

They are in great condition

this one's in very good shape

Portrait of Smoking Man, Fine 19th C. John Henry Sylvester British Watercolor Drawing documentary photograph About as pure and poignantA terrific late 19th c. watercolor portrait, of a manner that makes me think of Manet or John Singer Sargent, etc, with an equivalent sort of confidence and sense of ease about it. It appears to be signed John Henry Sylvester at the bottom and dated what looks to be 1896 (?) which points perhaps to the British artist of the same name, active in the last few decades of the 19th c. and by whom there is one portrait in the National Portrait Gallery in