Sampson Mordan like many companies produced porte crayon pencils. Typically, a porte crayon pencil was designed to hold solid plugs of graphite in both ends of the device. Sliding circular compression rings tighten and hold the plugs in place for writing. This pencil is a bit unique in that it was designed to use wooden pencil inserts rather than the typical plugs of graphite.  Circa 1879-1909. The piece is almost exactly 4 inches in length without the wooden inserts.