Book excerpt: Cigar-bands have sdorned cigars for more than 150 years. Until World War I they were produced and printed to the hightest quality using the best methods available, with the result that many cigar-bands of the time are genuine works of art. Images depicted on the bands are varied, but specific themes may be distinguished – flowers and foliage, for example, or heraldic ‘charges’, or of course portraits of contemporary rulers and celebrities. This book features nearly 1,800 cigar-bands drawn from the collection of Roger van Reeth, including some of the most beautiful, some of the rarest and some of the oldest. Their presence adds something special to what is already a special publication: the Flavour, perhaps, of a superb Havana cigar.