I was lucky enough to get to play with one of these yesterday. I met Michael Edelson (who's a really good guy, by the way) at a Christian Tobler seminar, and Mike brought his along. I pretty much agree with Joe's comments. It's a very nice blade: The hollow grinding is beautiful. Yes, there is a good amount of blade presence, but not in the hindering way. Rather, it's the "confidence" kind of blade presence. It's a sword that feels very natural in the cut, perhaps a little more so than the thrust. I only played with it for a couple minutes, but it's an incredibly nice sword.

I'd like to take this opporunity to apologize to all those who went to New York expecting to see the Earl at the Albion booth. I sort of got there early and ran off with it. :)

Despite Bill's kind words (thanks Bill!), I'm actually rather evil and snatched the Earl away before anyone could so much as look at it. Mine! Mine! :)

Since there's already a formal review of this sword on the way here (or I so believe from what I've read), I'll be taking some pics and doing an informal review / test soon, which I'll post here and on SFI. I'm just getting to know this sword, but so far I am thrilled with it.

On a side note, I had the opposite of Joe's experience with scabbards...I bought a campaign line scabbard from Albion for the Regent that arrived about a week before I bought the Earl...it fit the Regent but was very loose. I brought it with me to the NY custom knife show...just in case...and it fit the Earl perfectly. Fate...