I can remeber sucking cane in my youth. It was candy in the form of a cane and wikipedia can confirm this:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Candy_cane 

This should solve the riddle.

Wendelinus


> miki pfeffer <[log in to unmask]> hat am 15.07.2023 18:02 CEST geschrieben:
> 
>  
> If one makes a walking stick of a sugar cane stalk, sucking the head would
> be nicely doable and a sweet treat. Miki
> 
> On Sat, Jul 15, 2023 at 9:57 AM <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> 
> > Only a guess but I read "cane" as "sugar cane" and "cane heads" as some
> > sort of candy.  But I think it more likely that cane means walking stick.
> > Dweebish sorts of fellows are often described in older literature as
> > sitting and sucking the heads of their canes as a baby does its pacifier.
> >
> > I don't remember the context here, but the latter seems to fit the case.
> >
> > Carl
> >
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Mark Twain Forum <[log in to unmask]> On Behalf Of ben
> > Sent: Saturday, July 15, 2023 10:02 AM
> > To: [log in to unmask]
> > Subject: sucking cne heads
> >
> > I'm reading The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, in chapter 5 it read "...for
> > they had stood in the vestibule sucking their cane heads, a circling wall
> > of oiled and simpering admirers...", I don't quite understand what the
> > young men are doing, is "sucking their cane heads " a metaphor? Can someone
> > explain it?
> > Tks
> >
> 
> 
> -- 
> Miki Pfeffer, Ph D
> *A** New Orlean**s Author i**n Mark Twain's Court: *
> *Letters from Grace King's New England Sojourns   *
> (LSU Press, 2019)
> *Southern Ladies and Suffragists: Julia Ward Howe and Women's Rights at the
> 1884 New Orleans World's Fair   *(University Press of Mississippi, 2014)