multicoluored objects

how do i make oblects multicoloured when they are all part of the same mesh.

for example the other day i made a pencil but i couldn’t just select the verticies in the area where i wanted to make grey for the lead

sorry if ive not explained very well

Try this:
http://10secondclub.org/users/juicy/mid_tute104.html

In this tutorial a hammer (a single mesh) is given different materials and textures.