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+CHAPTER I. MR. SHERLOCK HOLMES.
+
+
+IN the year 1878 I took my degree of Doctor of Medicine of the
+University of London, and proceeded to Netley to go through the course
+prescribed for surgeons in the army. Having completed my studies there,
+I was duly attached to the Fifth Northumberland Fusiliers as Assistant
+Surgeon. The regiment was stationed in India at the time, and before
+I could join it, the second Afghan war had broken out. On landing at
+Bombay, I learned that my corps had advanced through the passes, and
+was already deep in the enemy's country. I followed, however, with many
+other officers who were in the same situation as myself, and succeeded
+in reaching Candahar in safety, where I found my regiment, and at once
+entered upon my new duties.
+
+The campaign brought honours and promotion to many, but for me it had
+nothing but misfortune and disaster. I was removed from my brigade and
+attached to the Berkshires, with whom I served at the fatal battle of
+Maiwand. There I was struck on the shoulder by a Jezail bullet, which
+shattered the bone and grazed the subclavian artery. I should have
+fallen into the hands of the murderous Ghazis had it not been for the
+devotion and courage shown by Murray, my orderly, who threw me across a
+pack-horse, and succeeded in bringing me safely to the British lines.
+
+Worn with pain, and weak from the prolonged hardships which I had
+undergone, I was removed, with a great train of wounded sufferers, to
+the base hospital at Peshawar. Here I rallied, and had already improved
+so far as to be able to walk about the wards, and even to bask a little
+upon the verandah, when I was struck down by enteric fever, that curse
+of our Indian possessions. For months my life was despaired of, and
+when at last I came to myself and became convalescent, I was so weak and
+emaciated that a medical board determined that not a day should be lost
+in sending me back to England. I was dispatched, accordingly, in the
+troopship "Orontes," and landed a month later on Portsmouth jetty, with
+my health irretrievably ruined, but with permission from a paternal
+government to spend the next nine months in attempting to improve it.
+
+I had neither kith nor kin in England, and was therefore as free as
+air--or as free as an income of eleven shillings and sixpence a day will
+permit a man to be. Under such circumstances, I naturally gravitated to
+London, that great cesspool into which all the loungers and idlers of
+the Empire are irresistibly drained. There I stayed for some time at
+a private hotel in the Strand, leading a comfortless, meaningless
+existence, and spending such money as I had, considerably more freely
+than I ought. So alarming did the state of my finances become, that
+I soon realized that I must either leave the metropolis and rusticate
+somewhere in the country, or that I must make a complete alteration in
+my style of living. Choosing the latter alternative, I began by making
+up my mind to leave the hotel, and to take up my quarters in some less
+pretentious and less expensive domicile.
+
+On the very day that I had come to this conclusion, I was standing at
+the Criterion Bar, when some one tapped me on the shoulder, and turning
+round I recognized young Stamford, who had been a dresser under me at
+Barts. The sight of a friendly face in the great wilderness of London is
+a pleasant thing indeed to a lonely man. In old days Stamford had never
+been a particular crony of mine, but now I hailed him with enthusiasm,
+and he, in his turn, appeared to be delighted to see me. In the
+exuberance of my joy, I asked him to lunch with me at the Holborn, and
+we started off together in a hansom.
+
+"Whatever have you been doing with yourself, Watson?" he asked in
+undisguised wonder, as we rattled through the crowded London streets.
+"You are as thin as a lath and as brown as a nut."
+
+I gave him a short sketch of my adventures, and had hardly concluded it
+by the time that we reached our destination.
+
+"Poor devil!" he said, commiseratingly, after he had listened to my
+misfortunes. "What are you up to now?"
+
+"Looking for lodgings." [3] I answered. "Trying to solve the problem
+as to whether it is possible to get comfortable rooms at a reasonable
+price."
+
+"That's a strange thing," remarked my companion; "you are the second man
+to-day that has used that expression to me."
+
+"And who was the first?" I asked.
+
+"A fellow who is working at the chemical laboratory up at the hospital.
+He was bemoaning himself this morning because he could not get someone
+to go halves with him in some nice rooms which he had found, and which
+were too much for his purse."
+
+"By Jove!" I cried, "if he really wants someone to share the rooms and
+the expense, I am the very man for him. I should prefer having a partner
+to being alone."
+
+Young Stamford looked rather strangely at me over his wine-glass. "You
+don't know Sherlock Holmes yet," he said; "perhaps you would not care
+for him as a constant companion."
+
+"Why, what is there against him?"
+
+"Oh, I didn't say there was anything against him. He is a little queer
+in his ideas--an enthusiast in some branches of science. As far as I
+know he is a decent fellow enough."
+
+"A medical student, I suppose?" said I.
+
+"No--I have no idea what he intends to go in for. I believe he is well
+up in anatomy, and he is a first-class chemist; but, as far as I know,
+he has never taken out any systematic medical classes. His studies are
+very desultory and eccentric, but he has amassed a lot of out-of-the way
+knowledge which would astonish his professors."
+
+"Did you never ask him what he was going in for?" I asked.
+
+"No; he is not a man that it is easy to draw out, though he can be
+communicative enough when the fancy seizes him."
+
+"I should like to meet him," I said. "If I am to lodge with anyone, I
+should prefer a man of studious and quiet habits. I am not strong
+enough yet to stand much noise or excitement. I had enough of both in
+Afghanistan to last me for the remainder of my natural existence. How
+could I meet this friend of yours?"
+
+"He is sure to be at the laboratory," returned my companion. "He either
+avoids the place for weeks, or else he works there from morning to
+night. If you like, we shall drive round together after luncheon."
+
+"Certainly," I answered, and the conversation drifted away into other
+channels.
+
+As we made our way to the hospital after leaving the Holborn, Stamford
+gave me a few more particulars about the gentleman whom I proposed to
+take as a fellow-lodger.
+
+"You mustn't blame me if you don't get on with him," he said; "I know
+nothing more of him than I have learned from meeting him occasionally in
+the laboratory. You proposed this arrangement, so you must not hold me
+responsible."
+
+"If we don't get on it will be easy to part company," I answered. "It
+seems to me, Stamford," I added, looking hard at my companion, "that you
+have some reason for washing your hands of the matter. Is this fellow's
+temper so formidable, or what is it? Don't be mealy-mouthed about it."
+
+"It is not easy to express the inexpressible," he answered with a laugh.
+"Holmes is a little too scientific for my tastes--it approaches to
+cold-bloodedness. I could imagine his giving a friend a little pinch of
+the latest vegetable alkaloid, not out of malevolence, you understand,
+but simply out of a spirit of inquiry in order to have an accurate idea
+of the effects. To do him justice, I think that he would take it himself
+with the same readiness. He appears to have a passion for definite and
+exact knowledge."
+
+"Very right too."
+
+"Yes, but it may be pushed to excess. When it comes to beating the
+subjects in the dissecting-rooms with a stick, it is certainly taking
+rather a bizarre shape."
+
+"Beating the subjects!"
+
+"Yes, to verify how far bruises may be produced after death. I saw him
+at it with my own eyes."
+
+"And yet you say he is not a medical student?"
+
+"No. Heaven knows what the objects of his studies are. But here we
+are, and you must form your own impressions about him." As he spoke, we
+turned down a narrow lane and passed through a small side-door, which
+opened into a wing of the great hospital. It was familiar ground to me,
+and I needed no guiding as we ascended the bleak stone staircase and
+made our way down the long corridor with its vista of whitewashed
+wall and dun-coloured doors. Near the further end a low arched passage
+branched away from it and led to the chemical laboratory.
+
+This was a lofty chamber, lined and littered with countless bottles.
+Broad, low tables were scattered about, which bristled with retorts,
+test-tubes, and little Bunsen lamps, with their blue flickering flames.
+There was only one student in the room, who was bending over a distant
+table absorbed in his work. At the sound of our steps he glanced round
+and sprang to his feet with a cry of pleasure. "I've found it! I've
+found it," he shouted to my companion, running towards us with a
+test-tube in his hand. "I have found a re-agent which is precipitated
+by hoemoglobin, [4] and by nothing else." Had he discovered a gold mine,
+greater delight could not have shone upon his features.
+
+"Dr. Watson, Mr. Sherlock Holmes," said Stamford, introducing us.
+
+"How are you?" he said cordially, gripping my hand with a strength
+for which I should hardly have given him credit. "You have been in
+Afghanistan, I perceive."
+
+"How on earth did you know that?" I asked in astonishment.
+
+"Never mind," said he, chuckling to himself. "The question now is about
+hoemoglobin. No doubt you see the significance of this discovery of
+mine?"
+
+"It is interesting, chemically, no doubt," I answered, "but
+practically----"
+
+"Why, man, it is the most practical medico-legal discovery for years.
+Don't you see that it gives us an infallible test for blood stains. Come
+over here now!" He seized me by the coat-sleeve in his eagerness, and
+drew me over to the table at which he had been working. "Let us have
+some fresh blood," he said, digging a long bodkin into his finger, and
+drawing off the resulting drop of blood in a chemical pipette. "Now, I
+add this small quantity of blood to a litre of water. You perceive that
+the resulting mixture has the appearance of pure water. The proportion
+of blood cannot be more than one in a million. I have no doubt, however,
+that we shall be able to obtain the characteristic reaction." As he
+spoke, he threw into the vessel a few white crystals, and then added
+some drops of a transparent fluid. In an instant the contents assumed a
+dull mahogany colour, and a brownish dust was precipitated to the bottom
+of the glass jar.
+
+"Ha! ha!" he cried, clapping his hands, and looking as delighted as a
+child with a new toy. "What do you think of that?"
+
+"It seems to be a very delicate test," I remarked.
+
+"Beautiful! beautiful! The old Guiacum test was very clumsy and
+uncertain. So is the microscopic examination for blood corpuscles. The
+latter is valueless if the stains are a few hours old. Now, this appears
+to act as well whether the blood is old or new. Had this test been
+invented, there are hundreds of men now walking the earth who would long
+ago have paid the penalty of their crimes."
+
+"Indeed!" I murmured.
+
+"Criminal cases are continually hinging upon that one point. A man is
+suspected of a crime months perhaps after it has been committed. His
+linen or clothes are examined, and brownish stains discovered upon them.
+Are they blood stains, or mud stains, or rust stains, or fruit stains,
+or what are they? That is a question which has puzzled many an expert,
+and why? Because there was no reliable test. Now we have the Sherlock
+Holmes' test, and there will no longer be any difficulty."
+
+His eyes fairly glittered as he spoke, and he put his hand over his
+heart and bowed as if to some applauding crowd conjured up by his
+imagination.
+
+"You are to be congratulated," I remarked, considerably surprised at his
+enthusiasm.
+
+"There was the case of Von Bischoff at Frankfort last year. He would
+certainly have been hung had this test been in existence. Then there was
+Mason of Bradford, and the notorious Muller, and Lefevre of Montpellier,
+and Samson of new Orleans. I could name a score of cases in which it
+would have been decisive."
+
+"You seem to be a walking calendar of crime," said Stamford with a
+laugh. "You might start a paper on those lines. Call it the 'Police News
+of the Past.'"
+
+"Very interesting reading it might be made, too," remarked Sherlock
+Holmes, sticking a small piece of plaster over the prick on his finger.
+"I have to be careful," he continued, turning to me with a smile, "for I
+dabble with poisons a good deal." He held out his hand as he spoke, and
+I noticed that it was all mottled over with similar pieces of plaster,
+and discoloured with strong acids.
+
+"We came here on business," said Stamford, sitting down on a high
+three-legged stool, and pushing another one in my direction with
+his foot. "My friend here wants to take diggings, and as you were
+complaining that you could get no one to go halves with you, I thought
+that I had better bring you together."
+
+Sherlock Holmes seemed delighted at the idea of sharing his rooms with
+me. "I have my eye on a suite in Baker Street," he said, "which would
+suit us down to the ground. You don't mind the smell of strong tobacco,
+I hope?"
+
+"I always smoke 'ship's' myself," I answered.
+
+"That's good enough. I generally have chemicals about, and occasionally
+do experiments. Would that annoy you?"
+
+"By no means."
+
+"Let me see--what are my other shortcomings. I get in the dumps at
+times, and don't open my mouth for days on end. You must not think I am
+sulky when I do that. Just let me alone, and I'll soon be right. What
+have you to confess now? It's just as well for two fellows to know the
+worst of one another before they begin to live together."
+
+I laughed at this cross-examination. "I keep a bull pup," I said, "and
+I object to rows because my nerves are shaken, and I get up at all sorts
+of ungodly hours, and I am extremely lazy. I have another set of vices
+when I'm well, but those are the principal ones at present."
+
+"Do you include violin-playing in your category of rows?" he asked,
+anxiously.
+
+"It depends on the player," I answered. "A well-played violin is a treat
+for the gods--a badly-played one----"
+
+"Oh, that's all right," he cried, with a merry laugh. "I think we may
+consider the thing as settled--that is, if the rooms are agreeable to
+you."
+
+"When shall we see them?"
+
+"Call for me here at noon to-morrow, and we'll go together and settle
+everything," he answered.
+
+"All right--noon exactly," said I, shaking his hand.
+
+We left him working among his chemicals, and we walked together towards
+my hotel.
+
+"By the way," I asked suddenly, stopping and turning upon Stamford, "how
+the deuce did he know that I had come from Afghanistan?"
+
+My companion smiled an enigmatical smile. "That's just his little
+peculiarity," he said. "A good many people have wanted to know how he
+finds things out."
+
+"Oh! a mystery is it?" I cried, rubbing my hands. "This is very piquant.
+I am much obliged to you for bringing us together. 'The proper study of
+mankind is man,' you know."
+
+"You must study him, then," Stamford said, as he bade me good-bye.
+"You'll find him a knotty problem, though. I'll wager he learns more
+about you than you about him. Good-bye."
+
+"Good-bye," I answered, and strolled on to my hotel, considerably
+interested in my new acquaintance.
+
+
+CHAPTER II. THE SCIENCE OF DEDUCTION.
+
+
+WE met next day as he had arranged, and inspected the rooms at No. 221B,
+Baker Street, of which he had spoken at our meeting. They
+consisted of a couple of comfortable bed-rooms and a single large
+airy sitting-room, cheerfully furnished, and illuminated by two broad
+windows. So desirable in every way were the apartments, and so moderate
+did the terms seem when divided between us, that the bargain was
+concluded upon the spot, and we at once entered into possession.
+That very evening I moved my things round from the hotel, and on the
+following morning Sherlock Holmes followed me with several boxes and
+portmanteaus. For a day or two we were busily employed in unpacking and
+laying out our property to the best advantage. That done, we
+gradually began to settle down and to accommodate ourselves to our new
+surroundings.
+
+Holmes was certainly not a difficult man to live with. He was quiet
+in his ways, and his habits were regular. It was rare for him to be
+up after ten at night, and he had invariably breakfasted and gone out
+before I rose in the morning. Sometimes he spent his day at the chemical
+laboratory, sometimes in the dissecting-rooms, and occasionally in long
+walks, which appeared to take him into the lowest portions of the City.
+Nothing could exceed his energy when the working fit was upon him; but
+now and again a reaction would seize him, and for days on end he would
+lie upon the sofa in the sitting-room, hardly uttering a word or moving
+a muscle from morning to night. On these occasions I have noticed such
+a dreamy, vacant expression in his eyes, that I might have suspected him
+of being addicted to the use of some narcotic, had not the temperance
+and cleanliness of his whole life forbidden such a notion.
+
projects / mmh / commitdiff