This newly published English edition contains 4 fulllength novels
and all 56 short stories featuring Sherlock Holmes at over a thousand pages.
Rivers of ink have flowed since 1887, when Sherlock Holmes was first
introduced to the world, in an adventure entitled A Study in Scarlet. Most of
the great detective''s fans know him so well, that they feel they have actually
met him. It would therefore be presumptuous to try and define him here, as his
many friends and admirers may each have very different views about this
legendary personage.
For those who have not made-up their minds, it might be useful if
they read Sir Arthur Conan Doyle''s Autobiography, Memories and Adventures. They
will undoubtedly come away with the notion that Sherlock Holmes resembles in
many ways Dr. Joseph Bell, one of the teachers at the medical school of
Edinburgh University…
Sir Arthur Conan Doyle was a Scottish physician and writer, most noted
for his stories about the detective Sherlock Holmes, generally considered milestones
in the field of crime fiction, and for the adventures of Professor Challenger.
He was a prolific writer whose other works include fantasy and
science fiction stories, plays, romances, poetry, non-fiction and historical
novels.
Arthur Conan Doyle was born on 22 May 1859 at Picardy Place, Edinburgh.
He died of a heart attack at the age of 71. His last words were directed toward
his wife: “You are wonderful.”
The Trapping of Birdy Edwards
................................................................ 429
Adventures of Sherlock Holmes
A Scandal in Bohemia................................................................................
440
p
內容試閱:
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 despatched, 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 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 someone tapped me on the shoulder, and turning round
I recognized young Stamford,
who had been a dresser under me at Bart’s. 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,” 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 today 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 wineglass.
“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.”