The Hound of the Baskervilles by Arthur Conan Doyle (good books to read for women txt) ๐
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It would be hard to nominate a more well-known character in English literature than that of the austere analytical detective Sherlock Holmes, created by Arthur Conan Doyle in the late 1880s. Holmes, alongside his friend and biographer Dr. John Watson, appeared in two initial novels and dozens of short stories serialized in popular magazines, attracting a devoted, almost fanatical following which continues to this day.
The Hound of the Baskervilles, serialized in 1901โ1902, was the third novel featuring Holmes and Watson. Sherlock Holmes is consulted in his Baker Street apartment by Dr. Mortimer, a physician now living on the fringes of Dartmoor. He gives Holmes and Watson an account of a centuries-old legend, in which a hell-hound slaughtered the debauched heir of the Baskerville family who had been in lecherous pursuit of an innocent maiden across the moor. The same hound is reputed to have harrowed several of the subsequent heirs to the estate.
This ancient story might be dismissed as mere fancy, but for the fact that the elderly Sir Charles Baskerville recently died in very mysterious circumstances, apparently fleeing in terror from something which came from the moor. Dr. Mortimer is concerned that the new heir, Sir Henry, just returned from Canada, may be at risk from this supernatural beast. Holmes is intrigued, but being too busy to go himself, sends Dr. Watson to accompany Sir Henry to the ancestral home on Dartmoor and to report anything suspicious.
The Hound of the Baskervilles is arguably the best, and certainly the most popular, of Doyleโs novels featuring his iconic detective. It has been translated into almost every language in the world and been the basis of dozens of movies (starting as early as 1914), radio plays and comic books.
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- Author: Arthur Conan Doyle
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โThen I was right.โ
โTo that extent.โ
โBut that was all.โ
โNo, no, my dear Watson, not allโ โby no means all. I would suggest, for example, that a presentation to a doctor is more likely to come from a hospital than from a hunt, and that when the initials โC.C.โ are placed before that hospital the words โCharing Crossโ very naturally suggest themselves.โ
โYou may be right.โ
โThe probability lies in that direction. And if we take this as a working hypothesis we have a fresh basis from which to start our construction of this unknown visitor.โ
โWell, then, supposing that โC.C.H.โ does stand for โCharing Cross Hospital,โ what further inferences may we draw?โ
โDo none suggest themselves? You know my methods. Apply them!โ
โI can only think of the obvious conclusion that the man has practised in town before going to the country.โ
โI think that we might venture a little farther than this. Look at it in this light. On what occasion would it be most probable that such a presentation would be made? When would his friends unite to give him a pledge of their good will? Obviously at the moment when Dr. Mortimer withdrew from the service of the hospital in order to start a practice for himself. We know there has been a presentation. We believe there has been a change from a town hospital to a country practice. Is it, then, stretching our inference too far to say that the presentation was on the occasion of the change?โ
โIt certainly seems probable.โ
โNow, you will observe that he could not have been on the staff of the hospital, since only a man well-established in a London practice could hold such a position, and such a one would not drift into the country. What was he, then? If he was in the hospital and yet not on the staff he could only have been a house-surgeon or a house-physicianโ โlittle more than a senior student. And he left five years agoโ โthe date is on the stick. So your grave, middle-aged family practitioner vanishes into thin air, my dear Watson, and there emerges a young fellow under thirty, amiable, unambitious, absentminded, and the possessor of a favourite dog, which I should describe roughly as being larger than a terrier and smaller than a mastiff.โ
I laughed incredulously as Sherlock Holmes leaned back in his settee and blew little wavering rings of smoke up to the ceiling.
โAs to the latter part, I have no means of checking you,โ said I, โbut at least it is not difficult to find out a few particulars about the manโs age and professional career.โ From my small medical shelf I took down the Medical Directory and turned up the name. There were several Mortimers, but only one who could be our visitor. I read his record aloud.
โMortimer, James, M.R.C.S., 1882, Grimpen, Dartmoor, Devon. House-surgeon, from 1882 to 1884, at Charing Cross Hospital. Winner of the Jackson prize for Comparative Pathology, with essay entitled โIs Disease a Reversion?โ Corresponding member of the Swedish Pathological Society. Author of โSome Freaks of Atavismโ (Lancet 1882). โDo We Progress?โ (Journal of Psychology, March, 1883). Medical Officer for the parishes of Grimpen, Thorsley, and High Barrow.โ
โNo mention of that local hunt, Watson,โ said Holmes with a mischievous smile, โbut a country doctor, as you very astutely observed. I think that I am fairly justified in my inferences. As to the adjectives, I said, if I remember right, amiable, unambitious, and absentminded. It is my experience that it is only an amiable man in this world who receives testimonials, only an unambitious one who abandons a London career for the country, and only an absentminded one who leaves his stick and not his visiting-card after waiting an hour in your room.โ
โAnd the dog?โ
โHas been in the habit of carrying this stick behind his master. Being a heavy stick the dog has held it tightly by the middle, and the marks of his teeth are very plainly visible. The dogโs jaw, as shown in the space between these marks, is too broad in my opinion for a terrier and not broad enough for a mastiff. It may have beenโ โyes, by Jove, it is a curly-haired spaniel.โ
He had risen and paced the room as he spoke. Now he halted in the recess of the window. There was such a ring of conviction in his voice that I glanced up in surprise.
โMy dear fellow, how can you possibly be so sure of that?โ
โFor the very simple reason that I see the dog himself on our very doorstep, and there is the ring of its owner. Donโt move, I beg you, Watson. He is a professional brother of yours, and your presence may be of assistance to me. Now is the dramatic moment of fate, Watson, when you hear a step upon the stair which is walking into your life, and you know not whether for good or ill. What does Dr. James Mortimer, the man of science, ask of Sherlock Holmes, the specialist in crime? Come in!โ
The appearance of our visitor was a surprise to me, since I had expected a typical country practitioner. He was a very tall, thin man, with a long nose like a beak, which jutted out between two keen, gray eyes, set closely together and sparkling brightly from behind a pair of gold-rimmed glasses. He was clad in a professional but rather slovenly fashion, for his frock-coat was dingy and his trousers frayed. Though young, his long back was already bowed, and he walked with a forward thrust of his head and a general air of peering benevolence. As he entered his eyes fell upon the stick in Holmesโs hand, and he ran towards it with an exclamation of joy. โI am so very glad,โ said he. โI was not sure whether I had left it here or in the Shipping Office. I would not lose that stick for the world.โ
โA presentation, I see,โ said Holmes.
โYes, sir.โ
โFrom
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