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.
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