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from The Technique of the
Mystery Story (1913)
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In one of Doyle's stories, Sherlock Holmes himself states definitely his principles of deduction in what purports to be a magazine article written by himself. The opening paragraph, however, is in the words of the faithful Dr. Watson.
1. Sherlock Holmes'
Method
Its somewhat ambitious title was "The
Book of Life," and it attempted to show how much an
observant man might learn by an accurate and systematic
examination of all that came in his way. It struck me
as being a remarkable mixture of shrewdness and
absurdity. The reasoning was close and intense, but the
deductions appeared to me to be far-fetched and
exaggerated. The writer claimed by a momentary
expression, a twitch of a muscle, or a glance of an
eye, to fathom a man's inmost thoughts. Deceit,
according to him, was an impossibility in the case of
one trained to observation and analysis. His
conclusions were as infallible as so many propositions
of Euclid. So startling would his results appear to the
uninitiated that, until they learned the processes by
which be had arrived at them, they might well consider
him a necromancer.
"From a drop of water," said the writer,
"a logician could infer the possibility of an Atlantic
or a Niagara without having seen or heard of one or the
other. So all life is a great chain the nature of which
is known whenever we are shown a single link of it.
Like all other arts, the Science of Deduction and
Analysis is one which can only be acquired by long and
patient study, nor is life long enough to allow any
mortal to attain the highest possible perfection of it.
Before turning to those moral and mental aspects of the
matter which present the greatest difficulties, let the
inquirer begin by mastering more elementary problems.
Let him, on meeting a fellow mortal, learn at a glance
to distinguish the history of the man, and the trade or
profession to which he belongs. Puerile as such an
exercise may seem, it sharpens the faculties of
observation and teaches one where to look and what to
look for. By a man's finger-nails, by his coat-sleeve,
by his boot, by his trouser-knees, by the callosities
of his forefinger and thumb, by his expression, by his
shirt cuffs — by each of these things a man's
calling is plainly revealed. That all united should
fail to enlighten the competent inquirer in any case is
almost inconceivable."
It is the sentence last quoted that proclaims the Transcendent Detective, and it is this element of omniscience that gives him such popularity and homage as is received by any other worker in magic.
As an example of this sort of deduction let us examine definitely some of Sherlock Holmes' work.
Typical in every respect, are his
deductions from an old hat as here given:
I took the tattered object in my hands
and turned it over rather ruefully. It was a very
ordinary black hat of the usual round shape, hard, and
much the worse for wear. The lining had been of red
silk, but was a good deal discolored. There was no
maker's name; but, as Holmes had remarked, the initials
"H.B." were scrawled upon one side. It was pierced in
the brim for a hat-securer, but the elastic was
missing. For the rest, it was cracked, exceedingly
dusty, and spotted in several places, although there
seemed to have been some attempt to hide the discolored
patches by smearing them with ink.
"I can see nothing," said I, handing it
back to my friend.
"On the contrary, Watson, you can see
everything. You fail to reason from what you see. You
are too timid in drawing your inferences."
"Then, pray tell me what it is that you
can infer from this hat?"
He picked it up and gazed at it in the
peculiar introspective fashion which was characteristic
of him. "It is perhaps less suggestive than it might
have been," he remarked, "and yet there are a few
inferences which are very distinct, and a few others
which represent at least a strong balance of
probability. That the man was highly intellectual is of
course obvious upon the face of it, and also that he
was fairly well-to-do within the last three years,
although he has now fallen upon evil days. He had
foresight, but has less now than formerly, pointing to
a moral retrogression, which, when taken with the
decline of his fortunes, seems to indicate some evil
influence, probably drink, at work upon him. This may
account also for the obvious fact that his wife has
ceased to love him."
"My dear Holmes!"
"He has, however, retained some degree
of self-respect," he continued, disregarding my
remonstrances. "He is a man who leads a sedentary life,
goes out little, is out of training entirely, is
middle-aged, has grizzled hair which he has had cut
within the last few days, and which he anoints with
lime-cream. These are the more potent facts which are
to be deduced from his hat. Also, by-the-way, that it
is extremely improbable that he has gas laid on in his
house."
"You are certainly joking, Holmes."
"Not in the least. Is it possible that
even now, when I give you these results, you are unable
to see how they are attained?"
"I have no doubt that I am very stupid;
but I must confess that I am unable to follow you. For
example, how did you deduce that this man was
intellectual?"
For answer Holmes clapped the hat upon
his head. It came right over the forehead and settled
upon the bridge of his nose. "It is a question of cubic
capacity," said he; "a man with so large a brain must
have something in it."
"The decline of his fortunes, then?
"This hat is three years old. These flat
brims curled at the edge came in then. It is a hat of
the very best quality. Look at the band of ribbed silk
and the excellent lining. If this man could afford to
buy so expensive a hat three years ago, and has had no
hat since, then he has assuredly gone down in the
world."
"Well, that is clear enough, certainly.
But how about the foresight and the moral
retrogression?"
Sherlock Holmes laughed. "Here is the
foresight," said he, putting his finger upon the little
disk and loop of the hat securer. "They are never sold
upon hats. If this man ordered one, it is a sign of a
certain amount of foresight, since he went out of his
way to take this precaution against the wind. But since
we see he had broken the elastic, and has not troubled
to replace it, it is obvious that he has less foresight
now than formerly, which is a distinct proof of a
weakening nature. On the other hand, he has endeavored
to conceal some of these stains upon the felt by
daubing them with ink, which is a sign that he has not
entirely lost his self-respect."
"Your reasoning is certainly plausible."
"The further points, that he is
middle-aged, that his hair is grizzled, that it has
been recently cut, and that he uses lime-cream, are all
to be gathered from a close examination of the lower
part of the lining. The lens discloses a large number
of hair-ends, clean cut by the scissors of the barber.
They all appear to be adhesive and there is a distinct
odor of lime-cream. The dust, you will observe, is not
the gritty, gray dust of the street, but the fluffy
brown dust of the house, showing that it has been hung
up indoors most of the time; while the marks of
moisture upon the inside are proof positive that the
wearer perspired very freely, and could, therefore,
hardly be in the best of training."
"But his wife — you said that she
had ceased to love him."
"This hat has not been brushed for
weeks. When I see you, my dear Watson, with a week's
accumulation of dust upon your hat, and when your wife
allows you to go out in such a state, I shall fear that
you also have been unfortunate enough to lose your
wife's affection."
"But he might be a bachelor."
"Nay, he was bringing home the goose as
a peace-offering to his wife. Remember the card upon
the bird's leg."
"You have an answer to everything. But
how on earth do you deduce that the gas is not laid on
in his house?"
"One tallow stain, or even two, might
come by chance; but when I see no less than five, I
think that there can be little doubt that the
individual must be brought into frequent contact with
burning tallow; walks upstairs at night, probably with
his hat in one hand and a guttering candle in the
other. Anyhow, he never got tallow-stains from a
gas-jet. Are you satisfied?"
And we will follow this with a similar
example:
"I think, Watson, that you have put on
seven and a half pounds since I saw you."
"Seven!" I answered.
"Indeed, I should have thought a little
more. Just a trifle more, I fancy, Watson. And in
practice again, I observe. You did not tell me that you
intended to go into harness."
"Then, how do you know?"
"I see it, I deduce it. How do I know
that you have been getting yourself very wet lately,
and that you have a most clumsy and careless servant
girl?"
"My dear Holmes," said I, "this is too
much. You would certainly have been burned, had you
lived a few centuries ago. It is true that I had a
country walk on Thursday and came home in a dreadful
mess; but, as I have changed my clothes, I can't
imagine how you deduce it. As to Mary Jane, she is
incorrigible, and my wife has given her notice; but
there, again, I fail to see how you work it out."
He chuckled to himself and rubbed his
long, nervous hands together.
"It is simplicity itself," said he; "my
eyes tell me that on the inside of your left shoe, just
where the firelight strikes it, the leather is scored
by six almost parallel cuts. Obviously they have been
caused by some one who has very carelessly scraped
round the edges of the sole in order to remove crusted
mud from it. Hence, you see, my double deduction that
you had been out in vile weather, and that you had a
particularly malignant boot-slitting specimen of the
London slavey. As to your practice, if a gentleman
walks into my rooms smelling of iodoform, with a black
mark of nitrate of silver upon his right forefinger,
and a bulge on the side of his top-hat to
show where he has secreted his stethoscope, I must be
dull, indeed, if I do not pronounce him to be an active
member of the medical profession."
In his early acquaintance Watson doubted
Holmes ability at this sort of deduction, and said to
him, by way of test:
"I have heard you say that it is
difficult for a man to have any object in daily use
without leaving the impress of his individuality upon
it in such a way that a trained observer might read it.
Now, I have here a watch which has recently come into
my possession. Would you have the kindness to let me
have an opinion upon the character or habits of the
late owner?"
"Though unsatisfactory, my research has
not been entirely barren," Holmes observed, staring up
at the ceiling with dreamy, lack lustre eyes. "Subject
to your correction, I should judge that the watch
belonged to your elder brother, who inherited it from
your father."
"That you gather, no doubt, from the
H.W. upon the back?"
"Quite so. The W. suggests your own
name. The date of the watch is nearly fifty years back,
and the initials are as old as the watch: So it was
made for the last generation. Jewellery usually
descends to the eldest son, and he is most likely to
have the same name as his father. Your father has, if I
remember right, been dead many years. It has,
therefore, been in the hands of your eldest brother."
"Right, so far," said I. "Anything
else?"
"He was a man of untidy habits —
very untidy and careless. He was left with good
prospects, but he threw away his chances, lived for
some time in poverty with occasional short intervals of
prosperity, and finally taking to drink, he died. That
is all I can gather."
I sprang from my chair and limped
impatiently about the room with considerable bitterness
in my heart.
"This is unworthy of you, Holmes," I
said. "I could not have believed that you would have
descended to this. You have made inquiries into the
history of my unhappy brother, and you now pretend to
deduce this knowledge in some fanciful way. You cannot
expect me to believe that you have read all this from
his old watch! It is unkind, and to speak plainly, has
a touch of charlatanism in it."
"My dear doctor," said he kindly, "pray
accept my apologies. Viewing the matter as an abstract
problem, I had forgotten how personal and painful a
thing it might be to you. I assure you, however, that I
never even knew that you had a brother until you handed
me the watch."
"Then how in the name of all that is
wonderful did you get these facts? They are absolutely
correct in every particular."
"What seems strange to you is only so
because you do not follow my train of thought or
observe the small facts upon which large inferences may
depend. For example, I began by stating that your
brother was careless. When you observe the lower part
of that watch-case you notice that it is not only
dinted in two places, but it is cut and marked all over
from the habit of keeping other hard objects, such as
coins or keys, in the same pocket. Surely it s no great
feat to assume that a man who treats a fifty-guinea
watch so cavalierly must be a careless man. Neither is
it a very far-fetched inference that a man who inherits
one article of such value is pretty well provided for
in other respects."
I nodded, to show that I followed his
reasoning.
"It is very customary for pawnbrokers in
England, when they take a watch, to scratch the number
of the ticket with a pin-point upon the inside of the
case. It is more handy than a label, as there is no
risk of the number being lost or transposed. There are
no less than four such numbers visible to my lens on
the inside of this case. Inference that your brother
was often at low water. Secondary inference — that
he had occasional bursts of prosperity, or he could not
have redeemed the pledge. Finally, I ask you to look at
the inner plate, which contains the keyhole. Look at
the thousand of scratches all round the hole —
marks where the key has slipped. What sober man's key
could have scored those grooves? But you will never see
a drunkard's watch without them. He winds it at night,
and he leaves these traces of his unsteady hand. Where
is the mystery in all this?"
"It is as clear as daylight," I
answered.
I could not help laughing at the ease
with which he explained his process of deduction. "When
I hear you give your reasons," I remarked, "the thing
always appears to me to be so ridiculously simple that
I could easily do it myself, though at each successive
instance of your reasoning I am baffled, until you
explain your process. And yet I believe that my eyes
are as good as yours."
"Quite so," he answered, lighting a
cigarette, and throwing himself down into an arm-chair.
"You see, but you do not observe. The distinction is
clear. For example you have frequently seen the steps
which lead up from the hall to this room."
"Frequently."
"How often?"
"Well, some hundreds of times."
"Then how many are there?"
"How many? I don't know."
"Quite so! You have not observed. And
yet you have seen. That is just my point. Now, I know
that there are seventeen steps, because I have both
seen and observed."
Lecoq announces his deductions with
rather more dramatic circumlocution. With nothing to
deduce from but footprints in the snow, he at last
cries triumphantly:
"Now I know everything."
"Oh, dear, that is a big word to say."
"When I say everything, I mean
everything that has reference to the drama played at
the Widow Chupin's which has culminated in bloodshed.
This deserted piece of land covered with snow is like a
vast white page of a book, and the persons whom we are
hunting have written upon it, not only their movements
and their proceedings, but also the secret doubts,
hopes, and fears which are agitating their souls. What
do these fleeting footprints teach you, old man?
Nothing; well, to me they are as full of life as the
people who have left them behind; they breathe, they
speak, and they denounce!"
His conclusions being received somewhat
dubiously he proceeds more definitely.
"Listen, then," continued Lecoq, "to the
writing as I read it. While the murderer was taking the
two women to the Poivriere, his companion or his
accomplice, as I think I may call him, waited for him
here. He was a middle-aged man, rather tall, wore a
soft hat and a brown woolly great-coat; he was probably
married, as he wore a wedding-ring on the little finger
of his right hand."
After the usual, "this is too much!" he
continues his recital:
"We have come, old fellow, to the moment
when the accomplice had mounted guard here, and the
time seemed to him rather long. To make the time pass,
he walked backward and forward the length of the beam,
and every now and then stopped to listen, so as to
break the monotony of his promenade. As he heard
nothing he stamped his feet, doubtless saying to
himself, 'What the deuce is the other fellow doing down
there?' He had walked up and down thirty times, for I
have counted them, when a dull sound broke the silence
— the two women were coming."
All of this is purely and simply the reasoning of Zadig and the early Orientals. On the whole this sort of "spurious profundity" is not difficult in detective fiction, however often it might fail to prove in real life.
The Present Writer, moved to attempt it,
wrote the following scene in a story, the characters
being a Transcendant Detective and an Admiring Friend.
I met him, accidentally one morning,
when we both chanced to go into a basement of the
Metropolis Hotel to have our shoes shined.
While waiting our turn to get a chair,
we stood talking, and, seeing a pair of shoes standing
on a table, evidently there to be cleaned, I said
banteringly:
"Now, I suppose, Stone, from looking at
those shoes, you can deduce all there is to know about
the owner of them."
With a mild twinkle in his eye, but with
a perfectly grave face, he said slowly:
"Those shoes belong to a young man, five
feet eight inches high. He does not live in New York,
but is here to visit his sweetheart. She lives in
Brooklyn, is five feet nine inches tall, and is deaf in
her left ear. They went to the theatre last night, and
neither was in evening dress."
I stared at him incredulously, as I
always did when confronted by his astonishing
"deductions," and simply said:
"Tell this little Missourian all about
it."
"It did sound well, reeled off like
that, did n't it?" he observed, chuckling more at my
air of eager curiosity than at his own achievement. "But it's absurdly easy,
after all. He is a young man because his shoes are in
the very latest, extreme, not exclusive style. He is
five feet eight, because the size of his foot goes with
that height of man, which, by the way, is the height of
nine out of ten men, any way. He does n't live in New
York or he would n't be stopping at a hotel. Besides,
he would be down-town at this hour, attending to
business."
"Unless he has freak business hours, as
you and I do," I put in.
"Yes, that might be. But I still hold
that he doesn't live in New York, or he could n't be
staying at this Broadway hotel overnight, and sending
his shoes down to be shined at half-past nine in the
morning. His sweetheart is five feet nine, for that is
the height of a tall girl. I know she is tall, for she
wears a long skirt. Short girls wear short skirts,
which make them look shorter still, and tall girls wear
very long skirts, which make them look taller."
"Why do they do that?" I inquired,
greatly interested.
"I don't know. You'll have to ask that
of some one wiser than I. But I know it's a fact. A
girl would n't be considered really tall if less than
five feet nine. So I know that's her height. She is his
sweetheart, for no man would go from New York to
Brooklyn and bring a lady over here to the theatre, and
then take her home, and return to New York in the early
hours of morning, if he were not in love with her. I
know she lives in Brooklyn, for the paper says there
was a heavy shower there last night, while I know no
rain fell in New York. I know that they were out in
that rain, for her long skirt became muddy, and in turn
muddied the whole upper of his left shoe. The fact that
only the left shoe is so soiled proves that he walked
only at her right side, showing that she must be deaf
in her left ear, or he would have walked part of the
time on that side. I know that they went to the theatre
in New York, because he is still sleeping at this hour,
and has sent his boots down to be cleaned, instead of
coming down with them on his feet to be shined here. If
he had been merely calling on the girl in Brooklyn, he
would have been home early, for they do not sit up late
in that borough. I know they went to the theatre,
instead of to the opera or a ball, for they did not go
in a cab, otherwise her skirt would not have become
muddied. This, too, shows that she wore a cloth skirt,
and as his shoes are not patent leathers, it is clear
that neither was in evening dress."
I did n't try to get a verification of
Fleming Stone's assertions; I did n't want any. Scores
of times I had known him to make similar deductions,
and in cases where we afterward learned the facts, he
was invariably correct. So, though we did n't follow up
this matter, I was sure he was right, and, even if he
had n't been, it would not have weighed heavily against
his large proportion of proved successes.
As it turned out, being fiction, these astute deductions were correct in every particular, and led ultimately to the conviction of the criminal!
A side light on Sherlock Holmes'
character is shown by his attitude regarding the
explanation of his own deduction. Doctor Watson thus
expresses it:
"Like all Holmes' reasoning the thing
seemed simplicity itself when it was once explained. He
read the thought upon my features, and his smile had a
tinge of bitterness.
"I am afraid that I rather give myself
away when I explain," said he. "Results without causes
are much more impressive."
Of course this is all part of the author's art, for it grasps the reader's sympathy and understanding, and forestalls his own slight feeling of disappointment at the exposed simplicity.
Not all of Sherlock Holmes' deductions are quite as marvelous as Watson asserts. For instance, a strong point is made by Holmes, in "The Hound of the Baskervilles," after reading a message concocted by means of pasting on paper words cut from a newspaper, and declaring at once that the words were cut from the London Times. Ability to distinguish the type of one great newspaper from another is not at all uncommon among newspaper readers. As a matter of fact, a large portion of the reading public could tell at once from what newspaper words were cut. It is the photographic memory rather than the analytic mind which performs this feat.
Again, not all of Holmes' deductions are
true in every detail. A pair of gold rimmed eye-glasses
leads him to declare their owner " a person of
refinement and well-dressed," for, he says "it is
inconceivable that any one who wore such glasses could
be slatternly in other respects." And yet, such
conditions have often been known. But in the story, of
course the lady proved to be refined and well-dressed,
and thus the
It is, of course, the spectacular deductions, the plays to the grand stand, that make for popularity. And no one could better combine the rational commonplace and the marvelous 'spurious profundity' than Doctor Doyle has done in the character of Sherlock Holmes.
But much of this profound reasoning is
far from spurious. In a moment of a serious
dissertation on his own art, we learn this about it:
Sherlock Holmes closed his eyes and
placed his elbows upon the arms of his chair, with his
finger-tips together.
"The ideal reasoner," he remarked,
"would, when he had once been shown a single fact in
all its bearings, deduce from it not only all the chain
of events which led up to it, but also all the results
which would follow from it. As Cuvier could correctly
describe a whole animal by the contemplation of a
single bone, so the observer who has thoroughly
understood one link in a series of incidents, should be
able to accurately state all the other ones, both
before and after. We have not yet grasped the results
which the reason alone
can attain to. Problems may be solved in the study
which have baffled all those who have sought a solution
by the aid of their senses. To carry the art, however,
to its highest pitch, it is necessary that the reasoner
should be able to utilize all the facts which have come
to his knowledge; and this in itself implies, as you
will readily see, a possession of all knowledge, which,
even in these days of free education and
encyclopaedias, is a somewhat rare accomplishment. It
is not so impossible, however, that a man should
possess all knowledge which is likely to be useful to
him in his work, and this I have endeavored in my case
to do."
5. The Inductive and the Deductive Methods
It is not easy for the untutored reader or writer of detective stories always to differentiate between inductive and deductive reasoning. Perhaps some light may be thrown on this abstruse subject by reading carefully this extract from a book by Arlo Bates, entitled "Talks on Writing English."
"It is proper and perhaps even important that the student shall learn the distinction which is made by logicians between reasoning which is inductive and that which is deductive. As a matter of practical work in the writing of arguments, the distinction is of less importance than might seem from the formality with which these terms are treated; but as Induction and Deduction are words which the true logician cannot mention without at least a seeming impulse to cross himself, it is well to know what the difference is.
"Induction, then, is reasoning from the particular to the general; the establishment of an hypothesis by showing that the facts agree with it. It is preeminently the scientific method. By observing natural phenomena, the scientist conceives what the law which governs them must be. This idea of the general principle is then the hypothesis which he attempts to prove; and his method is to examine the facts under all conditions possible, establishing his proposition by showing that the facts are in accord with it.
"Deduction is the converse of this, and consists in drawing out particular truths from general ones. A universal proposition may be regarded as a bundle in which are bound together many individual ones. It is the work of deduction to take these out, — to separate any one of them from the rest. The general truth, 'All metals are elements,' includes in it the especial truths, 'Iron is an element,' 'Gold is an Element,' and so on for each metal which could be named. Deduction is the process of separating one of these from the whole. Speaking broadly, scientific reasoning is more likely to be inductive, while other reasoning is more likely to be deductive."
A favorite exploit of the Transcendent Detective, is to follow silently another's train of thought; and then suddenly and seemingly with clairvoyance, announce what the other's thoughts are.
This is done first by Poe:
We were strolling one night down a long
dirty street, in the vicinity of the Palais Royal.
Being both, apparently, occupied with thought, neither
of us had spoken a syllable for fifteen minutes at
least. All at once Dupin broke forth with these words.
"He is a very little fellow, that's
true, and would do better for the Théatre des
"There can be no doubt of that," I
replied unwittingly, and not at first observing (so
much had I been absorbed in reflection) the
extraordinary manner in which the speaker had chimed in
with my
meditations. In an instant afterward I recollected
myself, and my astonishment was profound.
"Dupin," said I gravely, "this is beyond
my comprehension. I do not hesitate to say that I am
amazed, and can scarcely credit my senses. How was it
possible that you should know I was thinking of
—?" Here I paused, to ascertain beyond a doubt
whether he really knew of whom I thought.
— "of Chantilly," said he, "why do
you pause? You were remarking to yourself that his
diminutive figure unfitted him for tragedy."
This was precisely what had formed the
subject of my reflections. Chantilly was a quondam
cobbler of the Rue St. Denis, who, becoming stage-mad,
had attempted the role of Xerxes, in Crebillon's
tragedy so-called, and been notoriously pasquinaded for
his pains.
"Tell me, for Heaven's sake," I
exclaimed, "the method — if method there is —
by which you have been enabled to fathom my soul in
this matter." In fact, I was even more startled than I
would have been willing to express.
"It was the fruiterer," replied my
friend, "who brought you to the conclusion that the
mender of soles was not of sufficient height for Xerxes
et id genus omne."
"The fruiterer! — you astonish me
— I know no fruiterer whomsoever."
"The man who ran up against you as we
entered the street — it may have been fifteen
minutes ago."
I now remembered that, in fact, a
fruiterer, carrying upon his head a large basket of
apples, had nearly thrown me down, by accident, as we
passed from the Rue C—— into the thoroughfare
where we stood; but what had this to do with Chantilly
I could not possibly understand.
There was not a particle of
charlatanerie about Dupin. "I will explain," he said,
"and, that you may comprehend all clearly, we will
first retrace the course of your meditations, from the
moment in which I spoke to you until that of the
rencontre with the fruiterer in question. The larger
links of the chain run thus — Chantilly, Orion,
Dr. Nichols, Epicurus, Stereotomy, the street stones,
the fruiterer."
There are few persons who have not, at
some period of their lives, amused themselves in
retracing the steps by which particular conclusions of
their own minds have been attained. The occupation is
often full of interest; and he who attempts it for the
first time is astonished by the apparently illimitable
distance and incoherence between the starting-point and
the goal. What, then, must have been my amazement when
I heard the Frenchman speak what he had just spoken,
and when I could not help acknowledging that he had
spoken the truth. He continued:
"We had been talking of horses, if I
remember right, just before leaving the Rue C—.
This was the last subject that we discussed. As we
crossed into this street, a fruiterer, with a large
basket upon his head, brushing quickly past us, thrust
you upon a pile of paving-stones collected at a spot
where the causeway is undergoing repair. You stepped
upon one of the loose fragments, slipped, slightly
strained your ankle, appeared vexed or sulky, muttered
a few words, turned to look at the pile, and then
proceeded in silence. I was not particularly attentive
to what you did; but observation has become with me, of
late, a species of necessity.
"You kept your eyes upon the ground
— glancing, with a petulant expression, at the
holes and ruts in the pavement (so that I saw you were
still thinking of the stones), until we reached the
little alley called Lamartine, which has been paved, by
way of experiment with the overlapping and riveted
blocks. Here your countenance brightened up, and,
perceiving your lips move, I could not doubt that you
murmured the word 'stereotomy,' a term very affectedly
applied to this species of pavement. I knew that you
could not say to yourself 'stereotomy' without being
brought to think of atomies, and thus of the theories
of Epicurus; and since, when we discussed this subject
not very long ago I mentioned to you how singularly,
yet with how little notice the vague guesses of that
noble Greek had met with confirmation in the late
nebular cosmogony, I felt that you could not avoid
casting your eyes upward to the great nebula in Orion,
and I certainly expected that you would do so. You did
look up; and I was now assured that I had correctly
followed your steps. But in that bitter tirade upon
Chantilly, which appeared in yesterday's Musée,
the satirists, making some disgraceful allusions to the
cobbler's change of name upon assuming the buskin,
quoted a Latin line about which we have often
conversed. I mean the line
'Perdidit antiquum litera prima sonum.'
"I had told you that this was in
reference to Orion, formerly written
Urion; and, from certain pungencies connected with the
explanation, I was aware that you could not have
forgotten it. It was clear, therefore, that you would
not fail to combine the two ideas of Orion and
Chantilly. That you did combine them I saw by the
character of the smile which passed over your lips. You
thought of the poor Cobbler's immolation. So far, you
had been stooping in your gait; but now I saw you draw
yourself up to your full height. I was then sure that
you reflected upon the diminutive figure of Chantilly.
At this point I interrupted your meditations to remark
that as, in fact, he was a very little fellow —
that Chantilly — he would do better at the
Théatre des
This feat is paralleled in the Sherlock
Holmes story entitled "The Resident Patient":
"Finding that Holmes was too absorbed
for conversation, I had tossed aside the barren paper,
and leaning back in my chair, I fell into a brown
study. Suddenly my companion's voice broke in upon my
thoughts.
"You are right, Watson," said he. "It
does seem a very preposterous way of settling a
dispute."
"Most preposterous!" I exclaimed, and
then, suddenly realizing how he had echoed the inmost
thought of my soul, I sat up in my chair and stared at
him in blank amazement.
"What is this, Holmes?" I cried. "This
is beyond anything which I could have imagined."
He laughed heartily at my perplexity.
"You remember," said he, "that some
little time ago, when I read you the passage in one of
Poe's sketches, in which a close reasoner follows the
unspoken thoughts of his companion, you were inclined
to treat the matter as a mere tour de force of
the author. On my remarking that I was constantly in
the habit of doing the same thing you expressed
incredulity."
"Oh, no!"
"Perhaps not with your tongue, my dear
Watson, but certainly with your eyebrows. So when I saw
you throw down your paper and enter upon a train of
thought, I was very happy to have the opportunity of
reading it off, and eventually of breaking into it, as
a proof that I had been in rapport with you."
But I was still far from satisfied. "In
the example which you read to me," said I, "the
reasoner drew his conclusions from the actions of the
man whom he observed. If I remember right, he stumbled
over a heap of stones, looked up at the stars, and so
on. But I have been seated quietly in my chair, and
what clews can I have given you?"
"You do yourself an injustice. The
features are given to man as the means by which he
shall express his emotions, and yours are faithful
servants."
"Do you mean to say that you read my
train of thoughts from my features?"
"Your features, and especially your
eyes. Perhaps you cannot yourself recall how your
reverie commenced?"
"No, I cannot."
"Then I will tell you. After throwing
down your paper, which was the action which drew my
attention to you, you sat for half a minute with a
vacant expression. Then your eyes fixed themselves upon
your newly-framed picture of General Gordon, and I saw
by the alteration in your face that a train of thought
had been started. But it did not lead very far. Your
eyes turned across to the unframed portrait of Henry
Ward Beecher which stands upon the top of your books.
You then glanced up at the wall, and of course your
meaning was obvious. You were thinking that if the
portrait were framed it would just cover that bare
space and correspond with Gordon's picture over there."
"You have followed me wonderfully!" I
exclaimed.
"So far I could hardly have gone astray.
But now your thoughts went back to Beecher, and you
looked hard across as if you were studying the
character in his features. Then your eyes ceased to
pucker, but you continued to look across, and your face
was thoughtful. You were recalling the incidents of
Beecher's career. I was well aware that you could not
do this without thinking of the mission which he
undertook on behalf of the North at the time of the
Civil War, for I remember you expressing your
passionate indignation at the way in which he was
received by the more turbulent of our people. You felt
so strongly about it that I knew you could not think of
Beecher without thinking of that also. When a moment
later I saw your eyes wander away from the picture, I
suspected that your mind had now turned to the Civil
War, and when I
observed that your lips set, your eyes sparkled, and
your hands clinched, I was positive that you were
indeed thinking of the gallantry which was shown by
both sides in that desperate struggle. But then, again,
your face grew sadder; you shook your head. You were
dwelling upon the sadness and horror and useless waste
of life. Your hand stole towards your own old wound,
and a smile quivered on your lips, which showed me that
the ridiculous side of this method of settling
international questions had forced itself upon your
mind. At this point I agreed with you that it was
preposterous, and was glad to find that all my
deductions had been correct."
"Absolutely!" said I. "And now that you
have explained it, I confess that I am as amazed as
before."
"It was very superficial, my dear
Watson, I assure you. I should not have intruded it
upon your attention had you not shown some incredulity
the other day. But the evening has brought a breeze
with it. What do you say to a ramble through London?"
(End of Chapter X)