Am I alone in being disturbed that in the Sherlock Holmes story The Adventure of the Beryl Coronet, nobody comments on the extreme abuse of public trust on the part of the man who pawns an item of the Crown Jewels (or similar), and the criminal implication of Holmes' client in accepting the coronet as collateral for a loan? Would a Victorian reader have viewed such embezzlement as an acceptable practice?
And that in The Adventure of the Speckled Band, a coroner can't spot snakebite wounds and the effects of a toxin, that a poker abruptly bent and straightened doesn't snap, that Watson is apprehensive about a cheetah, gentlest of the big cats, and that Dr Roylott recalls his snake from a mission with a whistle? Oh, and the older Miss Stoner, dying of a neurotoxin, scared silly, and needing to open her locked bedroom door, is still grasping a used match in one hand and the box in the other when she dies?
And that the Red-Headed League obligingly dissolve their cover society a few days before the robbery, prompting Wilson to tip Holmes off, rather than running it for a few more days?
And that the mud in Dartmoor, of all places, can allegedly trap and drown a pony?
And that Holmes never admits that he's in love with Watson?
(misclick)
Dartmoor can do that.
They parachuted a jeep into Fox Tor Mire in front of observers in WW2 and never found it
I've seen Dartmoor swallow a Hillman Imp - later winched out of the mire.
I'm apprehensive around house cats so I'm with Watson on the unreliability of cheetahs. Though I have had a close encounter with a cheetah and it was amazingly affectionate. Apparently cheetahs share with house cats the ability to identify the person in the room least happy to be around them and then focus all of their attention on that person :)
I have seen an iron poker bent and straightened with no obvious ill effect.
Miss Stoner is clearly of the same ilk as some of the characters in my RPG campaigns who have claimed to be holding a sword, shield, lock-pick, torch and door wedge and to be able to use all of them at once , often to affect something happening 30 feet from their declared position. :)
QuoteAm I alone in being disturbed that in the Sherlock Holmes story The Adventure of the Beryl Coronet, nobody comments on the extreme abuse of public trust on the part of the man who pawns an item of the Crown Jewels (or similar), and the criminal implication of Holmes' client in accepting the coronet as collateral for a loan? Would a Victorian reader have viewed such embezzlement as an acceptable practice?
And that in The Adventure of the Speckled Band, a coroner can't spot snakebite wounds and the effects of a toxin, that a poker abruptly bent and straightened doesn't snap, that Watson is apprehensive about a cheetah, gentlest of the big cats, and that Dr Roylott recalls his snake from a mission with a whistle? Oh, and the older Miss Stoner, dying of a neurotoxin, scared silly, and needing to open her locked bedroom door, is still grasping a used match in one hand and the box in the other when she dies?
And that the Red-Headed League obligingly dissolve their cover society a few days before the robbery, prompting Wilson to tip Holmes off, rather than running it for a few more days?
Yes you are.
Beryl Coronet - lots of ducal coronets in the Victorian age - indeed a few here in 1953
(https://www.yorkshirepost.co.uk/webimg/b25lY21zOjQ1OTdhMDk5LWFmOGUtNDRmMi04MDUxLTgyNDFmYzM1NWIwNzowNTNjN2VmZS00NGFmLTQzMjYtOTVmZC1iZjllZmM5YjcwNjg=.jpg?width=640&quality=65&smart)
Speckled Band - English coroner not likely to look for snake bites; metal is malleable; cheetahs are carnivores; people dying do funny things
Red Headed League - get rid of potential witnesses
Hound of the Baskervilles -
(https://i2-prod.dailystar.co.uk/incoming/article15897256.ece/ALTERNATES/s615b/0_561d0d2c32814_SWNS_HORSE_SINKHOLE_07)https://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/latest-news/one-tonne-shire-horse-falls-17207983 (https://www.dailystar.co.uk/news/latest-news/one-tonne-shire-horse-falls-17207983)
Quote from: FierceKitty on 29 December 2022, 09:55:27 AMAnd that Holmes never admits that he's in love with Watson?
He does it all the time. He just does it in moderate language. I assume the whole point of this post is the rather childish assertion that Holmes and Watson were gay. Neither a unique observation, nor mature, nor comedic.
I understood that, at your entreaty, we were to refrain from commenting on each other's posts.
"Entreaty"? Hardly.
I apologise. I was merely addressing your query.