This looks like one of those unwelcome social summonses which call upon a man either to be bored or to lie.
He burst into one of his rare fits of laughter as he turned away from the picture. I have not heard him laugh often, and it has always boded ill to somebody.
Oh how I’ve missed you, Holmes.
I have heard, Mr. Holmes, that you can see deeply into the manifold wickedness of the human heart.
There is danger for him who taketh the tiger cub, and danger also for whoso snatches a delusion from a woman.
Never trust to general impressions, my boy, but concentrate yourself upon details.
I suppose I shall have to compound a felony, as usual. – Sherlock Holmes.
You wish to put me in the dark. I tell you that I will never be put in the dark. You wish to beat me. I tell you that you will never beat me.
It is all in the way of professional experience. – Sherlock Holmes.
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.
I should be very much obliged if you would slip your revolver into your pocket. An Eley’s No. 2 is an excellent argument with gentlemen who can twist steel pokers into knots. That and a tooth-brush are, I think, all that we need.
Picnics are very dear to those who are in the first stage of the tender passion.
You have been in Afghanistan I perceive.
Circumstantial evidence is a very tricky thing. It may seem to point very straight to one thing, but if you shift your own point of view a little, you may find it pointing in an equally uncompromising manner to something entirely different.
Beyond the obvious facts that he has at some time done manual labour, that he takes snuff, that he is a Freemason, that he has been in China, and that he has done a considerable amount of writing lately, I can deduce nothing else.
To the man who loves art for its own sake, it is frequently in its least important and lowliest manifestations that the keenest pleasure is to be derived.
Some facts should be suppressed, or, at least, a just sense of proportion should be observed in treating them.
Circumstantial evidence is occasionally very convincing, as when you find a trout in the milk, to quote Thoreau’s example.
The most difficult crime to track is the one which is purposeless.
I never guess. It is a shocking habit destructive to the logical faculty.