minnbanya/nlp-a2-sherlock · Datasets at Hugging Face

text stringlengths 0 88
extraordinary powers. His rooms were brilliantly lit, and, even as I
looked up, I saw his tall, spare figure pass twice in a dark silhouette
against the blind. He was pacing the room swiftly, eagerly, with his
head sunk upon his chest and his hands clasped behind him. To me, who
knew his every mood and habit, his attitude and manner told their own
story. He was at work again. He had risen out of his drug-created
dreams and was hot upon the scent of some new problem. I rang the bell
and was shown up to the chamber which had formerly been in part my own.

His manner was not effusive. It seldom was; but he was glad, I think,
to see me. With hardly a word spoken, but with a kindly eye, he waved
me to an armchair, threw across his case of cigars, and indicated a
spirit case and a gasogene in the corner. Then he stood before the fire
and looked me over in his singular introspective fashion.

“Wedlock suits you,” he remarked. “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
someone 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 right 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.”

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 armchair. “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. By the way, since you are interested in these
little problems, and since you are good enough to chronicle one or two
of my trifling experiences, you may be interested in this.” He threw
over a sheet of thick, pink-tinted notepaper which had been lying open
upon the table. “It came by the last post,” said he. “Read it aloud.”

The note was undated, and without either signature or address.

“There will call upon you to-night, at a quarter to eight o’clock,” it
said, “a gentleman who desires to consult you upon a matter of the very
deepest moment. Your recent services to one of the royal houses of
Europe have shown that you are one who may safely be trusted with
matters which are of an importance which can hardly be exaggerated.
This account of you we have from all quarters received. Be in your
chamber then at that hour, and do not take it amiss if your visitor
wear a mask.”

“This is indeed a mystery,” I remarked. “What do you imagine that it
means?”

“I have no data yet. It is a capital mistake to theorise before one has
data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of
theories to suit facts. But the note itself. What do you deduce from
it?”

extraordinary powers. His rooms were brilliantly lit, and, even as I

looked up, I saw his tall, spare figure pass twice in a dark silhouette

against the blind. He was pacing the room swiftly, eagerly, with his

head sunk upon his chest and his hands clasped behind him. To me, who

knew his every mood and habit, his attitude and manner told their own

story. He was at work again. He had risen out of his drug-created

dreams and was hot upon the scent of some new problem. I rang the bell

and was shown up to the chamber which had formerly been in part my own.

His manner was not effusive. It seldom was; but he was glad, I think,

to see me. With hardly a word spoken, but with a kindly eye, he waved

me to an armchair, threw across his case of cigars, and indicated a

spirit case and a gasogene in the corner. Then he stood before the fire

and looked me over in his singular introspective fashion.

“Wedlock suits you,” he remarked. “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

someone 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 right 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.”

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 armchair. “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. By the way, since you are interested in these

little problems, and since you are good enough to chronicle one or two

of my trifling experiences, you may be interested in this.” He threw

over a sheet of thick, pink-tinted notepaper which had been lying open

upon the table. “It came by the last post,” said he. “Read it aloud.”

The note was undated, and without either signature or address.

“There will call upon you to-night, at a quarter to eight o’clock,” it

said, “a gentleman who desires to consult you upon a matter of the very

deepest moment. Your recent services to one of the royal houses of

Europe have shown that you are one who may safely be trusted with

matters which are of an importance which can hardly be exaggerated.

This account of you we have from all quarters received. Be in your

chamber then at that hour, and do not take it amiss if your visitor

wear a mask.”

“This is indeed a mystery,” I remarked. “What do you imagine that it

means?”

“I have no data yet. It is a capital mistake to theorise before one has

data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of

theories to suit facts. But the note itself. What do you deduce from

it?”