The Misadventure of Shelrock Holmes Read Online Free Page B
Author: Anthology
Tags: Detective and Mystery Stories, Holmes, Sir, Sherlock (Fictitious character) -- Fiction, 1859-1930, Arthur Conan, Doyle
Buffalo and Sfobbareen, Ireland, under the name Altamont; received Congressional Medal for services to U. S. Government in so-called "Adventure of the American Ambassador and the Thermite Bullet"; diamond sword from King Albert of Belgium, 1916; and Versailles Plaque (with palms}. Club: Diogenes. Author: Monographs, "Upon the Typewriter and Its Relation to Crime'; "Upon the Distinction Between the Ashes of the Various Tobaccos — 140 Forms of Cigar, Cigarette and Pipe Tobaccos," ill. with colored plates; "Upon the Influence of a Trade on the Form of a Hand," ill. with lithotypes; "Upon the Tracing of Footsteps"; "Upon the Dating of Documents"; "Upon Tattoo Mar^s"; "Upon the Polyphonic Motets of Lassus" and "Upon Variations in the Human Ear" (two issues of "The Anthropological Journal"); two short accounts of cases: "The Adventure of the Blanched Soldier" and "The Adventure of the Lion's Mane"; "The Boo^ of Life" a magazine article on the theory of deduction, published anonymously, "Practical Handbook, of Bee Culture with Some Observations on the Segregation of the Queen." Assistant and narrator: Dr. John H. Watson. For celebrated cases see: A STUDY IN SCARLET
(1887); THE SIGN OF [THE] FOUR (1890); THE ADVENTURES OF SHERLOCK HOLMES (1892); MEMOIRS OF SHERLOCK HOLMES (1894); THE HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES (1902); THE RETURN OF SHERLOCK HOLMES (1905); THE VALLEY OF FEAR (1915); HIS LAST BOW (1917); THE CASE-BOOK OF SHERLOCK
HOLMES (1927). Hobbies: The violin, medieval music, boxing, fencing, bee-keeping, snapshooting and criminal law. Indulgences: cocaine, morphine and shag tobacco. Residences: Montague Street, near the British Museum, London till 1881; 22iB Ba^er St., London till 1903, Sussex and,
later, Devonshire.
Prepared by KENNETH MACGOWAN
PART ONE:
BY DETECTIVE-STORY WRITERS
"Though he might be more humble, there's no
police like Holmes."
— E. W. HORNUNG
Detective: SHERLAW KOMBS Narrator: WHATSON
THE GREAT PEGRAM MYSTERY
by ROBERT BARR
Here is one of the earliest — and still, in your Editors' opinion, one of the finest — parodies of Sherlock^ Holmes. It appeared less than a year after the publication of the first Sherloc^ Holmes short story.
"The Great Pegram Mystery" has an interesting bibliographic history. It broke into print in the May 1892 issue of "The Idler Magazine" (London and New Yorf(), edited — do you remember? — by Jerome K. Jerome and Robert Barr. Originally it was called "Detective Stories Gone Wrong: The Adventures of Sherlaw Kombs," and was signed by the pen-name of Lu\e Sharp. Two years later, under its present title, it appeared in Robert Barr's boot^ of short stories, THE FACE AND THE MASK (London, Hutchinson, 189^; New Yor^, Stores, 7895) — and thus the true authorship was acknowledged.
Mr. Barr's parody reveals a shrewd grasp of the character of Sherloc/^ Holmes and an equally penetrating comprehension of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's style. You will recognize the inexorable sequence of idiosyncrasies and events — the violin, the contempt for Scotland Yard, the anticipated visitor, the extraordinary deductions, and the minute examination of the scene of the crime by magnifying glass. Alas! only the solution fails to follow the time-honored pattern!
It is especially fitting that Mr. Barr's burlesque be the chronological leader in our Pageant of Parodies. For Mr. Barr made his indelible mar\ in serious detective fiction too. His historically important booJ^, THE TRIUMPHS OF EUGENE VALMONT (London, Hurst & Blac\ett, 7906; New YorJ^, Appleton, 1906), gave us "The Absent-Minded Coterie" one of the truly great classics among detective short stories.
THE GREAT PEGRAM MYSTERY
I
_ DROPPED in on my friend, Sherlaw Kombs, to hear what he had to say about the Pegram mystery, as it had come to be called in the newspapers. I found him playing the violin with a look of sweet peace and serenity on his face, which I never noticed on the countenances of those within hearing distance. I knew
(1887); THE SIGN OF [THE] FOUR (1890); THE ADVENTURES OF SHERLOCK HOLMES (1892); MEMOIRS OF SHERLOCK HOLMES (1894); THE HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES (1902); THE RETURN OF SHERLOCK HOLMES (1905); THE VALLEY OF FEAR (1915); HIS LAST BOW (1917); THE CASE-BOOK OF SHERLOCK
HOLMES (1927). Hobbies: The violin, medieval music, boxing, fencing, bee-keeping, snapshooting and criminal law. Indulgences: cocaine, morphine and shag tobacco. Residences: Montague Street, near the British Museum, London till 1881; 22iB Ba^er St., London till 1903, Sussex and,
later, Devonshire.
Prepared by KENNETH MACGOWAN
PART ONE:
BY DETECTIVE-STORY WRITERS
"Though he might be more humble, there's no
police like Holmes."
— E. W. HORNUNG
Detective: SHERLAW KOMBS Narrator: WHATSON
THE GREAT PEGRAM MYSTERY
by ROBERT BARR
Here is one of the earliest — and still, in your Editors' opinion, one of the finest — parodies of Sherlock^ Holmes. It appeared less than a year after the publication of the first Sherloc^ Holmes short story.
"The Great Pegram Mystery" has an interesting bibliographic history. It broke into print in the May 1892 issue of "The Idler Magazine" (London and New Yorf(), edited — do you remember? — by Jerome K. Jerome and Robert Barr. Originally it was called "Detective Stories Gone Wrong: The Adventures of Sherlaw Kombs," and was signed by the pen-name of Lu\e Sharp. Two years later, under its present title, it appeared in Robert Barr's boot^ of short stories, THE FACE AND THE MASK (London, Hutchinson, 189^; New Yor^, Stores, 7895) — and thus the true authorship was acknowledged.
Mr. Barr's parody reveals a shrewd grasp of the character of Sherloc/^ Holmes and an equally penetrating comprehension of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's style. You will recognize the inexorable sequence of idiosyncrasies and events — the violin, the contempt for Scotland Yard, the anticipated visitor, the extraordinary deductions, and the minute examination of the scene of the crime by magnifying glass. Alas! only the solution fails to follow the time-honored pattern!
It is especially fitting that Mr. Barr's burlesque be the chronological leader in our Pageant of Parodies. For Mr. Barr made his indelible mar\ in serious detective fiction too. His historically important booJ^, THE TRIUMPHS OF EUGENE VALMONT (London, Hurst & Blac\ett, 7906; New YorJ^, Appleton, 1906), gave us "The Absent-Minded Coterie" one of the truly great classics among detective short stories.
THE GREAT PEGRAM MYSTERY
I
_ DROPPED in on my friend, Sherlaw Kombs, to hear what he had to say about the Pegram mystery, as it had come to be called in the newspapers. I found him playing the violin with a look of sweet peace and serenity on his face, which I never noticed on the countenances of those within hearing distance. I knew
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