Arthur Conan Doyle
Books and Quotes Collection
A Study in Scarlet
1887The Sign of the Four
1890The White Company
1891
"What was that?" he asked, as a hissing, sharp-drawn voice seemed to whisper in his ear. The steersman smiled, and pointed with his foot to where a short heavy cross-bow quarrel stuck quivering in the boards.
[O]f a sudden the trees began to thin and the sward to spread out onto a broad, green lawn, where five cows lay in the sunshine and droves of black swine wandered unchecked.
"MY dear fellow," said Sherlock Holmes, as we sat on either side of the fire in his lodgings at Baker-street, "life is infinitely stranger than anything which the mind of man could invent. We would not dare to conceive the things which are really mere commonplaces of existence. […]"
He is as brave as a bulldog and as tenacious as a lobster if he gets his claws upon anyone.
The Passing
1898
Fire burst from its open mouth, its eyes glowed with a smouldering glare, its muzzle and hackles and dewlap were outlined in flickering flame.
But it was not the sight of her body, nor yet was it the body of Hugo Baskerville lying near her, which raised the hair upon the heads of these three daredevil roysterers, but it was that, standing over Hugo, and plucking at his throat, there stood a foul thing, a great, black beast, shaped like a hound, yet larger than any hound that ever mortal eye has rested upon.'
These, though known for their valour and their breed, were whimpering in a cluster at the head of a deep dip or goyal, as we call it, upon the moor, some slinking away and some, with starting hackles and staring eyes, gazing down the narrow valley before them. "The company had come to a halt, more sober men, as you may guess, than when they started. The most of them would by no means advance, but three of them, the boldest, or it may be the most drunken, rode forward down the goyal.
Somewhere in the heart of the great Grimpen Mire, down in the foul slime of the huge morass which had sucked him in, this cold and cruel-hearted man is for ever buried.
A cold wind swept down from it and set us shivering. Somewhere there, on that desolate plain, was lurking this fiendish man, hiding in a burrow like a wild beast, his heart full of malignancy against the whole race which had cast him out.
Mortimer had stayed to dinner, and he and the baronet played ecarte afterwards.
And while the revellers stood aghast at the fury of the man, one more wicked or, it may be, more drunken than the rest, cried out that they should put the hounds upon her.
I was up betimes in the morning, but Holmes was afoot earlier still, for I saw him as I dressed, coming up the drive.
The Lost World
1912
We all stopped to examine that monstrous spoor. If it were indeed a bird - and what animal could leave such a mark? - its foot was so much larger than an ostrich's that its height upon the same scale must be enormous.
The affluents of the Amazon are, half of them, of this nature, while the other half are whitish and opaque, the difference depending upon the class of country through which they have flowed.
"He's a hard nail, is Jack, and a dead shot, too, but you can't leave a Grand National winner to die like that - what?"
"And that the germ plasm is different from the parthenogenetic egg?" "Why, surely!" I cried, and gloried in my own audacity.
Once some bandy-legged, lurching creature, an ant-eater or a bear, scuttled clumsily amid the shadows.
Even Challenger was affected by the consideration that his enemies would never stand confuted if the confirmation of his statements should never reach those who had doubted them.
Like a dado round the room was the jutting line of splendid heavy game-heads, the best of their sort from every quarter of the world, with the rare white rhinoceros of the Lado Enclave drooping its supercilious lip above them all.
"This is a Bland's .577 axite express," said he. "I got that big fellow with it." He glanced up at the white rhinoceros.
"Second one vamped up for the occasion. If you are clever and know your business you can fake a bone as easily as you can a photograph."
All the paper that I possess consists of five old note-books and a lot of scraps, and I have only the one stylographic pencil; but so long as I can move my hand I will continue to set down our experiences and impressions[.]
The Valley of Fear
1915
Well, that's because he daren't trust you. But in his heart he is not a loyal brother. We know that well. So we watch him and we wait for the time to admonish him.
MacDonald shook his head. “Man, you are surely travelling overfast,” said he. “I have heard no evidence yet that any stranger was ever in the house at all.”
"Say, McMurdo," said he, "I remembered your address, so I made bold to call. I'm surprised that you've not reported to the bodymaster...
Should I ever marry, Watson, I should hope to inspire my wife with some feeling which would prevent her from being walked off by a housekeeper when my corpse was lying within a few yards of her. It was badly stage-managed; for even the rawest investigators must be struck by the absence of the usual feminine ululation.
The magistrate could not possibly, on the evidence, have held them for a higher court. On the one hand the compositors and pressmen were forced to admit that the light was uncertain, that they were themselves much perturbed, and that it was difficult for them to swear to the identity of the assailants; although they believed that the accused were among them. Cross examined by the clever attorney who had been engaged by McGinty, they were even more nebulous in their evidence.
"Dear me, Mr. Holmes. Dear me!" said this singular epistle. There was neither superscription nor signature. I laughed at the quaint message; but Holmes showed unwonted seriousness.
"What the hell is it to you who are my friends?" roared McMurdo in a voice which brought every head in the carriage round to witness the altercation.
The Land of Mist
1926
"Whilst he was sawing the beam, however, a fire broke out among the debris around him, and though he persevered most manfully, and continued until he was himself badly scorched, it was impossible for him to save Beale, who probably died from suffocation."
Only Enid could dare him at such a time, and even she felt occasionally that sinking of the heart which the bravest of tamers may experience as he unbars the gate of the cage.
His was the end house of a cul-de-sac, with the side wall of a huge brewery beyond.
"The humble dung-beetle was at least a fact. All this psychic stuff is not." "No doubt you have good grounds for your views," chirped the mischievous Millworthy, a mild youth with a velvety manner.
"Why, you're shakin' all over!" "I suppose I wouldn't be a medium if I wasn't high strung."