… has a hunting crop convenient to hand for whipping fathers conning their daughters into—
wait, Holmes has a hunting crop in his and Watson’s lodgings in London where horses are not generally available to ride and yet it’s convenient to hand?
I often find myself muttering, “What are we supposed to think, Doyle? What are we supposed to think?”
… cares not for your privacy, Victorian Age or no.
Nor about the fact that right here would be a good point for someone to take a head shot.
… and his friend Dr. Watson are totally not laughing at you.
Context: “The Red-Headed League.” Which is all kinds of hilarious.
… can convince three otherwise canine-amiable men to watch him poison a dog in the name of science! detection.
Context: A Study in Scarlet, and it has more than a character development point to it. Also, the dog is old. Watson made sure that we knew that before the scene in question.
Context: A Study in Scarlet, when Stamford introduces Dr. Watson to Mr. Sherlock Holmes. And it never occurs to Watson, “Hmm! I wonder why he hasn’t found a roommate yet.” Of course, Stamford did tell Watson that Holmes goes about beating on corpses (to observe how bruising occurs after death), and Watson seems fine with this, or at least so bored out of his skull after abject failure in the army that a crazy roommate is preferable to running down his finances in a lonely hotel room.
By the by, based on Holmes’ somewhat Cloud Cuckoo Lander personality in A Study in Scarlet, some people have “diagnosed” him with some form or other of ADD. That cocaine apparently calms him down and allows him to concentrate in later years, as opposed to making him hyperactive1, would seem to support such a theory.
