We all learn by experience, and your lesson this time is that you should never lose sight of the alternative. Sherlock Holmes speaking with Dr. Watson.

Philosophy, astronomy, and politics were marked at zero, I remember. Botany variable, geology profound as regards the mud stains from any region within fifty miles of town, chemistry eccentric, anatomy unsystematic, sensational literature and crime records unique, violin player, boxer, swordsman, lawyer, and self-poisoner by cocaine and tobacco.

I am an omnivorous reader with a strangely retentive memory for trifles.

A client is to me a mere unit, a factor in a problem.

All right, Watson. Don’t look so scared,” he muttered in a very weak voice. “It’s not as bad as it seems.” “Thank God for that!” “I’m a bit of a single-stick expert, as you know. I took most of them on my guard. It was the second man that was too much for me.” “What can I do, Holmes? Of course, it was that damned fellow who set them on. I’ll go and thrash the hide off him if you give the word.” “Good old Watson!(...)

I never can resist a touch of the dramatic.

To a great mind, nothing is little,' remarked Holmes, sententiously.