The Hound of the Baskervilles.
Sidney Paget, Strand Magazine, 1901
Such is the tale, my sons, of the coming of the hound which is said to have plagued the family so sorely ever since. If I have set it down it is because that which is clearly known hath less terror than that which is but hinted at and guessed. Nor can it be denied that many of the family have been unhappy in their deaths, which have been sudden, bloody, and mysterious. Yet may we shelter ourselves in the infinite goodness of Providence, which would not for ever punish the innocent beyond that third or fourth generation which is threatened in Holy Writ. To that Providence, my sons, I hereby commend you, and I counsel you by way of caution to forbear from crossing the moor in those dark hours when the powers of evil are exalted.34 [This from Hugo Baskerville35 to his sons Rodger and John, with instructions that they say nothing thereof to their sister Elizabeth.]
Cromlech near Drewsteignton.
An Exploration of Dartmoor, by J. Ll. W. Page (1895)
“There in the centre lay the unhappy maid where she had fallen.”
Sidney Paget, Strand Magazine, 1901
“It was that, standing over Hugo, and plucking at his throat, there stood a great, black beast.”
Richard Gutschmidt, Der Hund von Baskerville (Stuttgart: Robert Lutz Verlag, 1903)
When Dr. Mortimer had finished reading this singular narrative he pushed his spectacles up on his forehead and stared across at Mr. Sherlock Holmes. The latter yawned and tossed the end of his cigarette into the fire.
“Well?” said he.
“Do you not find it interesting?”
“To a collector of fairy-tales.”
Dr. Mortimer drew a folded newspaper out of his pocket. “Now, Mr. Holmes, we will give you something a little more recent. This is the Devon County Chronicle of June36 14th of this year. It is a short account of the facts elicited at the death of Sir Charles Baskerville which occurred a few days before that date.”
My friend leaned a little forward and his expression became intent. Our visitor readjusted his glasses and began:
The recent sudden death of Sir Charles Baskerville, whose name has been mentioned as the probable Liberal37 candidate for Mid-Devon38 at the next election, has cast a gloom over the county. Though Sir Charles had resided at Baskerville Hall for a comparatively short period his amiability of character and extreme generosity had won the affection and respect of all who had been brought into contact with him. In these days of nouveaux riches it is refreshing to find a case where the scion of an old county family which has fallen upon evil days is able to make his own fortune and to bring it back with him to restore the fallen grandeur of his line. Sir Charles, as is well known, made large sums of money in South African speculation. More wise than those who go on until the wheel turns against them, he realized his gains and returned to England with them. It is only two years since he took up his residence at Baskerville Hall, and it is common talk how large were those schemes of reconstruction and improvement which have been interrupted by his death. Being himself childless, it was his openly-expressed desire that the whole countryside should, within his own lifetime, profit by his good fortune, and many will have personal reasons for bewailing his untimely end. His generous donations to local and county charities have been frequently chronicled in these columns.
“The circumstances connected with the death of Sir Charles cannot be said to have been entirely cleared up by the inquest, but at least enough has been done to dispose of those rumours to which local superstition has given rise. There is no reason whatever to suspect foul play, or to imagine that death could be from any but natural causes. Sir Charles was a widower, and a man who may be said to have been in some ways of an eccentric habit of mind. In spite of his considerable wealth he was simple in his personal tastes, and his indoor servants at Baskerville Hall consisted of a married couple named Barrymore, the husband acting as butler and the wife as housekeeper. Their evidence, corroborated by that of several friends, tends to show that Sir Charles’s health has for some time has been impaired, and points especially to some affection of the heart, manifesting itself in changes of colour, breathlessness, and acute attacks of nervous depression. Dr. James Mortimer, the friend and medical attendant of the deceased, has given evidence to the same effect.
The facts of the case are simple. Sir Charles Baskerville was in the habit every night before going to bed of walking down the famous Yew Alley of Baskerville Hall. The evidence of the Barrymores shows that this had been his custom. On the 4th of June Sir Charles had declared his intention of starting next day for London, and had ordered Barrymore to prepare his luggage. That night he went out as usual for his nocturnal walk, in the course of which he was in the habit of smoking a cigar. He never returned. At twelve o’clock Barrymore, finding the hall door still open, became alarmed and, lighting a lantern, went in search of his master. The day had been wet, and Sir Charles’s footmarks were easily traced down the Alley, and it was at the far end of it that his body was discovered. One fact which has not been explained is the statement of Barrymore that his master’s footprints altered their character from the time that he passed the moor-gate, and that he appeared from thence onwards to have been walking on his toes. One Murphy, a gipsy horse-dealer, was on the moor at no great distance at the time, but he appears by his own confession to have been the worse for drink. He declares that he heard cries, but is unable to state from what direction they came. No signs of violence were to be discovered upon Sir Charles’s person and though the doctor’s evidence pointed to an almost incredible facial distortion—so great that Dr. Mortimer refused at first to believe that it was indeed his friend and patient who lay before him—it was explained that this is a symptom which is not unusual in cases of dyspnœa39 and death from cardiac exhaustion. This explanation was borne out by the post-mortem examination, which showed long standing organic disease, and the coroner’s jury returned a verdict in accordance with the medical evidence.40 It is well that this is so, for it is obviously of the utmost importance that Sir Charles’s heir should settle at the Hall, and continue the good work which has been so sadly interrupted. Had the prosaic finding of the coroner not finally put an end to the romantic stories which have been whispered in connection with the affair, it might have been difficult to find a tennant for Baskerville Hall. It is understood that the next-of-kin is Mr. Henry Baskerville, if he be still alive, the son of Sir Charles Baskerville’s younger brother. The young man, when last heard of, was in America, and inquiries are being instituted with a view to informing him of his good fortune.
“His body was discovered.”
Sidney Paget, Strand Magazine, 1901
Dr. Mortimer refolded his paper and replaced it in his pocket.
“Those are the public facts, Mr. Holmes, in connection with the death of Sir Charles Baskerville.”
“I must thank you,” said Sherlock Holmes, “for calling my attention to a case which certainly presents some features of interest. I had observed some newspaper comment at the time, but I was exceedingly preoccupied by that little affair of the Vatican cameos, and in my anxiety to oblige the Pope41 I lost touch with several interesting English cases. This article, you say, contains all the public facts?”
“It does.”
“Then let me have the private ones.” He leaned back, put his finger-tips together, and assumed his most impassive and judicial expression.
“In doing so,” said Dr. Mortimer, who had begun to show signs of strong emotion, “I am telling that which I have not confided to anyone. My motive for withholding it from the coroner’s inquiry is that a man of science shrinks from placing himself in the public position of seeming to indorse a popular superstition. I had the further motive that the Baskerville Hall, as the paper says, would certainly remain untenanted if anything were done to increase its already rather grim reputation. For both these reasons I thought that I was justified in telling rather less than I knew, since no practical good could result from it,
but with you there is no reason why I should not be perfectly frank.
“The moor is very sparsely inhabited, and those who live near each other are thrown very much together. For this reason I saw a good deal of Sir Charles Baskerville. With the exception of Mr. Frankland, of Lafter Hall, and Mr. Stapleton, the naturalist, there are no other men of education within many miles. Sir Charles was a retiring man, but the chance of his illness brought us together, and a community of interests in science kept us so. He had brought back much scientific information from South Africa, and many a charming evening we have spent together discussing the comparative anatomy of the Bushman and the Hottentot.42
“Within the last few months it became increasingly plain to me that Sir Charles’s nervous system was strained to breaking point. He had taken this legend which I have read you exceedingly to heart—so much so that, although he would walk in his own grounds, nothing would induce him to go out upon the moor at night. Incredible as it may appear to you, Mr. Holmes, he was honestly convinced that a dreadful fate overhung his family, and certainly the records which he was able to give of his ancestors were not encouraging. The idea of some ghastly presence constantly haunted him, and on more than one occasion he has asked me whether I had on my medical journeys at night ever seen any strange creature or heard the baying of a hound. The latter question he put to me several times, and always with a voice which vibrated with excitement.
“I can well remember driving up to his house in the evening, some three weeks before the fatal event. He chanced to be at his hall door. I had descended from my gig43 and was standing in front of him, when I saw his eyes fix themselves over my shoulder, and stare past me with an expression of the most dreadful horror. I whisked round and had just time to catch a glimpse of something which I took to be a large black calf passing at the head of the drive. So excited and alarmed was he that I was compelled to go down to the spot where the animal had been and look around for it. It was gone, however, and the incident appeared to make the worst impression upon his mind. I stayed with him all the evening and it was on that occasion, to explain the emotion which he had shown, that he confided to my keeping that narrative which I read to you when first I came. I mention this small episode because it assumes some importance in view of the tragedy which followed, but I was convinced at the time that the matter was entirely trivial and that his excitement had no justification.
“I saw his eyes fix themselves over my shoulder.”
Sidney Paget, Strand Magazine, 1901
“It was at my advice that Sir Charles was about to go to London. His heart was, I knew, affected, and the constant anxiety in which he lived, however chimerical the cause of it might be, was evidently having a serious effect upon his health. I thought that a few months among the distractions of town would send him back a new man. Mr. Stapleton, a mutual friend, who was much concerned at his state of health, was of the same opinion. At the last instant came this terrible catastrophe.
“On the night of Sir Charles’s death Barrymore the butler, who made the discovery, sent Perkins the groom on horseback to me, and as I was sitting up late I was able to reach Baskerville Hall within an hour of the event. I checked and corroborated all the facts which were mentioned at the inquest. I followed the footsteps down the Yew Alley, I saw the spot at the moor-gate where he seemed to have waited, I remarked the change in the shape of the prints after that point, I noted that there were no other footsteps save those of Barrymore on the soft gravel, and finally I carefully examined the body, which had not been touched until my arrival. Sir Charles lay on his face, his arms out, his fingers dug into the ground, and his features convulsed with some strong emotion to such an extent that I could hardly have sworn to his identity. There was certainly no physical injury of any kind. But one false statement was made by Barrymore at the inquest. He said that there were no traces upon the ground round the body. He did not observe any. But I did—some little distance off, but fresh and clear.”
“Sir Charles lay on his face, his arms out, his fingers dug into the ground . . .”
Richard Gutschmidt, Der Hund von Baskerville (Stuttgart: Robert Lutz Verlag, 1903)
“Footprints?”
H. T. Webster, New York Herald Tribune, April 16, 1938
“Footprints.”
“A man’s or a woman’s?”
Dr. Mortimer looked strangely at us for an instant, and his voice sank almost to a whisper as he answered:
“Mr. Holmes, they were the footprints of a gigantic hound!”44
26 Because Holmes evidently thinks that Mortimer is likely to have read this paper, it must have been published in a scientific journal that enjoyed wide circulation, reasons Walter Klinefelter, in “The Writings of Sherlock Holmes.” On the basis of H. W. Bell’s 1886 date for The Hound of the Baskervilles, Klinefelter ascribes Holmes’s “little monograph” to a period before that year. Tage LaCour, in Ex Bibliotheca Holmesiana, assigns it to 1887 and asserts that it is also mentioned in “The Golden Pince-Nez.” This latter point is incorrect; Holmes is found engrossed in a palimpsest, but he never mentions his monograph, even though “The Golden Pince-Nez” is unanimously dated long after the events of The Hound of the Baskervilles.
27 Arthur Godfrey, Editor of The Pictou Advocate, Pictou, Nova Scotia, in a letter to the Baker Street Journal, explains the rule for usage of the typographical symbol for a long “s” (ƒ): “The long ‘s’ was never used as the initial letter of a word if the capital ‘S’ was used, nor was it used at the end of a word. It occurred only in the body of a word, and it was there used (properly) exclusively, except where it was doubled, and then the second ‘s’ was a short one. For example, ‘miƒsed.’ ” As to the dating of the manuscript, Dr. Lionel K. J. Glassey, tutor in palaeography in the Department of History at the University of Glasgow, points out that the practice of alternately using the long and short “s” in documents is one dating from 1500 and that, by 1780, the practice had come to an end, placing the manuscript well within bounds.
28 If this were the “inch or two” of manuscript protruding from Dr. Mortimer’s pocket, it goes a long way toward explaining Holmes’s remarkable ability to give the date of the document “within a decade or so.”
29 Edward Hyde, first Earl of Clarendon (1609–1674), wrote History of the Rebellion and Civil Wars in England Begun in the Year 1641 (completed in 1674 but not published until 1702), the book to which the Baskerville manuscript evidently refers. Hyde served as Lord High Chancellor of England under Charles II and as Chancellor of the University of Oxford. In the judgement of the Encyclopædia Britannica (9th Ed.), “That he was a historian of wide grasp and deep insight cannot be maintained; his works are professedly pleadings on behalf of the Episcopalian Royalists and himself; but, though it would be too much to allege that his accuracy is never warped by his purpose, we may in general accept his statements of fact as correct.” Having survived this slight, History of the Rebellion is still in print today, in a multi-volume facsimile of the definitive 1888 edition, edited by W. Dunn Macray.
30 September 29, dedicated to the Archangel Michael and all angels.
31 Platters or plates for the service of meat.
32 In hunting, to cause the hounds to spread out before they are drawn to the “line” of the fox’s scent.
33 A gully or ravine.
34 See Appendix 3 for a discussion of the suggestion that Hugo is to be identified as Richard Cabell.
35 This Hugo appears to be the great-grandson of the Hugo of legend. If the events recounted took place at the time of the Great Rebellion (1641–1651) and the scroll, written at a time when writer Hugo had three children presumably old enough to read, is dated 1742, his birthdate would be approximately ninety years after the legendary Hugo’s, and thus he would likely be the fourth generation descended from him. We may assume that his son Rodger was an ancestor of the three Baskerville brothers; Charles, the unnamed man who was Henry’s father; and Rodger, the father of Vandeleur/Stapleton.
&n
bsp; 36 Curiously, the version of the newspaper account in the Strand Magazine has the date of the paper as May 14 and the date of death (later in the account) as May 4.
37 William Gladstone, the great Liberal Prime Minister, resumed the office in 1880. It was not until 1885 that Lord Salisbury, a Conservative, became Prime Minister.
38 Prior to the Local Government Act of 1888, “Mid-Devon” (another name for the Ashburton division of the county) was not a parliamentary borough. The date of Royal Assent to the Act was August 13, 1888, to be effective not later than November 8, 1888. How far in advance of August could Sir Charles have been the “probable candidate” for a district not yet officially created? Either the date of Holmes’s involvement in The Hound of the Baskervilles, discussed in Appendix 5, must take this into account, and those chronologies who date the case prior to 1888 must be rejected, or we must conclude that the borough named is Watsonian obfuscation.
39 Difficult or laboured breathing.
40 Under the English legal system, the coroner, a public appointee, was charged, in the event of a sudden or violent death, to inquire how the decedent came to his or her death. For this purpose, a jury of not fewer than twelve persons was convened and an inquisition held before the coroner and the jury. If a person were found guilty of murder or other homicide by the jury, the coroner committed the alleged criminal to prison for trial, certified the material evidence to the court, and bound over the proper persons to prosecute or give evidence at the trial.
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