by Tim Symonds
Though a short book, the presence of Sherlock, Watson, Einstein and other larger-than-life persons makes it feel all the more real and tangible. As we follow Sherlock and Watson to Serbia, a feeling of the exotic - complete with more great historical details that paint a vivid picture of the context of the detective’s work, which is an aspect all the more welcome as it’s one often missing from the typical whodunit - takes hold and draws us further in. Yet more than even the current-day masters, this book reads like the late Victorian/Edwardian novels did, with grand dialog and gentlemanly conduct, no matter how many sinister threats may lurk around every corner. Highly recommended. 5 of 5 stars***’
Thank you, Mike, where-ever you live!
And also a big thank-you to an Australian. Sherlock Holmes and the Case of the Bulgarian Codex was reviewed in J. JURIS by Dr Xanthé Mallett, University of New England, Australia: ‘...the trusty duo set off for Bulgaria, travelling on the Orient Express through beautifully described landscapes. As one would expect, the story is not as simple as it at first appears, and what follows is a tale of murder, greed, and vampires. There are the requisite unexpected twists and turns. A tale worthy of Holmes any day.’
Andrea S. Goldman, Associate Professor and China specialist at the UCLA Department of History. Right from the early research stage Professor Goldman was very very helpful with a background reading list. I found her own book ‘Opera and the City: The Politics of Culture in Beijing, 1770-1900’ especially valuable. I took full account of her suggestions, including on Wang Feng: ‘Re. his title, I would make it Investigating Censor (jiancha yushi, one of a small number of officials in the Censorate or Duchayuan). He would be empowered to gather complaints from the people, review the handling of prisoners, and impeach officials for misconduct.’
Min-Jung Kim, Curator, Museum of Applied Arts & Sciences, Sydney, Australia, who offered the ingenious suggestion which I used in the plot (and which Holmes completely failed to spot): ‘The Emperor’s dragon robe is known as ‘nine dragons robe’. However, only eight dragons were embroidered on the actual garment. The reason was the emperor was a dragon himself, so when he wore the robe it completed the number nine.’
Fatefully she added, ‘It would be interesting to make a plot where the garment ordered by the Empress Dowager had nine dragons which means the Emperor was no longer regarded an Emperor (or dragon)!’
Hajime Matsubara. Ornithologist connected with the Japanese Bird Research Association. It was Hajime Matsubara who told me how well the crow’s kinetic vision is developed. To identify particular clothing during flight would be very easy, including such ornamentation as a patch of embroidery. And (as Sherlock Holmes reports in the story) he made a further point: a crow can be trained to identify a particular object by UV signal - ‘for example someone wearing jewel-beetle ornamentation which reflects UV strongly’.
Innes Cuthill, School of Biological Sciences, Bristol, re. Corvid eyesight and UV radiation: ‘Yes, a corvid would see UV reflection from a beetle. Iridescent colours, such as in a jewel beetle, often reflect strongly in several different wavebands, and in the mathematically predictable way.’
From Dr Nicholas Roberts, School of Biological Sciences, University of Bristol: ‘I agree with Innes. Corvids do have UV vision. The shortest wavelength sensitivity in birds is mediated by either UV or Violet-sensitive (VS) photoreceptors and Corvids have VS cells. This is not true UV sensitivity like passerines for example, but their sensitivity still extends down to 350-360nm into the UV.’
Kevin J. McGowan, Project Manager, Distance Learning in Bird Biology, Cornell Lab of Ornithology. Kevin writes, ‘The crow species that would be in Peking would be the Large-billed Crow, Corvus macrorhynchos. A crow could be trained to do what you describe, but it would have to be hand-raised from a small chick. Wild crows could be trained to recognize a particular set of clothing but they wouldn’t try to land on someone’s shoulder. That would take a tame, hand-raised and trained individual.’
Catherine Cooke, Senior Business Systems Analyst, Information Services, Marylebone Library (and Sherlock Holmes specialist) for her wonderful response to any conceivable question, for example, when I needed to know which deadly diseases Watson may come across at his make-shift surgery in Peking, Catherine replied, ‘The British Medical Journal is a good a place to start. We may still have a subscription at work or I have moles in a couple of medical libraries. I’ll have a dig around and get back to you.’
Richard Sawden, who conducts visitor courses on mushrooms in England’s New Forest, for suggesting locations where deadly plants such as the Hemlock Water Dropwort, also called ‘dead man’s fingers’, can be spotted but definitely not eaten.
Simon Shelly, International Organisations Department, Foreign and Commonwealth Office, London, who wrote: ‘If you would like to come by to look at and discuss parts of the building with one of our historic guides, you could ask...me! I am a member of our tour guide cadre, and would be happy to go round with you to help you plug any factual and historic gaps in your knowledge.’ And, on Dr. Watson’s behalf, I took the tour of this remarkable building.
Peter Starley, Black Powder retailer and Member of the Gun Trade Association, for professional advice on how the assassins would have used black powder for their fiendishly clever plot. ‘Only a small amount of powder would be needed. Placed within a couple of inches of the ear this should do the job. The ear is in effect a funnel. The damage to the drum would be caused by the explosive pressure blasting into the ear.’
V&A Theatre & Performance Enquiry Service. For their valued assistance in determining when and where Shakespeare’s Hamlet was performed in England circa 1906, for example on the Pavilion Pier, Brighton.
The London Library. One of the most famous and largest of Britain’s libraries. Extremely helpful on my research into the Ch’ing Dynasty. The building was among the first steel-framed buildings in London. The present eclectic facade, the Main Hall, Reading Room and the grille-floored bookstacks are worth visiting for the atmosphere alone.
Jamie Russell MCIM. John Bell & Croyden. Preparing Dr. Watson for his epic journey to Kashgar and Peking. ‘We no doubt would have been able to sell Dr. Watson a boiling point thermometer and we would have sold ready packed sterilized needle and syringe packs ready for administration. We used to sell leeches to help heal wounds during far travels and war time.’
Juyan Webster of the Chinese Tea Company who wrote: ‘Cixi loved tea, and she would drink tea according to different seasons, Dragon well green tea for spring, Jasmine Green tea for the summer and Puer tea for winter. She also would use different teawares to match with teas and season.’
Jim Webster for providing insights into ‘circumstantial evidence’ versus ‘direct evidence’ in criminal cases. I met Jim and his wife-to-be Karen when we were all students in Göttingen and at UCLA. Jim has spent his life as an attorney-at-law fighting for the rights of the under-dog and would have made a fine mentor to the censor Wang.
Craig Brough, Information Services Librarian, Public Programmes Directorate, Royal Botanic Gardens. Fruit trees in China etc. Ever helpful on the most abstruse enquiry on little-known flora.
Janice Phillips, Chief Executive & HR Administrator Office, British Association of Optometrists, responding immediately to my query on Victorian eye-glasses.
Neil Handley MA, AMA+, FRSA, curator of the British Optical Association Museum, for his very useful description of the railway glasses Holmes needed to disguise his non-Chinese grey eyes. The museum is based at the College of Optometrists. Visitors and researchers welcome.
Dr. Annie Hodgson, York University Chemistry department, who said, ‘This has to be one of the most intriguing emails I have ever had. As a great fan of Sherlock Holmes (I am currently reading my way through all the original stories) I am happy to see if I can help you.’ - and came up trumps (chemically speaking) whenever I needed advice on poisons!
Howard White. My old friend and ‘listening board’ of St. Leonard’s On Sea. He scouted the hard-to-find Old Roar Falls in the hills near Hastings which I used in my short story ‘A Most Diabolical Plot’ in the MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories, part 111 (Editor David Marcum), published in 2015.
Dr. Michael Pritchard FRPS. Director-General, Royal Photographic Society. Author of ‘A History of Photography In 50 Cameras’. For telling me about the Aeroscope. I also asked about disguised cameras and received the following information: ‘There were a lot of disguised cameras available in 1906 - cameras hidden in bags, hats, canes, watches, books, etc. Some were more novelties than anything else but others were capable of producing reasonable quality photos. Houghton’s Ticka camera was available by 1906 and was capable of producing decent images on film.’
Andy Patterson, for providing me with the article ‘No Shadows’, by Luke S. K. Kwong, published in ‘History Today’ in September 2000.
Tang Li, Public Services Librarian at Yale’s East Asia Collection, who suggested reading the curious ‘China under the empress dowager, being the history of the life and times of Tzu’ hsi’, by J. O. P. Bland and E. Backhouse.
Frances Wood, English librarian, Sinologue and historian widely known for her writings on Chinese history.
Google and Wikipedia. When I grew up in Guernsey there was one tiny (and private) library, the Priaulx. Other library books took a fortnight to order from mainland Britain - if you knew what you wanted to read. Now, with the click of a mouse, the whole universe from obscure Chinese scrolls to gravitational waves flies through the ether to my computer in deep woodland in East Sussex.
And last but definitely not least, the Bard of Stratford:
William Shakespeare (c. 1564–1616). Poet, playwright, whose ‘Tragedy of Hamlet, Prince of Denmark’ gave General Yuán the idea for his own plot against the Emperor, after hearing the ghost of Hamlet’s father, King Hamlet, describe his murder: ‘Brief let me be. Sleeping within my orchard, My custom always of the afternoon...’
For Shakespeare’s contemporary audiences the vileness of the crime was reinforced by the ugly effects of the poison, which clotted King Hamlet’s blood and ‘corrupted’ his body.
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