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attached to it, and three rusty old disks of metal.

"Well, my boy, what do you make of this lot?" he
asked, smiling at my expression.

"It is a curious collection."

"Very curious, and the story that hangs round it will
strike you as being more curious still."

"These relics have a history then?"

"So much so that they are history."

"What do you mean by that?"

Sherlock Holmes picked them up one by one, and laid
them along the edge of the table. Then he reseated
himself in his chair and looked them over with a gleam
of satisfaction in his eyes.

"These," said he, "are all that I have left to remind
me of the adventure of the Musgrave Ritual."

I had heard him mention the case more than once,
though I had never been able to gather the details.
"I should be so glad," said I, "if you would give me
an account of it."

"And leave the litter as it is?" he cried,
mischievously. "Your tidiness won't bear much strain
after all, Watson. But I should be glad that you
should add this case to your annals, for there are
points in it which make it quite unique in the
criminal records of this or, I believe, of any other
country. A collection of my trifling achievements
would certainly be incomplete which contained no
account of this very singular business.

"You may remember how the affair of the _Gloria Scott_,
and my conversation with the unhappy man whose fate I
told you of, first turned my attention in the
direction of the profession which has become my life's
work. You see me now when my name has become known
far and wide, and when I am generally recognized both
by the public and by the official force as being a
final court of appeal in doubtful cases. Even when
you knew me first, at the time of the affair which you
have commemorated in 'A Study in Scarlet,' I had
already established a considerable, though not a very
lucrative, connection. You can hardly realize, then,
how difficult I found it at first, and how long I had
to wait before I succeeded in making any headway.

"When I first came up to London I had rooms in
Montague Street, just round the corner from the
British Museum, and there I waited, filling in my too
abundant leisure time by studying all those branches
of science which might make me more efficient. Now
and again cases came in my way, principally through
the introduction of old fellow-students, for during my
last years at the University there was a good deal of
talk there about myself and my methods. The third of
these cases was that of the Musgrave Ritual, and it is
to the interest which was aroused by that singular
chain of events, and the large issues which proved to
be at stake, that I trace my first stride towards the
position which I now hold.

"Reginald Musgrave had been in the same college as
myself, and I had some slight acquaintance with him.
He was not generally popular among the undergraduates,
though it always seemed to me that what was set down
as pride was really an attempt to cover extreme

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