This etext was prepared by David Brannan of Woodbridge, Virginia. 

The Adventure of the Dying Detective 

By Sir Arthur Conan Doyle 

Mrs.  Hudson, the landlady of Sherlock Holmes, was a long-
suffering woman.  Not only was her first-floor flat invaded at
all hours by throngs of singular and often undesirable characters
but her remarkable lodger showed an eccentricity and irregularity
in his life which must have sorely tried her patience.  His
incredible untidiness, his addiction to music at strange hours,
his occasional revolver practice within doors, his weird and
often malodorous scientific experiments, and the atmosphere of
violence and danger which hung around him made him the very worst
tenant in London.  On the other hand, his payments were princely.
I have no doubt that the house might have been purchased at the
price which Holmes paid for his rooms during the years that I was