Purchase one of 1st World Library's Classic Books and help support our free internet library of downloadable eBooks. Visit us online at www. 1stWorldLibrary. ORG - - Mr. Sherlock Holmes, who was usually very late in the mornings, save upon those not infrequent occasions when he was up all night, was seated at the breakfast table. I stood upon the hearth-rug and picked up the stick which our visitor had left behind him the night before. It was a fine, thick piece of wood, bulbous-headed, of the sort which is known as a "Penang lawyer." Just under the head was a broad silver band nearly an inch across. "To James Mortimer, M. R. C. S. , from his friends of the C. C. H. ," was engraved upon it, with the date "1884." It was just such a stick as the old-fashioned family practitioner used to carry-dignified, solid, and reassuring. "Well, Watson, what do you make of it?" Holmes was sitting with his back to me, and I had given him no sign of my occupation.
