 What was Sherlock Holmes'
favourite tea? Many say Lapsang Souchong, that smoky tea reminiscent of camp fires ... and
briar pipes.
But although tea is mentioned in a
number of the stories, nowhere does Conan Doyle name a specific variety that Holmes
preferred.
Following are all the tea references
in the canon (the complete collection of Holmes stories). The quotations are taken from
The Complete Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle with a preface by Christopher
Morley; published by Doubleday & Company, Inc. They may vary
somewhat in other versions.
A Study in
Scarlet
Part 2, The
Country of the Saints; Chapter 1, On the great alkali plain
"Gone, eh!" said the
little girl. "Funny, she didn't say good-bye; she 'most always did if she was just
goin' over to auntie's for tea, and now she's been away three days. Say, it's awful dry,
ain't it? Ain't there no water nor nothing to eat?"
The Sign of Four
Chapter
3, In quest of a solution
"There is no great mystery in
this matter," he said, taking the cup of tea which I had poured out for him;
"the facts appear to admit of only one explanation."
The Boscombe Valley Mystery
"I have ordered a
carriage," said Lestrade as we sat over a cup of tea. "I knew your energetic
nature, and that you would not be happy until you had been on the scene of the
crime."
The Adventure of the Beryl
Coronet
I had just finished my tea when he
returned, evidently in excellent spirits, swinging an old elastic-sided boot in his hand.
He chucked it down into a corner and helped himself to a cup of tea.
The Yellow Face
But we had not a very long time to
wait for that. It came just as we had finished our tea.
The "Gloria Scott"
" 'It was the year '55, when
the Crimean War was at its height, and the old convict ships had been largely used as
transports in the Black Sea. The government was compelled, therefore, to use smaller and
less suitable vessels for sending out their prisoners. The Gloria Scott had been
in the Chinese tea-trade, but she was an old-fashioned, heavy-bowed, broad-beamed craft,
and the new clippers had cut her out. She was a five-hundred-ton boat; and besides her
thirty-eight jail-birds, she carried twenty-six of a crew, eighteen soldiers, a captain,
three mates, a doctor, a chaplain, and four warders. Nearly a hundred souls were in her,
all told, when we set sail from Falmouth.
also...
"That was the narrative which I
read that night to young Trevor, and I think, Watson, that under the circumstances it was
a dramatic one. The good fellow was heart-broken at it, and went out to the Terai tea
planting, where I hear that he is doing well. As to the sailor and Beddoes, neither of
them was ever heard of again after that day on which the letter of warning was written.
They both disappeared utterly and completely. No complaint had been lodged with the
police, so that Beddoes had mistaken a threat for a deed. Hudson had been seen lurking
about, and it was believed by the police that he had done away with Beddoes and had fled.
For myself I believe that the truth was exactly the opposite. I think that it is most
probable that Beddoes, pushed to desperation and believing himself to have been already
betrayed, had revenged himself upon Hudson, and had fled from the country with as much
money as he could lay his hands on. Those are the facts of the case, Doctor, and if they
are of any use to your collection, I am sure that they are very heartily at your
service."
The Crooked Man
"There is a room which is used
as a morning-room at Lachine. This faces the road and opens by a large glass folding-door
on to the lawn. The lawn is thirty yards across and is only divided from the highway by a
low wall with an iron rail above it. It was into this room that Mrs. Barclay went upon her
return. The blinds were not down, for the room was seldom used in the evening, but Mrs.
Barclay herself lit the lamp and then rang the bell, asking Jane Stewart, the housemaid,
to bring her a cup of tea, which was quite contrary to her usual habits. The colonel had
been sitting in the dining-room, but, hearing that his wife had returned, he joined her in
the morning-room. The coachman saw him cross the hall and enter it. He was never seen
again alive.
also...
"The tea which had been ordered
was brought up at the end of ten minutes; but the maid, as she approached the door, was
surprised to hear the voices of her master and mistress in furious altercation. She
knocked without receiving any answer, and even turned the handle, but only to find that
the door was locked upon the inside...
also...
"It is quite certain that when
Mrs. Barclay left the house at half-past seven she was on good terms with her husband. She
was never, as I think I have said, ostentatiously affectionate, but she was heard by the
coachman chatting with the colonel in a friendly fashion. Now, it was equally certain
that, immediately on her return, she had gone to the room in which she was least likely to
see her husband, had flown to tea as an agitated woman will, and finally, on his coming in
to her, had broken into violent recriminations. Therefore something had occurred between
seven-thirty and nine o'clock which had completely altered her feelings towards him. But
Miss Morrison had been with her during the whole of that hour and a half. It was
absolutely certain, therefore, in spite of her denial, that she must know something of the
matter.
The Resident Patient
"He has a cup of tea taken in
to him early every morning. When the maid entered, about seven, there the unfortunate
fellow was hanging in the middle of the room. He had tied his cord to the hook on which
the heavy lamp used to hang, and he had jumped off from the top of the very box that he
showed us yesterday."
The Greek Interpreter
It was after tea on a summer
evening, and the conversation, which had roamed in a desultory, spasmodic fashion from
golf clubs to the causes of the change in the obliquity of the ecliptic, came round at
last to the question of atavism and hereditary aptitudes. The point under discussion was,
how far any singular gift in an individual was due to his ancestry and how far to his own
early training.
The Naval Treaty
The table was all laid, and just as
I was about to ring Mrs. Hudson entered with the tea and coffee. A few minutes later she
brought in three covers, and we all drew up to the table, Holmes ravenous, I curious, and
Phelps in the gloomiest state of depression.
also...
"I'll tell you what I did
first, and how I came to do it afterwards," said he. "After leaving you at the
station I went for a charming walk through some admirable Surrey scenery to a pretty
little village called Ripley, where I had my tea at an inn and took the precaution of
filling my flask and of putting a paper of sandwiches in my pocket. There I remained until
evening, when I set off for Woking again and found myself in the highroad outside
Briarbrae just after sunset.
The Adventure of the Three
Students
"To-day, about three o'clock,
the proofs of this paper arrived from the printers. The exercise consists of half a
chapter of Thucydides. I had to read it over carefully, as the text must be
absolutely correct. At four-thirty my task was not yet completed. I had, however, promised
to take tea in a friend's rooms, so I left the proof upon my desk. I was absent rather
more than an hour.
also...
"You are aware, Mr. Holmes,
that our college doors are double -- a green baize one within and a heavy oak one without.
As I approached my outer door, I was amazed to see a key in it. For an instant I imagined
that I had left my own there, but on feeling in my pocket I found that it was all right.
The only duplicate which existed, so far as I knew, was that which belonged to my servant,
Bannister -- a man who has looked after my room for ten years, and whose honesty is
absolutely above suspicion. I found that the key was indeed his, that he had entered my
room to know if I wanted tea, and that he had very carelessly left the key in the door
when he came out. His visit to my room must have been within a very few minutes of my
leaving it. His forgetfulness about the key would have mattered little upon any other
occasion, but on this one day it has produced the most deplorable consequences.
also...
"It was about
half-past four. That is Mr. Soames' tea time."
The Adventure of the
Abbey Grange
It was not until we had
consumed some hot tea at the station and taken our places in the Kentish train that we
were sufficiently thawed, he to speak and I to listen. Holmes drew a note from his pocket,
and read aloud: ...
The Valley of Fear
Chapter 3, The tragedy of Birlstone
"Mrs. Douglas had
visitors to tea," said Ames. "I couldn't raise it until they went. Then I wound
it up myself."
also...
Chapter 6, A dawning light
"I wish none of
their confidences," said Holmes, when I reported to him what had occurred. He had
spent the whole afternoon at the Manor House in consultation with his two colleagues, and
returned about five with a ravenous appetite for a high tea which I had ordered for him.
"No confidences, Watson; for they are mighty awkward if it comes to an arrest for
conspiracy and murder."
The Adventure of the
Cardboard Box
" 'Well, I don't
know now whether it was pure devilry on the part of this woman, or whether she thought
that she could turn me against my wife by encouraging her to misbehave. Anyway, she took a
house just two streets off and let lodgings to sailors. Fairbairn used to stay there, and
Mary would go round to have tea with her sister and him. How often she went I don't know,
but I followed her one day, and as I broke in at the door Fairbairn got away over the back
garden wall, like the cowardly skunk that he was. I swore to my wife that I would kill her
if I found her in his company again, and I led her back with me, sobbing and trembling,
and as white as a piece of paper. There was no trace of love between us any longer. I
could see that she hated me and feared me, and when the thought of it drove me to drink,
then she despised me as well.
The Adventure of the
Devil's Foot
I have said that
scattered towers marked the villages which dotted this part of Cornwall. The nearest of
these was the hamlet of Tredannick Wollas, where the cottages of a couple of hundred
inhabitants clustered round an ancient, moss-grown church. The vicar of the parish, Mr.
Roundhay, was something of an archaeologist, and as such Holmes had made his acquaintance.
He was a middle-aged man, portly and affable, with a considerable fund of local lore. At
his invitation we had taken tea at the vicarage and had come to know, also, Mr. Mortimer
Tregennis, an independent gentleman, who increased the clergyman's scanty resources by
taking rooms in his large, straggling house...
The Adventure of the
Illustrious Client
"There was no
difficulty about that, for I simply sent in my card. He is an excellent antagonist, cool
as ice, silky voiced and soothing as one of your fashionable consultants, and poisonous as
a cobra. He has breeding in him -- a real aristocrat of crime, with a superficial
suggestion of afternoon tea and all the cruelty of the grave behind it. Yes, I am glad to
have had my attention called to Baron Adelbert Gruner."
The Adventure of the
Three Gables
"No, I don't think
I have anything rarer than a Crown Derby tea-set"
also...
"That would hardly
justify all this mystery. Besides, why should they not openly state what they want? If
they covet your tea-set, they can surely offer a price for it without buying you out,
lock, stock, and barrel. No, as I read it, there is something which you do not know that
you have, and which you would not give up if you did know."
The Adventure of the
Sussex Vampire
Sir:
Our client, Mr. Robert Ferguson, of Ferguson and Muirhead, tea brokers, of Mincing Lane,
has made some inquiry from us in a communication of even date concerning vampires. As our
firm specializes entirely upon the assessment of machinery the matter hardly comes within
our purview, and we have therefore recommended Mr. Ferguson to call upon you and lay the
matter before you. We have not forgotten your successful action in the case of Matilda
Briggs.
also...
"The tea is ready,
Dolores," said Ferguson. "See that your mistress has everything she can
wish."
also...
A smart maid, the only
modern thing which we had seen in the house, had brought in some tea. As she was serving
it the door opened and a youth entered the room. He was a remarkable lad, pale-faced and
fair-haired, with excitable light blue eyes which blazed into a sudden flame of emotion
and joy as they rested upon his father. He rushed forward and threw his arms round his
neck with the abandon of a loving girl.
also...
Sir:
Referring to your letter of the 19th, I beg to state that I have looked into the inquiry
of your client, Mr. Robert Ferguson, of Ferguson and Muirhead, tea brokers, of Mincing
Lane, and that the matter has been brought to a satisfactory conclusion. With thanks for
your recommendation, I am, sir,
Faithfully
yours,
Sherlock
Holmes
The Adventure of the
Creeping Man
"The real
source," said Holmes, "lies, of course in that untimely love affair which gave
our impetuous professor the idea that he could only gain his wish by turning himself into
a younger man ... There is an early train to town, Watson, but I think we shall just have
time for a cup of tea at the Chequers before we catch it."
The Adventure of the
Lion's Mane
But that work met with
an annoying interruption. I had hardly swallowed my early cup of tea and was starting for
the each when I had a call from Inspector Bardle of the Sussex Constabulary -- a steady,
solid, bovine man with thoughtful eyes, which looked at me now with a very troubled
expression.
|
ea with Sherlock
Holmes