'You have ill-used us — you have tortured us — now you have murdered one of us, and you would do the same to me. You are a coward, a monster, a man fit only for the gallows!' ('The Speckled Band')

'the monster goes safe.' ('Wisteria Lodge')

'I'll tell you, Watson. He is the king of all the blackmailers.' ('Charles Augustus Milverton')

'The king may do what he will without hindrance from one whom he has cruelly wronged.' ('A Scandal in Bohemia')

'You are right,' he cried, 'I am the king. Why should I attempt to conceal it?' 'Why, indeed?' murmured Holmes. ('A Scandal in Bohemia')

'Dark rumours gathered round him in the university' ('The Final Problem')

Being an absolutely selfish man, when a chance presented itself he did not allow either his sister's happiness or your reputation to hold his hand.' ('The Naval Treaty')

'From what I have heard from him this morning, I gather that he has lost heavily in dabbling with stocks, and that he is ready to do anything on earth to better his fortunes.' ('The Naval Treaty')

'he is not a man whom I should judge to be of a particularly forgiving disposition.' ('The Devil's Foot')

'But the matter is so inexplicable, and the recent turn which it has taken is so elaborate, that I shall lay it all before you, and you shall judge what is essential and what is not.' ('The Resident Patient')

'I know that he is a pretty shrewd judge.' ('The Stockbroker's Clerk')

'A rash word or a hasty act was followed by annihilation, and yet none knew what the nature might be of this terrible power which was suspended over them. ' (A Study in Scarlet)

'Eh, what's that, Watson? Danger, isn't it? Yes, by Jove, it's a danger signal. There he goes again!' ('The Red Circle')

'Now, you rascal, do you deny that it is a signal? Come, speak up! Who is your confederate out yonder, and what is this conspiracy that is going on?' (The Hound of the Baskervilles)

'That is our signal,' said Holmes ('The Speckled Band')

'I recognized that justice must be done' (A Study in Scarlet)

'So evident was the crisis in his mind that none of us dared to speak, and we sat, barrister, prisoner, and myself, watching him in a concentrated and absorbed silence.' ('The Problem of Thor Bridge')

'If it's on the market I'll buy it - if it means another penny on the income tax.' ('The Second Stain')

'Education never ends, Watson. It is a series of lessons with the greatest for the last. This is an instructive case.' ('The Red Circle')

'I knew that this man Small had a certain degree of low cunning, but I did not think him capable of anything in the nature of delicate finesse. That is usually a product of higher education.' (The Sign of the Four)

'He included us all in a sweeping bow, and stalked out of the room.' ('The Noble Bachelor')

'Come,' said the inspector, laughing; 'it's a very pretty diversity of opinion.' ('The Engineer's Thumb')

'“Cut the poetry, Watson,” said Holmes severely.' ('The Retired Colourman') #WorldPoetryDay

'the public works were notoriously neglected, the accounts were slurred over by bribed auditors, and the decent citizen was terrorized into paying public blackmail, and holding his tongue lest some worse thing befall him.' (The Valley of Fear)

'He is a man of no physical courage, as they are well aware from their experience the other night.' ('The Greek Interpreter')

'Strange rumours began to be bandied about—rumours of murdered immigrants and rifled camps in regions' (A Study in Scarlet)

'This was evidently no ordinary party of immigrants, but rather some nomad people who had been compelled from stress of circumstances to seek themselves a new country.' (A Study in Scarlet)

By Vachel Lindsay (for #PiDay)

'There was the news of a revolution, of a possible war, and of an impending change of government, but these did not come within the horizon of my companion.' ('The Bruce-Partington Plans')

'You have attempted to tinge it with romanticism, which produces much the same effect as if you worked a love-story or an elopement into the fifth proposition of Euclid.' (The Sign of the Four) #PiDay

'His conclusions were as infallible as so many propositions of Euclid.' (A Study in scarlet) #PiDay

'There were a couple of brace of cold woodcock, a pheasant, a pâté de foie gras pie, with a group of ancient and cobwebby bottles.' ('The Noble Bachelor') #PiDay

'If he were safely out of the country it would relieve the taxpayer of a burden.' (The Hound of the Baskervilles)

'he arrived at Baker Street late in the evening with…a general air of dissipation which would have made his own person the fitting object of a Scotland Yard investigation.' ('The Solitary Cyclist')

'he is wayward, dissipated, and unprincipled. He was nearly expelled' ('The Three Students')

'He assured me that I could do nothing. … It was all like some dreadful dream.' (The Valley of Fear)

'Were it not for the ugly wound upon my hand, all that had passed during those dreadful hours might have been an evil dream.' ('The Engineer's Thumb')

'I fancy that the poor fellow murmured some incoherent, delirious words, and that she twisted them into this meaningless message.' ('The Golden Pince-Nez')

'He was incoherent in his agitation.' ('The Lady Frances Carfax')

'Briefly, Watson, I am in the midst of a very remarkable inquiry, and I have hoped to find a clue in the incoherent ramblings of these sots, as I have done before now.' )'The Dying Detective')

'The incident left a most unpleasant impression upon my mind. The violent and causeless excitement, followed by this brutality of speech…showed me how deep was the disorganization of his mind.' ('The Dying Detective')

'My friend had listened with amused surprise to this long speech' ('The Missing Three-quarter')

'Yet when I think of him in cold blood, far away from the glamour of his presence, I am convinced from his cynical speech, and the look which I have caught in his eyes, that he is one who should be deeply distrusted.' ('The Beryl Coronet')

'Do you find it interesting?' 'To a collector of fairy-tales.' (The Hound of the Baskervilles) #TellAFairyTaleDay

'Anything is better than stagnation, but really we seem to have been switched on to a Grimm's fairy tale.' ('The Sussex Vampire') #TellAFairyTaleDay

Hesketh Pearson, who wrote Conan Doyle: His Life and Art (Methuen, 1943), born #OTD 1887. Adrian Conan Doyle disparage the work as "nothing more than a vehicle for a stranger's personal and quite unauthoritative opinions…"

'The whole proceeding is absolutely illegal and outrageous.' ('His Last Bow')

'He broke out now into a furious stream of German invective, his face convulsed with passion.' ('His Last Bow')

'I've heard that with you German politicians when an agent has done his work you are not sorry to see him put away.' ('His Last Bow')

'A vague feeling of uneasiness began to steal over me.' ('The Engineer's Thumb')