…Under the circumstances, I naturally gravitated to London, that great cesspool into which all of the loungers and idlers of the Empire are irresistibly drained…
    … “Dr Watson, Mr. Sherlock Holmes,” said Stamford, introducing us.
    “How are you?” he said cordially, gripping my hand with a strength for which I should hardly have given him credit. “You have been in Afghanistan, I perceive.”
    “How on earth did you know that?” I asked in astonishment….
    … “You remind me of Edgar Allan Poe’s Dupin. I had no idea that such individuals did exist outside of stories.”
    Sherlock Holmes rose and lit his pipe.  “No doubt you think you are complimenting me in comparing me to Dupin,” he observed. “Now, in my opinion, Dupin was a very inferior fellow…”

… “It’s a queer case though, and I knew your taste for such things.” …
    … At that instant there was a sharp click, the jangling of metal, and Sherlock Holmes sprang to his feet again.
    “Gentlemen,” he cried with flashing eyes. “let me introduce you to Mr. Jefferson Hope, the murderer of Enoch Drebber and of Joseph Strangeson.” …
    Sherlock Holmes in his first appearance, in the full length novel A Study In Scarlet. You’ll notice, I hope, that right here at the start, Poe is given due credit, by the author at least although not by his arrogant principal character. At this stage, Doyle was yet to invent the formula for the detective story—Holmes only in it in the first half and at the very end, the rest being an account of the crime as confessed by the villain, after Holmes sprung him on page 136.
    … “It is wonderful !” I cried. “Your merits should be publicly recognised. You should publish an account of the case. If you won’t, I will for you.” …