"You are developing a certain unexpected vein of pawky humour, Watson, against which I must learn to guard myself.

But in calling Moriarty a criminal you are uttering libel in the eyes of the law--and there lie the glory and the wonder of it! The greatest schemer of all time, the organizer of every deviltry, the controlling brain of the underworld, a brain which might have made or marred the destiny of nations--that's the man! But so aloof is he from general suspicion, so immune from criticism, so admirable in his management and self-effacement, that for those very words that you have uttered he could hale you to a court and emerge with your year's pension as a solatium for his wounded character.

Is he not the celebrated author of The Dynamics of an Asteroid, a book which ascends to such rarefied heights of pure mathematics that it is said that there was no man in the scientific press capable of criticizing it?
Is this a man to traduce?
Foul-mouthed doctor and slandered professor--such would be your respective roles! That's genius, Watson.
But if I am spared by lesser men, our day will surely come." "May I be there to see!" I exclaimed devoutly.

"But you were speaking of this man Porlock." "Ah, yes--the so-called Porlock is a link in the chain some little way from its great attachment.

Porlock is not quite a sound link--between ourselves.