Saturday, September 23, 2017

"The Glorious Crumb of Carbon Is, Of Course, Priceless"

"The Theft of the Kôh-I-Noor."
By Allen Upward (1863-1926).
Serialized in 5 installments in To-Day, November 2-30, 1895.
Short story (16 pages, 10 illos total).

Online at Archive.org.
(Note: Text very faded; use "Zoom In" function to improve clarity.)


NO LESS an eminent personage than the Queen herself discovers the theft of a precious diamond stolen literally out from under her nose, and it falls to Mr. Verriter, a no less
eminent detective, to retrieve it.

Chapter I, November 2, 1895 (HERE) (4 pages, 2 illos): The Queen Makes a Discovery
   "This is not the Kôh-I-Noor! It is a paste imitation!"

Typo: "corriders"

Chapter II, November 9, 1895 (HERE) (3 pages, 2 illos): Sir Henry Ponsonby's Mistake
   ". . . for aught I know the Kôh-I-Noor may be in your pocket at this minute."

Chapter III, November 16, 1895 (HERE) (3 pages, 2 illos): The Clue of the Crumb of Steel
   "That is where the real difficulty of detective work generally lies, in eliciting little points which those who know them do not think important enough to be worth mentioning."
Chapter IV, November 23, 1895 (HERE) (3 pages, 2 illos): What Took Place in the Green Park
   "Will you oblige me by feeling in the left-hand pocket, just to see if it really is there?"
Chapter V, November 30, 1895 (HERE) (3 pages, 2 illos): Mr. Verriter's Reward
   ". . . I am afraid that a bribe of twenty or perhaps fifty thousand pounds would corrupt a good many ladies in even higher stations."
Resources:
- Our author, Allen Upward (who ended his life as a suicide, unfortunately), is credited with first using the word "scientology"; see Wikipedia (HERE) and The Modernist Journals
Project (HERE) for more.
- Like other Victorian authors, Upward wrote widely in many genres long before they were categorized, including what we now call science fiction; see the SFE (HERE) and the

ISFDb (HERE).
- To-Day magazine was founded and edited by Jerome K. Jerome of Three Men in a Boat

fame (HERE) until he was forced to turn it over to Barry Pain; the Online Books Page has
a list of available issues (HERE).

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