The Mysterious Case of the Musgrave Ritual
The Mysterious Case of the Musgrave Ritual is an article written by Barbara Roden published in the A.C.D. - The Journal of The Arthur Conan Doyle Society (Vol. 7, 1996/7).
This article explores a possible literary source for The Musgrave Ritual, comparing its central plot device with Julian Hawthorne's earlier story The Mysterious Case of My Friend Browne. It argues that similarities in the transmission of a hidden clue across generations may suggest an indirect influence on Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes story.
The Mysterious Case of the Musgrave Ritual
In January 1872, a short story appeared in the pages of Harper's New Monthly Magazine. Entitled 'The Mysterious Case of My Friend Browne', it was one of the first published short stories by Julian Hawthorne, only son of one of America's greatest men of letters, Nathaniel Hawthorne.
Hawthorne senior, who knew the difficulty of making a living merely by the pen, dissuaded his son from following in his footsteps; but early literary success (he was paid $50.00 for his first short story, published in 1870 when he was only twenty-four) convinced Julian that he could make writing his full-time profession. Sadly, he was fated always to do well enough with his writing that he was never forced to turn to work that was less inspiring but more remunerative, but never so well that he could cease worrying about where his next paycheque would come from.
'The Mysterious Case of My Friend Browne' is told in the first person by Simpson, a seemingly wealthy, slightly pompous, rather self-centred, and none-too-bright bachelor who describes himself as a bookworm. In the course of searching through one of his favourite haunts, he chances across a bundle of old papers bound together in a time-worn leather cover. He pays ten cents for this prize and carries it home, where closer examination proves it to be copies of letters and journal extracts, arranged in order by some person unknown, and telling the story of two men and a woman who had lived some one hundred and fifty years earlier. The story, which concerns a love triangle, is a tragic one, but it is impossible to tell who the participants were, as the names of the three parties involved have been rendered merely as B, M, and H, with H being the woman involved and B being the man who successfully woos her from her former lover, who had gone so far as to buy her an engagement ring.
Shortly after reading this tale, Simpson receives a visit from his friend Browne, who is in an extremely agitated state. He has recently become engaged to a Miss Hammill, and is now convinced that the two of them are being haunted, for reasons unknown. It soon becomes apparent to the reader (although not to Simpson) that Browne and his fiancée are descendants of two of the three participants in the earlier tragedy, and are being haunted by the ghost of the jilted man.
After Browne's departure Simpson has a dream in which he sees the blank spaces in the manuscript filled with the names of Browne, Miss Hammill, and a Thomas Murray, and in which he himself figures as the copier or compiler of the papers he had purchased. The next morning, when he goes to look at the papers once more, he finds that something startling has happened:
- There [the book of papers] lay on the top shelf of my book-case, where I had placed it the night before; but a jar of some chemical liquid, which I remembered to have seen standing around ever since I was a boy, and which I had been told was an heirloom in our family for many generations, had fallen over on it and broken, and the liquid had run out and deluged the manuscript completely. With a sigh for the sad fate of the jar, I took down the papers and opened them.
- The sight that met my eyes made me feel as if the roots of my hair were alive and moving! All the blanks were filled up with names, written in a pale, reddish ink; and they were all exactly as I had dreamed they were. ... And yes! I was there too! My name was signed to the note appended to Thomas Murray's prayer for vengeance-John Simpson' in full!
- 'Now how the deuce,' soliloquized I, 'did those names get written down there? They certainly weren't there yesterday. Ah! here's one only half written! How's that? Ah!' I exclaimed, drawing a long breath of relief, 'I see now! Sympathetic writing, by George! and it was the old jar of chemicals brought it out!'
- Such was the fact. One of the names, written near a corner of the paper, had partially escaped being wetted by the liquid in the jar, and that part which had escaped was invisible, while the rest presented the same reddish tinge as the others. In this, likewise, I saw the explanation of the existence of the jar in our family during so many years. Doubtless my old ancestor, John Simpson, when he wrote the names in sympathetic ink, had provided himself with the reagent to be used when needed; and the occasion not arising during his own life, it had passed down from one generation to another, until all remembrance of its original purpose had been lost...
Compare this with Sherlock Holmes's words to Reginald Musgrave — another wealthy, rather pompous, self-centred, and none-too-bright bachelor — when the detective is explaining the significance of the ancient family Ritual at the close of 'The Musgrave Ritual':
- 'It is likely that the Musgrave who held the secret died in the interval, and by some oversight left this guide to his descendant without explaining the meaning of it. From that day to this it has been handed down from father to son...
Is the coincidence in central plot points — the idea of a key to a mystery being handed down unknowingly from father to son-merely a coincidence? Or was Conan Doyle aware of the Hawthorne story, published some twenty-one years before 'The Musgrave Ritual'? Even if ACD had not seen the story in its original magazine publication, he might well have been familiar with Hawthorne's story 'Calbot's Rival', an anglicised version of 'The Mysterious Case of My Friend Browne'. The later story was published in both Gentleman's Magazine and then in Hawthorne's collection The Laughing Mill and Other Stories, published in London by MacMillan in 1879.
That Conan Doyle was familiar with Hawthorne's work is a matter of fact. In Through the Magic Door (1907) ACD wrote:
- Nathaniel Hawthorne never appealed in the highest degree to me. The fault, I am sure, is my own, but I always seem to crave stronger fare than he gave me. It was too subtle, too elusive, for effect. Indeed, I have been more affected by some of the short work of his son Julian, though I can quite understand the high artistic claims which the senior writer has...
Of course, at this late date, pinning anything Conan Doyle wrote down to a definite source is rather like trying to pick up drops of mercury: impossible. Unless a letter in ACD's hand is uncovered, stating positively that he had read Hawthorne's story (in either incarnation) and decided to use a variation of the central plot device, we are left to speculate. The evidence is there; draw from it what conclusions you will!
- Article courtesy Christopher Roden, founder of The Arthur Conan Doyle Society (1989-2003).
