Sherlock and the Lion’s Mane
As if one plague at the present time wasn’t enough to be dealing with, we who live on the east coast of Ireland have now been afflicted by a new menace in the undulating shape of the Lion’s Mane jellyfish. This vicious creature sports long reddish gold tentacles that can inflict powerful stings, and we have been warned not to go into the sea.
[image error]
Recently on the beach in Skerries, north of Dublin, I was called over by my grandson Jacob, to be informed with great excitement, ‘There’s a jellyfish in the water!’ I peered at what I thought at first was a mass of weed. But then a rolling wave turned the thing over and I saw the sinister globe of its back. It was big, though thankfully nothing like the two metres that have been reported elsewhere. We stood watching it, fascinated, for a while and warned a young woman paddling straight towards it, carrying her baby, to get out of the water immediately, which she did.
Of course, aficionados of the Sherlock Holmes’ canon will already be acquainted with the Lion’s Mane jellyfish as the villain of the piece in a late story from The Casebook. The tale is unusual in that it is related not by Dr Watson but by the detective himself now in retirement in Sussex, breeding his bees.
[image error]
Walking by the sea with a friend one day, Holmes encounters a young man in in his death throes, his body covered in angry weals, as if he had been savagely beaten by a cat o’ nine tails. Before he dies, the man manages to gasp, ‘The Lion’s Mane,’ which means nothing to his listeners. Suspicion instead lights on a rival in love until this man too almost succumbs to the deadly poison of the jellyfish.
I have to say, it takes Sherlock a while to figure it all out but once he does, he hastens to the beach, accompanied by PC Plod who has been on the point of arresting the wrong man, to reveal the culprit in vividly disgusting language:
“‘Cyanea!’ I cried. ‘Cyanea!’ (Sherlock of course knows the Latin name). ‘Behold the Lion’s Mane.’ The strange object at which I pointed did indeed look like a tangled mass torn from the mane of a lion. It lay upon a rocky shelf some three feet under the water, a curious waving, vibrating, hairy creature with streaks of silver among its yellow tresses. It pulsated with a slow heavy dilation and contraction.”
The fact that the stings in reality are rarely fatal must not detract from a rattling good yarn, but may console those of us thinking of taking a dip.
Buy ‘Mrs Hudson Investigates’ at https://www.amazon.co.uk/Mrs-Hudson-Investigates-Susan-Knight/dp/1787054845 https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1787054845/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i0
Now also available on Kindle: https://www.amazon.com/Mrs-Hudson-Investigates…/…/B081PDMJ9Z
Buy The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories XX at https://www.amazon.com/s?k=MX+book+of+new+sherlock+holmes+stories+XX&ref=nb_sb_noss_2
