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New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXXIII, Issue 4, 26 January 1905, Page 30

All understanding of history depends dn one's understanding t|he forces that make' it, of w,hieh religiofus forces are the m|ost active and the most definite. At fe recent dinner Sir Conan Doyle began his speech by recalling that while he was in America his health had once been proposed by a m-an who said that while report maide their guest a doctor, it was a sinister fact that no living patient of his had ever been seen. Apparently realising -that even in England there was some doubt aa to his medical abilities, Sir Conan said that at least his medical experience had been extremely varied, and that lew doctors had seen as many sides of the profession as himself. He had, he explained, sjerved as HuN geon on a whaling ship, had been in South Africa as an army doctjor, and in England itself had practised both in the country and in the London slums. He had even arrived at the dignity ol an office iv a London street much favored by doctors, where he had waited for patronage aa an ophthalmic surgeon. That the waiting was for the n\ost part vain, and therefore a dreary business, seems to have turned him definitely to writing.