Customer Reviews

The Mystery of a Hansom Cab

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The Mystery of a Hansom Cab (1893) by Fergus Hume was one of the most popular mysteries in the nineteenth century, apparently even surpassing the sales of Sherlock Holmes books. While unlikely to attract a wide audience today, this forgotten Australian melodrama should appeal to readers interested in the early development of the mystery story. I gave The Mystery of a Hansom Cab three stars.

Late one night on a lonely street in Melbourne, the driver of a Hansom cab (a horse-drawn, two-wheeled, covered carriage) discovers that his inebriated passenger is dead, having been poisoned with a chloroform-soaked handkerchief. All evidence points to Brian Fitzgerald, "a tall, handsome, fair-haired young man hailing from Ireland". To protect the reputation of a young woman, Fitzgerald refuses to disclose details of his whereabouts at the time of the murder.

In his short introduction Fergus Hume reveals that he carefully patterned his story after the then popular detective stories by Gaboriau. Furthermore, Hume repeatedly visited some of Melbourne's worst slums to find realistic characters for his story, like his memorable Mother Guttersnipe. Hume had hoped to receive some local attention for his first novel; he had no expectation of creating an international best seller.

Dover Publications should be commended for reprinting hard-to find, early mystery and detective stories like The Mystery of a Hansom Cab (1893). Dover published this reprint in 1982.

There is a very good reason why Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's stories about Sherlock Holmes have been available in multiple editions since their creation, while the stories of Mr. Hume have been largely forgotten. This is even aside from the popularity of the character Sherlock Holmes.

Mr. Hume's narrative harks back to the sprawling novels of Wilkie Collins and Charles Dickens. The story has a stunning opening-- a species of a locked room mystery. A cab driver stops to take on a fare, two men-- one of whom is the worse for the drink. One of his fares leaves him. When the cabbie reaches the second one's location, he discovers that the second man has been murdered. Who else could murdered him than the first man-- and why? However, after that things begin to drag.

There's a large cast of characters, some of whom make an appearance, play their assigned roles, then are seen no more. His characterization is cardboard-- the young upper class man out from England (who makes his fortune by honest, hard labor but who is so self sacrificing that he would go to the gallows rather than betray a trust) is a cliche of romantic literature of the period. That's not to say that there are not some good moments. When one of the two detectives in this case picks up a yellow backed* edition of a book by Zola in the murdered man's room that tells us all we needed to know about the depraved nature of the deceased.

Clues are dropped like lead anvils. There's courtroom drama, a frantic search for the missing witness who can save a man from the gallows, deathbed confessions and gallant heroics.

I do not regret the time I spent reading it but I doubt if I would reread it.



*Yellow backed novels were cheap mass produced editions of book sold to railway passengers to pass the time on the journey. They tended to have lurid covers and a reputation for being racy. French author Emil Zola had much the same reputation as a yellow back novel so the combination is irresistible.