23 volumes, large 8vo. Numerous illustrations by Sidney Paget. (Some spotting.) Original light blue pictorial cloth stamped in black, spines stamped in gilt and black, some with gilt edges (a few spines darkened, some light rubbing at spine ends and fore-corners).

A CONSECUTIVE RUN OF THE STRAND MAGAZINE, CONTAINING MANY FIRST APPEARANCES OF THE SHERLOCK HOLMES STORIES; includes all of the stories that would later be collected in book form in The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes. Volume XXIII contains the entire novel, The Hound of the Baskervilles. H.G. Wells also makes an appearance with "The Stolen Body" and "The First Men in the Moon." Although Sherlock Holmes had already been introduced to the public in "A Study in Scarlet" and "The Sign of Four", it was not until his appearance in The Strand that he gained both unprecedented popularity and visual identity (thanks to Sidney Paget, who was also the first to portray him with a deerstalker cap). The first story that Doyle submitted to The Strand, "A Scandal in Bohemia" appeared in July 1891 (vol. I). "Today it is impossible to think of The Strand without thinking of Sherlock Holmes, and difficult to think of Sherlock Holmes without thinking of The Strand” (Loren D. Estleman).