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Bulldog Drummond #4
The Final Count
Robin Gaunt's new invention was terrifyingly, unimaginably powerful: a weapon of chemical warfare which caused "universal, instantaneous death". When Gaunt disappeared from his rooms, leaving no trace but a faint bitter smell, the police suspected that he had sold out to the other side.
But Bulldog Drummond believes otherwise. Convinced of Gaunt's innocence, he can think of only one man ruthless enough to use the invention to hold the world to ransom, and he is determined to track him down before it is too lake. Then he receives an invitation to a lavish dinner-dance aboard an airship that is to mark the beginning of his final battle for triump...
But Bulldog Drummond believes otherwise. Convinced of Gaunt's innocence, he can think of only one man ruthless enough to use the invention to hold the world to ransom, and he is determined to track him down before it is too lake. Then he receives an invitation to a lavish dinner-dance aboard an airship that is to mark the beginning of his final battle for triump...
244 pages, Paperback
First published September 1, 1925
28 people are currently reading
104 people want to read
About the author
Sapper
266 books37 followersSapper was the pseudonym of Herman Cyril McNeile, whose father was Malcolm McNeile, a Captain in the Royal Navy and, at who was at the time, governor of the naval prison at Bodmin, the town where Herman was born.
McNeile was educated at Cheltenham College and the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich and was commissioned into the Royal Engineers in 1907. He went to France in 1914 when World War I broke out and he saw action at both the First and the Second Battle of Ypres where he displayed considerable bravery, was awarded the Military Cross and was mentioned in dispatches.
His first known published work was a series of short war stories based on his own experiences, and published under the name 'Sapper' in the Daily Mail and in the magazine 'The War Illustrated'.
These stories were immediately successful and later sold over 200,000 copies within a year when subsequently republished in book-form. His realistic writing proved most popular at a time of great stress and Lord Northcliff, the owner of the Daily Mail who recognised his talent, was so impressed by that he attempted, but failed, to have McNeile released from the army so he could work as a war correspondent.
After the War was over, in 1919, McNeile resigned from the army with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel and became a full-time author, publishing his first novel, Mufti, in that year.
In 1922, he moved to Sussex and lived there for the rest of his life, having married Peggy Baird-Douglas with whom he had two sons.
He began the series for which he now best remembered, that of Hugh 'Bulldog' Drummond in 1920 and thereafter he wrote 10 novels featuring his eponymous hero. The public took to Drummond and McNeile had great financial success.
The first book was adapted for the stage and produced, to great success, at Wyndham's Theatre during the 1921-1922 season with Gerald du Maurier playing the main character. Films followed and the first talkie BullDog Drummond film in 1922 was reputed to have earned McNeile the vast sum of $750,000. There were 26 films made of his books.
As well as Drummond, he wrote about Ronald Standish but the majority of his work was short stories that were published in various popular monthly magazines and continued to earn him good money. Indeed, in addition to his novels, many of his books were short story collections.
He was reputedly an unremittingly hearty man, who even his good friend and collaborator Gerard Fairlie, who continued the Drummond series after McNeile's death with seven further books, described as "not everybody's cup of tea". He died on August 14, 1937 at his home in Pulborough, West Sussex.
His funeral, with full military honours, took place at Woking crematorium.
Gerry Wolstenholme
May 2010
McNeile was educated at Cheltenham College and the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich and was commissioned into the Royal Engineers in 1907. He went to France in 1914 when World War I broke out and he saw action at both the First and the Second Battle of Ypres where he displayed considerable bravery, was awarded the Military Cross and was mentioned in dispatches.
His first known published work was a series of short war stories based on his own experiences, and published under the name 'Sapper' in the Daily Mail and in the magazine 'The War Illustrated'.
These stories were immediately successful and later sold over 200,000 copies within a year when subsequently republished in book-form. His realistic writing proved most popular at a time of great stress and Lord Northcliff, the owner of the Daily Mail who recognised his talent, was so impressed by that he attempted, but failed, to have McNeile released from the army so he could work as a war correspondent.
After the War was over, in 1919, McNeile resigned from the army with the rank of Lieutenant Colonel and became a full-time author, publishing his first novel, Mufti, in that year.
In 1922, he moved to Sussex and lived there for the rest of his life, having married Peggy Baird-Douglas with whom he had two sons.
He began the series for which he now best remembered, that of Hugh 'Bulldog' Drummond in 1920 and thereafter he wrote 10 novels featuring his eponymous hero. The public took to Drummond and McNeile had great financial success.
The first book was adapted for the stage and produced, to great success, at Wyndham's Theatre during the 1921-1922 season with Gerald du Maurier playing the main character. Films followed and the first talkie BullDog Drummond film in 1922 was reputed to have earned McNeile the vast sum of $750,000. There were 26 films made of his books.
As well as Drummond, he wrote about Ronald Standish but the majority of his work was short stories that were published in various popular monthly magazines and continued to earn him good money. Indeed, in addition to his novels, many of his books were short story collections.
He was reputedly an unremittingly hearty man, who even his good friend and collaborator Gerard Fairlie, who continued the Drummond series after McNeile's death with seven further books, described as "not everybody's cup of tea". He died on August 14, 1937 at his home in Pulborough, West Sussex.
His funeral, with full military honours, took place at Woking crematorium.
Gerry Wolstenholme
May 2010
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Displaying 1 - 16 of 16 reviews
December 15, 2025
A scientist invents a new kind of lethal poison that is so terrible it will end all wars. The scientist is kidnapped and Bulldog Drummond and the Black Gang intervene.
The prophetic nature of these stories still inteigues me. Writing in 1926, 'Sapper' talks abou he rise of Fascims in Germany, the increasing threat of Communist Russia, and even has a good job in this one of predicting the Great Depression.
A serviceable thriller with enough tension to keep the reader interested, if not actually entertained. The author introduces a narrating character, rather than retaining the third person limited narrator of the previous three books. This doesn't add any interest to the story, so why did he bother?
If you're a completist, this is worth reading.
The prophetic nature of these stories still inteigues me. Writing in 1926, 'Sapper' talks abou he rise of Fascims in Germany, the increasing threat of Communist Russia, and even has a good job in this one of predicting the Great Depression.
A serviceable thriller with enough tension to keep the reader interested, if not actually entertained. The author introduces a narrating character, rather than retaining the third person limited narrator of the previous three books. This doesn't add any interest to the story, so why did he bother?
If you're a completist, this is worth reading.
August 20, 2020
As the title promises, The Final Count offers us the last showdown between Bulldog Drummond and his arch-nemesis, Carl Peterson, though readers hoping for closure on the battle of wits (or should I say half-wits) between the two enemies are likely to be disappointed. A final twist allows Sapper to continue making Drummond books, and indeed he (and other writers) continued to churn out more.
Once again, as in The Third Round, the previous Bulldog Drummond book, the action revolves around a scientist who makes a discovery with alarming implications. This time the scientist is Robin Gaunt, and he has been working on a poison that is deadly to the touch, and which can be reproduced as a weapon of mass destruction. As ever the scientist and discovery are spirited away by the master-criminal Carl Peterson, who wishes to use them for destructive purposes, and to gain power and money. However our hero Drummond is on hand to save the day and prevent plans for a major terrorist attack.
The political content of The Final Count is not as pronounced as in the first two Bulldog Drummond books, but more so than in the last novel. We can lay aside the usual cheerful bigotry towards Bolsheviks, Jews and foreigners, which is par for the course in Sapper. None of this occupies much of the book anyway.
Instead the most interesting element of the book is Robin Gaunt’s plans to develop a deadly poison that can be dropped on hapless nations. Gaunt’s views are in some ways more enlightened than we usual see in Sapper novels, which is probably why they are so wrong-headed. He does not share Drummond’s contempt for the Boche, but he is alarmed by the atmosphere of inter-war Europe, and he correctly fears that there will be another major war that will be far more deadly than the last one.
Gaunt’s solution is to work on developing a weapon that will guarantee ‘universal, instantaneous death’. In the world of the 1920s this is a poison, but by the 1940s it will be a nuclear weapon. The book therefore offers us a useful insight into the fears of the ruling classes, and their motives in building weapons of mass destruction that will hold the whole world to ransom and prevent any more damaging wars.
We get a glimpse of the dangers of what can happen when such weapons fall into the wrong hands, and how they can be applied for evil purposes. The book’s most memorable scene is found in a written account by the captured Gaunt who witnesses Peterson using an airship to drop the poison onto the unsuspecting heads of wealthy passengers on a liner. We get to see what total war will be like, a world where civilians have as much to fear as combatants.
I doubt whether Sapper understands the potential implications of his story, as he is caught up in treating the whole affair like a jolly game, as the name of the book suggests. There may be intelligent people who can uncritically enjoy Bulldog Drummond books, but I can hardly see how. The book is about a stupid man who only triumphs because everybody else is stupider than he is – his friends, the police, the narrator, and of course Carl Peterson.
Let’s consider the tiddlers first. Drummond’s friends are a bunch of upper-class twits who look as if they have blundered into the book after leaving the Drones Club, the social establishment used by dim-witted aristocrats in the novels of P G Wodehouse. The police are led by MacIver, a suitably inept police officer who is always two steps behind Drummond. The rest of the police force are little better, and there is one comic scene where MacIver, Drummond and his friends are locked in a cellar by a policeman who thinks he has captured the criminals, while the real culprits are making their getaway.
Unlike earlier Drummond novels, The Final Count has a narrator, John Stockton. Stockton is a friend of Gaunt, and he meets Drummond for the first time. Needless to say he is utterly inept, and nearly ruins Drummond’s operations. (It is the role of the fictional narrator to be less talented or intelligent than the other players in the book, since a novel would be wearisome and boastful if narrated by the book’s prevailing genius.) Indeed it’s not clear why Drummond wants Stockton along. It seems to be little more than a sporting belief that the man who began the adventure should be around to enjoy the fun of seeing it out.
Drummond is not as stupid as he appears to be, but that is not saying much, as he presents himself as possessing the minimum of brain cells necessary to breathe and swallow food. He is certainly brave and resourceful, and not without some good sense. However his triumphs rely on the good fortune to have rivals as doltish as he is.
For Drummond, this is a bit of sport or fun, and he feels no concern for what is happening. This is reflected in the fact that he could have killed Carl Peterson long ago. He had Peterson captured in the first book, but spared his life in the full knowledge that Peterson would escape. In the second book, he nearly strangles Peterson in a fit of anger, but is prevented by his wife. These two failures are understandable, but what about the third book where Drummond is set for a sporting fight to the death, only to fall for a trick that amounted to little more than someone saying ‘Look behind you’?
For all his hatred of Drummond, Peterson is also inept, and plays the game in such a way that Drummond always has a sporting chance of escaping. There are numerous moments when Peterson could have killed Drummond in a second. Indeed a man who runs a network of trained murderers could have Drummond removed at any time. Instead Peterson employs the most inefficient means possible for the gratification of personally witnessing Drummond’s demise, and thereby spoils his chances every time.
Just think. If Peterson had killed Drummond quickly and competently, then his evil schemes might have come to fruition. Britain might have descended into Bolshevism, Peterson would have been able to produce a supply of diamonds for his own enrichment, and he could have terrorised the world into submission with the threat of a chemical weapon. On the other side, if Drummond has murdered Peterson at the earliest opportunity, he would have prevented many a theft, abduction, torture and horrific murder. All he had to do was take Peterson seriously and not treat the whole adventure like a jolly cricket match.
The chapter describing the horrifying effects of the poison dropped on the wealthy ship passengers is a disquieting one. Does Drummond for one minute think that if he had acted swiftly to remove Peterson that he might have prevented this atrocity and many other terrible deaths? Is there any guilt or angst or remorse? Of course not. Soon afterwards Drummond is lamenting that he may not get to be in on the final kill, and complacently acknowledging that he and his friends had a lot of fun.
As stated, the book ends with the final battle between Drummond and Peterson. Peterson dies as a result of the deadly poison that he used to kill others, a characteristic act of poetic justice often found in Sapper stories. However this is not the end. Peterson’s ‘daughter’ (actually his mistress) Irma now commits herself to pursuing Drummond out of revenge. Our credulity is stretched when this appears to be the result of some telepathic link to Peterson.
Indeed I believe that she now becomes the leading villain in the remaining Drummond stories. This is a convenient device for Sapper. Drummond’s schoolboy ethics ensure that he will never do anything so awful as throttle a woman, offer to fight her to the death on the top of a glacier or try to force her to drink poison. The substitution of a male arch-nemesis for a female one ensures that the franchise can continue for as long as Sapper wishes.
The Final Round is a typically fat-headed end to the Peterson quartet of stories. As in earlier books, we see a number of weakly-defined characters and situations, and a narrative that treats horrifying events with a disturbing level of flippancy. Once more the main interest in reading the books (for me) is the chance to see the attitudes still held by many conservatives in the inter-war years, and to understand their fears and wishes.
Once again, as in The Third Round, the previous Bulldog Drummond book, the action revolves around a scientist who makes a discovery with alarming implications. This time the scientist is Robin Gaunt, and he has been working on a poison that is deadly to the touch, and which can be reproduced as a weapon of mass destruction. As ever the scientist and discovery are spirited away by the master-criminal Carl Peterson, who wishes to use them for destructive purposes, and to gain power and money. However our hero Drummond is on hand to save the day and prevent plans for a major terrorist attack.
The political content of The Final Count is not as pronounced as in the first two Bulldog Drummond books, but more so than in the last novel. We can lay aside the usual cheerful bigotry towards Bolsheviks, Jews and foreigners, which is par for the course in Sapper. None of this occupies much of the book anyway.
Instead the most interesting element of the book is Robin Gaunt’s plans to develop a deadly poison that can be dropped on hapless nations. Gaunt’s views are in some ways more enlightened than we usual see in Sapper novels, which is probably why they are so wrong-headed. He does not share Drummond’s contempt for the Boche, but he is alarmed by the atmosphere of inter-war Europe, and he correctly fears that there will be another major war that will be far more deadly than the last one.
Gaunt’s solution is to work on developing a weapon that will guarantee ‘universal, instantaneous death’. In the world of the 1920s this is a poison, but by the 1940s it will be a nuclear weapon. The book therefore offers us a useful insight into the fears of the ruling classes, and their motives in building weapons of mass destruction that will hold the whole world to ransom and prevent any more damaging wars.
We get a glimpse of the dangers of what can happen when such weapons fall into the wrong hands, and how they can be applied for evil purposes. The book’s most memorable scene is found in a written account by the captured Gaunt who witnesses Peterson using an airship to drop the poison onto the unsuspecting heads of wealthy passengers on a liner. We get to see what total war will be like, a world where civilians have as much to fear as combatants.
I doubt whether Sapper understands the potential implications of his story, as he is caught up in treating the whole affair like a jolly game, as the name of the book suggests. There may be intelligent people who can uncritically enjoy Bulldog Drummond books, but I can hardly see how. The book is about a stupid man who only triumphs because everybody else is stupider than he is – his friends, the police, the narrator, and of course Carl Peterson.
Let’s consider the tiddlers first. Drummond’s friends are a bunch of upper-class twits who look as if they have blundered into the book after leaving the Drones Club, the social establishment used by dim-witted aristocrats in the novels of P G Wodehouse. The police are led by MacIver, a suitably inept police officer who is always two steps behind Drummond. The rest of the police force are little better, and there is one comic scene where MacIver, Drummond and his friends are locked in a cellar by a policeman who thinks he has captured the criminals, while the real culprits are making their getaway.
Unlike earlier Drummond novels, The Final Count has a narrator, John Stockton. Stockton is a friend of Gaunt, and he meets Drummond for the first time. Needless to say he is utterly inept, and nearly ruins Drummond’s operations. (It is the role of the fictional narrator to be less talented or intelligent than the other players in the book, since a novel would be wearisome and boastful if narrated by the book’s prevailing genius.) Indeed it’s not clear why Drummond wants Stockton along. It seems to be little more than a sporting belief that the man who began the adventure should be around to enjoy the fun of seeing it out.
Drummond is not as stupid as he appears to be, but that is not saying much, as he presents himself as possessing the minimum of brain cells necessary to breathe and swallow food. He is certainly brave and resourceful, and not without some good sense. However his triumphs rely on the good fortune to have rivals as doltish as he is.
For Drummond, this is a bit of sport or fun, and he feels no concern for what is happening. This is reflected in the fact that he could have killed Carl Peterson long ago. He had Peterson captured in the first book, but spared his life in the full knowledge that Peterson would escape. In the second book, he nearly strangles Peterson in a fit of anger, but is prevented by his wife. These two failures are understandable, but what about the third book where Drummond is set for a sporting fight to the death, only to fall for a trick that amounted to little more than someone saying ‘Look behind you’?
For all his hatred of Drummond, Peterson is also inept, and plays the game in such a way that Drummond always has a sporting chance of escaping. There are numerous moments when Peterson could have killed Drummond in a second. Indeed a man who runs a network of trained murderers could have Drummond removed at any time. Instead Peterson employs the most inefficient means possible for the gratification of personally witnessing Drummond’s demise, and thereby spoils his chances every time.
Just think. If Peterson had killed Drummond quickly and competently, then his evil schemes might have come to fruition. Britain might have descended into Bolshevism, Peterson would have been able to produce a supply of diamonds for his own enrichment, and he could have terrorised the world into submission with the threat of a chemical weapon. On the other side, if Drummond has murdered Peterson at the earliest opportunity, he would have prevented many a theft, abduction, torture and horrific murder. All he had to do was take Peterson seriously and not treat the whole adventure like a jolly cricket match.
The chapter describing the horrifying effects of the poison dropped on the wealthy ship passengers is a disquieting one. Does Drummond for one minute think that if he had acted swiftly to remove Peterson that he might have prevented this atrocity and many other terrible deaths? Is there any guilt or angst or remorse? Of course not. Soon afterwards Drummond is lamenting that he may not get to be in on the final kill, and complacently acknowledging that he and his friends had a lot of fun.
As stated, the book ends with the final battle between Drummond and Peterson. Peterson dies as a result of the deadly poison that he used to kill others, a characteristic act of poetic justice often found in Sapper stories. However this is not the end. Peterson’s ‘daughter’ (actually his mistress) Irma now commits herself to pursuing Drummond out of revenge. Our credulity is stretched when this appears to be the result of some telepathic link to Peterson.
Indeed I believe that she now becomes the leading villain in the remaining Drummond stories. This is a convenient device for Sapper. Drummond’s schoolboy ethics ensure that he will never do anything so awful as throttle a woman, offer to fight her to the death on the top of a glacier or try to force her to drink poison. The substitution of a male arch-nemesis for a female one ensures that the franchise can continue for as long as Sapper wishes.
The Final Round is a typically fat-headed end to the Peterson quartet of stories. As in earlier books, we see a number of weakly-defined characters and situations, and a narrative that treats horrifying events with a disturbing level of flippancy. Once more the main interest in reading the books (for me) is the chance to see the attitudes still held by many conservatives in the inter-war years, and to understand their fears and wishes.
July 17, 2025
3 times Bulldog Drummond and his friends have crossed the path and fought with master criminal Carl Peterson and his lady friend Irma. In this 4th duel to the death there can be only 1 outcome - one of them will perish.
The story is science (or pseudo-science) based, although not as far-fetched as one might think, certainly at the time of writing. It exists, though the focus went from chemical based warface to bacteriological. But that is just the background of the story and Sapper uses it to add a horror-element between all the action. Peterson has an elaborate plan to get very richt (again) and Drummond plans to sabotage it. Although it takes a long time for Drummond to realise that Peterson is behind all the things happening, and connects some events that seem to have no connection at all.
A new character, Stockton, is introduced and he is present from beginning to end of the story. In fact he is the person from whose perspective it is told.
Some very colourful characters make their appearance, some are real others will prove to be Peterson in one of his famous disguises. A house with a secret passage into the house nextdoor and an old tin mine with a cave system underneath it will play important parts. Airships, ships, cars provide some exotic but mostly very fast means of transportation.
Drummond acquires a new aunt which provides a fun intermezzo.
The story feels quite different from its 3 predecessors because of the perspective of the narrative.
Some people die, beaten to death, strangled or shot, but others most horridly by a poison that works immediately just when it touches the skin.
It plays after WWI and hints on some horrors that will take place during WWII.
Suspense, action, humor form the foundation of the story, psychology is a plus but exists more in the background.
The friends make fun of each other which relieves the tension a bit during the frequent dialogues.
The fight with Peterson will reach its end but Irma leaves unscathed and warns Hugh that she does not forget. She will appear again in some upcoming stories.
The story is science (or pseudo-science) based, although not as far-fetched as one might think, certainly at the time of writing. It exists, though the focus went from chemical based warface to bacteriological. But that is just the background of the story and Sapper uses it to add a horror-element between all the action. Peterson has an elaborate plan to get very richt (again) and Drummond plans to sabotage it. Although it takes a long time for Drummond to realise that Peterson is behind all the things happening, and connects some events that seem to have no connection at all.
A new character, Stockton, is introduced and he is present from beginning to end of the story. In fact he is the person from whose perspective it is told.
Some very colourful characters make their appearance, some are real others will prove to be Peterson in one of his famous disguises. A house with a secret passage into the house nextdoor and an old tin mine with a cave system underneath it will play important parts. Airships, ships, cars provide some exotic but mostly very fast means of transportation.
Drummond acquires a new aunt which provides a fun intermezzo.
The story feels quite different from its 3 predecessors because of the perspective of the narrative.
Some people die, beaten to death, strangled or shot, but others most horridly by a poison that works immediately just when it touches the skin.
It plays after WWI and hints on some horrors that will take place during WWII.
Suspense, action, humor form the foundation of the story, psychology is a plus but exists more in the background.
The friends make fun of each other which relieves the tension a bit during the frequent dialogues.
The fight with Peterson will reach its end but Irma leaves unscathed and warns Hugh that she does not forget. She will appear again in some upcoming stories.
February 26, 2025
I was mystified by the name Sapper and it meant nothing to me. But then I found out that he was the creator of Bulldog Drummond who I’d sometimes heard my father talking about. And when I mentioned Bulldog Drummond to an older friend, she lit up with glee, thrilled to have the opportunity of making me a new convert to Sapper’s detective adventures.
My friend was so determined that I should make the acquaintance of the idiosyncratic Bulldog Drummond that she made me a gift of one of her own many copies of Sapper’s books that she hoovers up at charity shops. It’s a 1929 reprint of Sapper’s fourth mystery novel, “The Final Count”, with Bulldog Drummond on the trail yet again of evil mastermind, Carl Peterson. He’s the arch-criminal responsible for kidnapping a scientist who’s invented a weapon of mass destruction that in the wrong hands threatens humanity.
Hugh “Bulldog” Drummond is the affable ex-officer and perfect gentleman with a fondness for boxing, drinking beer with his pals and solving crimes as an amateur detective. Sleuthing gives him a purpose as he struggles to adapt to his life of socialite ease and frivolity after distinguished military service on the Western Front.
People complain that Sapper’s plots are creaky and formulaic, and that his characters rely on stereotypes. I can see where these reviewers are coming from. The prejudices and attitudes are most definitely of their time. Nevertheless, a century on, I found Sapper’s books curiously readable, racy, often tongue in cheek and surprisingly subversive.
Sapper’s hero, Bulldog Drummond, is fearless and resourceful, tender hearted and loyal, generous, modest and entirely self-deprecating. Values such as these seem under-rated today, unpopular even. Yet I can’t help feeling that I’d like Hugh Drummond to be fighting my corner if I needed a good friend. And I’ll enjoy reading more of Sapper’s books - as long as my friend doesn’t get to them first.
My friend was so determined that I should make the acquaintance of the idiosyncratic Bulldog Drummond that she made me a gift of one of her own many copies of Sapper’s books that she hoovers up at charity shops. It’s a 1929 reprint of Sapper’s fourth mystery novel, “The Final Count”, with Bulldog Drummond on the trail yet again of evil mastermind, Carl Peterson. He’s the arch-criminal responsible for kidnapping a scientist who’s invented a weapon of mass destruction that in the wrong hands threatens humanity.
Hugh “Bulldog” Drummond is the affable ex-officer and perfect gentleman with a fondness for boxing, drinking beer with his pals and solving crimes as an amateur detective. Sleuthing gives him a purpose as he struggles to adapt to his life of socialite ease and frivolity after distinguished military service on the Western Front.
People complain that Sapper’s plots are creaky and formulaic, and that his characters rely on stereotypes. I can see where these reviewers are coming from. The prejudices and attitudes are most definitely of their time. Nevertheless, a century on, I found Sapper’s books curiously readable, racy, often tongue in cheek and surprisingly subversive.
Sapper’s hero, Bulldog Drummond, is fearless and resourceful, tender hearted and loyal, generous, modest and entirely self-deprecating. Values such as these seem under-rated today, unpopular even. Yet I can’t help feeling that I’d like Hugh Drummond to be fighting my corner if I needed a good friend. And I’ll enjoy reading more of Sapper’s books - as long as my friend doesn’t get to them first.
September 12, 2018
Disappointing fourth and final novel in the Bulldog-Petersen series. The conflict between our lovable hero, Bulldog Drummond, and the nefarious criminal mastermind Carl Petersen has been building for the past three novels, but their final confrontation is very anticlimatic. Petersen doesn't appear until the final chapter, and even Drummond is in only half the book. Sapper makes the bewildering decision to narrate it all from the point of view of a justly minor character, so we are at a curious distance from it all when the two antagonists meet. Bummer.
September 20, 2017
Published in 1925, The Final Round is the last part of the Carl Peterson Quartet in which Drummond once again is pitted against master criminal Carl Peterson. The plot here involves a new secret weapon, but some of the technical details of the weapons use are so naïve and downright silly that you wonder what the author was thinking at the time. Fun in a silly kind of way.
August 8, 2019
Fun! Poison! Zeppelins!!
July 26, 2021
Interesting
Good story that moved along very well. The characters and places are well described. I enjoyed reading this book and would like to see more from this author.
Good story that moved along very well. The characters and places are well described. I enjoyed reading this book and would like to see more from this author.
October 29, 2021
Bulldog is not quite as flippant in this tale as the body count raises rapidly into triple figures! Peterson is back for the final showdown, but you knew that had to happen.
December 25, 2012
The Final Count, published in 1926, was the fourth of the ten Bulldog Drummond novels written by H. C. McNeile under the name Sapper during the 1920s and 1930s (although McNeile’s friend Gerard Fairlie would write seven more Bulldog Drummond books after McNeile’s death).
The Final Count also marks the fourth occasion on which Drummond would match wits with the sinister criminal mastermind Carl Peterson.
The novel is narrated by a man named Stockton, whose friend Robin Gaunt is working on some hush-hush project for the British War Office. Gaunt had been working on a secret super-weapon during the Great War and now he believes he has perfected it. He believes it to be a weapon so terrible that it will make any future war impossible - any nation that possesses the secret of this weapon could impose peace on the entire world and no nation would dare to oppose them.
This is of course a slightly eccentric plan, but Gaunt is no madman. Not yet, anyway. Then Stockton receives a strange telephone call from Gaunt. When he hurries round to Gaunt’s flat he is greeted by a strange scene - there is much blood on the floor, there are the dead bodies of a dog and a guinea pig, and no sign of Robin Gaunt. And in the flat next door a man lies dead.
When strange and sinister events are afoot, events that leave the police baffled, it is never very long before Captain Hugh Drummond manages to get involved. He has an infallible nose for a mystery and for an adventure, and sure enough he is soon in the thick of things. And this is a very great mystery indeed, and even stranger events will soon unfold.
Clearly someone had discovered the existence of Gaunt’s super-weapon and that someone must now be assumed to be in possession of the secret, but what possible connection can this have with the disappearance of a private luxury yacht, the building of a new commercial dirigible and Cornish tin mines? Drummond doesn’t know yet, but he intends to find out. His determination is strengthened when he begins to suspect that his old foe Carl Peterson may be involved. Carl Peterson is Drummond’s Professor Moriarty, an arch-criminal so clever and so vicious that if the public knew of his existence no-one would ever sleep soundly in their beds.
This follows Sapper’s standard formula which by this time he had down to a fine art. There will be high adventure and Drummond will have to make use of both his uncanny instincts when it comes to unusual and spectacular crimes, his wartime experiences that made him such a great leader of men, and his pugnacious and indomitable spirit. And of course his fists.
The Bulldog Drummond novels might not be great literature but they are great fun. Like Sax Rohmer, McNeile had a gift for story-telling and for coming up with outrageous master plans by which his chief villain could not only pull off audacious crimes, but crimes on such a scale that the very existence of European civilisation would be threatened.
Whether you actually like Drummond as a character depends on your tastes. Some modern readers may consider him too patriotic and too faultlessly courageous, qualities that are now out of fashion. But Drummond is a fascinating character as well. He gives the impression of being almost a buffoon but beneath the brash exterior there is a razor sharp mind.
This is an old-fashioned ripping yarn, and thoroughly enjoyable it is too. The Bulldog Drummond novels do need to be read in sequence though, so read the first three before reading this one. Drummond’s four encounters with Carl Peterson have been collected in a splendid and ridiculously cheap omnibus edition by Wordsworth, a volume I highly recommend to all lovers of spy/adventure stories featuring diabolical criminal masterminds.
The Final Count also marks the fourth occasion on which Drummond would match wits with the sinister criminal mastermind Carl Peterson.
The novel is narrated by a man named Stockton, whose friend Robin Gaunt is working on some hush-hush project for the British War Office. Gaunt had been working on a secret super-weapon during the Great War and now he believes he has perfected it. He believes it to be a weapon so terrible that it will make any future war impossible - any nation that possesses the secret of this weapon could impose peace on the entire world and no nation would dare to oppose them.
This is of course a slightly eccentric plan, but Gaunt is no madman. Not yet, anyway. Then Stockton receives a strange telephone call from Gaunt. When he hurries round to Gaunt’s flat he is greeted by a strange scene - there is much blood on the floor, there are the dead bodies of a dog and a guinea pig, and no sign of Robin Gaunt. And in the flat next door a man lies dead.
When strange and sinister events are afoot, events that leave the police baffled, it is never very long before Captain Hugh Drummond manages to get involved. He has an infallible nose for a mystery and for an adventure, and sure enough he is soon in the thick of things. And this is a very great mystery indeed, and even stranger events will soon unfold.
Clearly someone had discovered the existence of Gaunt’s super-weapon and that someone must now be assumed to be in possession of the secret, but what possible connection can this have with the disappearance of a private luxury yacht, the building of a new commercial dirigible and Cornish tin mines? Drummond doesn’t know yet, but he intends to find out. His determination is strengthened when he begins to suspect that his old foe Carl Peterson may be involved. Carl Peterson is Drummond’s Professor Moriarty, an arch-criminal so clever and so vicious that if the public knew of his existence no-one would ever sleep soundly in their beds.
This follows Sapper’s standard formula which by this time he had down to a fine art. There will be high adventure and Drummond will have to make use of both his uncanny instincts when it comes to unusual and spectacular crimes, his wartime experiences that made him such a great leader of men, and his pugnacious and indomitable spirit. And of course his fists.
The Bulldog Drummond novels might not be great literature but they are great fun. Like Sax Rohmer, McNeile had a gift for story-telling and for coming up with outrageous master plans by which his chief villain could not only pull off audacious crimes, but crimes on such a scale that the very existence of European civilisation would be threatened.
Whether you actually like Drummond as a character depends on your tastes. Some modern readers may consider him too patriotic and too faultlessly courageous, qualities that are now out of fashion. But Drummond is a fascinating character as well. He gives the impression of being almost a buffoon but beneath the brash exterior there is a razor sharp mind.
This is an old-fashioned ripping yarn, and thoroughly enjoyable it is too. The Bulldog Drummond novels do need to be read in sequence though, so read the first three before reading this one. Drummond’s four encounters with Carl Peterson have been collected in a splendid and ridiculously cheap omnibus edition by Wordsworth, a volume I highly recommend to all lovers of spy/adventure stories featuring diabolical criminal masterminds.
April 1, 2013
I love Bulldog. I love him so much. I love how he talks. I love how he gets up off the page and almost struts around the room--he's just that vibrant. But instead, this book is told from the POV of a completely new BORING character. Why? Why is told from boring guy rather than nearly anyone else? Why? Meh. If this had been my first Bulldog, it would have been my last. But the next has the lovely Irma as the bad guy, so carrying on....
March 11, 2014
A change in this one, in that the book is written in the first person by a new member of Drummond's gang rather than in the third person. Peterson finally gets his just deserts in this one while attempting to bring off his most audacious plan. Taken as a good old fashioned thriller this is probably the best of the first four Drummond novels, with the action never letting up for an instant.
April 23, 2016
read SOMETIME in 2006
June 6, 2016
I loved the classic hero. It was so nail-biting, electrifying. I LOVE BULLDOG DRUMMOND!!!
December 27, 2017
A very enjoyable read. Fast paced with good characters
Want to read
September 29, 2018Synopsis: Drummond suspects his arch enemy Carl Peterson has kidnapped the inventor of a new weapon.
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