Fergus Hume

Fergus Hume was a New Zealand-raised barrister who wrote The Mystery of a Hansom Cab in Melbourne in 1886, published it himself when nobody would touch it, and watched it become the best-selling detective novel of the century — outselling A Study in Scarlet. He had sold the rights outright for fifty pounds and earned nothing more from it. He wrote some 130 further books in England.