I love your passion for these characters and the series. :) I never tire of reading your analyses and comments.

I think while I might greatly admire Holmes' intelligence, I might want to knock him on the head a bit. ;) On the other hand, I think I want to pat Watson. ;)

I would imagine that a lot of married couples of this era had marriages that operated in much the same manner that Watson's and Mary's did. Marriage had a lot to do with convenience and social standing at that time, and very little to do with actual love or passion, at least in a lot of cases. People (especially women) were lucky if they ended up marrying someone who was good to them and that they could stand. Of course, in a lot of cases, the relationship developed into a love of sorts, but I think it may have been more of a companionable love than a romantic one.