Sherlock Holmes is a government official. Mycroft has a unique civil service position as a kind of human database for all aspects of government policy. He lacks Sherlock's interest in physical investigation, however, preferring to spend his time at the Diogenes Club. Holmes says that he first developed his methods of deduction as an undergraduate; his earliest cases, which he pursued as an amateur, came from fellow university students. A meeting with a classmate's father led him to adopt detection as a profession, and he spent several years after university as a consultant before financial difficulties led him to accept John H.
William Mycroft last into the 1876 season, when he was top bowler with 62 wickets and achieved best bowling of 9–25, a record which lasted nearly fifty years before being bettered by Billy Bestwick. He played several matches for Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC), and also appeared for Players and the North. At this time he found himself in an assembled team of cricketers in several Gentlemen vs. Players matches, Mycroft's fellow Players including past and future England Test representatives Arthur Shrewsbury, George Ulyett, John Selby, Tom Emmett, and Fred Morley. In the 1877 season, Mycroft took most wickets for Derbyshire with 63