In the first sentence of the last paragraph of the passage, sherlock holmes uses figurative language to explain his answer. what does sherlock holmes literally mean by telling dr. watson, "if they are guilty we should be giving up all chance of bringing it home to them"?

Holmes says this when he is going over a list of people that Watson is supposed to watch will he's away. This is a small list of possible guilty people, so in this words, he expresses his opinion about being very cautioned with the suspects so they can take the guilty one to pay for their crimes, and not to take an innocent neither to free a guilty one.

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