I was still a-bed, yet unable to use my legs otherwise than awkwardly, and Charles flew to me, catches me in his arms, raised and extending mine to meet his dear embrace, and gives me an account, interrupted by many a sweet parenthesis of kisses, of the success of his measures.
— from Memoirs of Fanny Hill A New and Genuine Edition from the Original Text (London, 1749) by John Cleland

Johnson repeated the common remark, that, 'as there is no necessity for our having poetry at all, it being merely a luxury, an instrument of pleasure, it can have no value, unless when exquisite in its kind.'
— from Boswell's Life of Johnson Abridged and edited, with an introduction by Charles Grosvenor Osgood by James Boswell

In the towns of Cottage Grove, Burke, Windsor, and Bristol, Americans preceded Norwegians by several years, as also in Blue Mounds, where Ebenezer Brigham located as early as 1828, or some sixteen years before that part of the county actually became settled.
— from A History of Norwegian Immigration to the United States From the Earliest Beginning down to the Year 1848 by George T. (George Tobias) Flom

In all his conversations with persons of rank and education, he advanced his claims modestly, and as if by mere inadvertency, and seldom pretended to a longevity beyond three hundred years, except when he found he was in company with persons who would believe any thing.
— from Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds by Charles Mackay

Stone seems, by the cunning labor of the chisel, to have been robbed of its weight and density, suspended aloft as if by magic, and
— from The Sketch-Book of Geoffrey Crayon by Washington Irving

His dwelling was a cottage looking out upon the Avon and its bordering meadows, and was a picture of that neatness, order, and comfort which pervade the humblest dwellings in this country.
— from The Sketch-Book of Geoffrey Crayon by Washington Irving

Whereupon the city at once voted against it and rejected it, very nobly, by Zeus, and as it behoved men to do who are nurtured under the eyes of the most wise goddess.
— from The Works of the Emperor Julian, Vol. 2 by Emperor of Rome Julian

Thence to the office and did several businesses and answered several people, but my head aching and it being my great night of accounts, I went forth, took coach, and to my brother’s, but he was not within, and so I back again and sat an hour or two at the Coffee
— from The Diary of Samuel Pepys — Complete by Samuel Pepys

AWAY, carry away as if by mistake.
— from Every Man in His Humor by Ben Jonson

At once, however, and as if by mutual agreement, the instruments sounded a retreat; it was expressed in wailing notes, which seemed to imply a dirge for the fallen.
— from The Fair Maid of Perth; Or, St. Valentine's Day by Walter Scott

"In the adjoining room," he said, and again I bent my eyes upon the ground.
— from A Diplomatic Woman by Huan Mee

Costs money to live in Los Angeles and I bought me a dog–looky here, cost me eight hundred dollars!”
— from Wunpost by Dane Coolidge

“But the chosen are not sure to enjoy the ‘affections of all,’ for as long as a man is alive and in business,” Mr. Oseba concludes, “there will be marked differences of opinion regarding his mental and moral worth.”
— from Mr. Oseba's Last Discovery by George W. (George William) Bell

“And if I do,” he said to himself, “the minute I am gone, the sneaking jackals and vultures will appear as if by magic, and begin spoiling the beautiful meat; Joe will laugh at me first for being a coward, and then turn angry because I have left the eland for the animals to maul.”
— from Diamond Dyke The Lone Farm on the Veldt - Story of South African Adventure by George Manville Fenn

I don't suppose that he was at all influenced by my argument, but I noticed him last night paying devoted attention to Constance Twitter, which caused me to suspect that he might be contemplating giving up bachelor life and becoming a benefice—I think that is the term.
— from Mrs. Radigan: Her Biography, with that of Miss Pearl Veal, and the Memoirs of J. Madison Mudison by Nelson Lloyd

Pirates and slavetraders are not men of low and abortive intelligence, but men of education who deliberately throw off all restraint, and who use their powers for the destruction of society. ”
— from Systematic Theology (Volume 2 of 3) by Augustus Hopkins Strong

Ken, who was always watching with sharp eyes, saw buzzards appear, as if by magic.
— from Ken Ward in the Jungle by Zane Grey