A dull and visionary intellect could hit on no other way of justifying a good instinct.
— from The Life of Reason: The Phases of Human Progress by George Santayana

This troubled me so much as, together with the shortness of the time and muchness of the business, did let me be at it till but about ten at night, and then quite weary, and dull, and vexed, I could go no further, but resolved to leave the rest to to-morrow morning, and so in full discontent and weariness did give over and went home, with[out] supper vexed and sickish to bed, and there slept about three hours, but then waked, and never in so much trouble in all my life of mind, thinking of the task I have upon me, and upon what dissatisfactory grounds, and what the issue of it may be to me. 5th.
— from The Diary of Samuel Pepys — Complete by Samuel Pepys

[Pg 72] &c. Meanwhile Mr. Taylor has instituted a detailed and very important comparison between the names contained in Mr. Kemble's two lists, and those of a corresponding kind in Germany, not indeed from ancient records, but from existing place-names.
— from Surnames as a Science by Robert Ferguson

It was perhaps natural that when events no longer inspired him, Wordsworth should have turned with new feelings towards the classic, and discovered a virtue in classic form to which his own method had hitherto made him a little blind.
— from Studies in Literature by John Morley

They are scows, or "flats," greatly differing in size, with low-ceilinged cabins built upon them—sometimes of one room, sometimes of half a dozen, and varying in character from a mere shanty to a well-appointed cottage.
— from Afloat on the Ohio An Historical Pilgrimage of a Thousand Miles in a Skiff, from Redstone to Cairo by Reuben Gold Thwaites

This opinion of my literary accomplishments was not altogether unjust, for I was and remained always a practical Orientalist, and these theorists might have remembered that a mere bookman could not possibly have travelled through so many Islamic lands as Dervish and faced all dangers and vicissitudes in close intercourse with the people.
— from The story of my struggles: the memoirs of Arminius Vambéry, Volume 2 by Ármin Vámbéry

Her eyes were singularly large and dark, and violet in color.
— from The U. P. Trail by Zane Grey

While the drift was by a devious and very irregular course, yet it was in the general direction of northwest, from 71° 35´ N., and 175° W., at besetment, to 71° 15´ N., and 155° E., when the ship was finally crushed by the pack.
— from Explorers and Travellers by A. W. (Adolphus Washington) Greely

But alwayes this sentence, the word became flesh, and dwelt amongst vs, I ceased not to pronounce, signing my selfe with the signe of the crosse, and neerer then seuen or eight pases I durst not approach vnto the said head: but I departed and fled vnto another place in the sayd valley, ascending vp into a little sand mountaine, where looking round about, I saw nothing but the sayd citherns, which me thought I heard miraculously sounding and playing by themselues without the help of musicians.
— from The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries of the English Nation — Volume 09 Asia, Part II by Richard Hakluyt