"Yes, for aught I know," returned Captain Delano—"but nay," rallying himself into fearless truth, "some of them talked of going off on another fishing party about midnight."
— from The Piazza Tales by Herman Melville

A tumult in the High Church of Edinburgh spread into a universal battle and struggle over all these realms;—there came out, after fifty years' struggling, what we all call the " Glorious Revolution" a Habeas Corpus Act, Free Parliaments, and much else!—Alas, is it not too true what we said, That many men in the van do always, like Russian soldiers, march into the ditch of Schweidnitz, and fill it up with their dead bodies, that the rear may pass over them dry-shod, and gain the honor?
— from On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History by Thomas Carlyle

‘Never go into the company of a filthy Punch any more,’ said Mrs Jarley, ‘after this.’
— from The Old Curiosity Shop by Charles Dickens

I am sorry for myself, sir, said he, that I should so unhappily incur your displeasure; but I rejoice for her sake in your honourable intentions: give me leave only to say, that if you make Miss Andrews your lady, she will do credit to your choice with every body that sees her, or comes to know her; and, for person and mind both, you may challenge the county.
— from Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded by Samuel Richardson

While the synod debated, a fanatic proposed a more summary decision, by raising a dead man to life: the prelates assisted at the trial; but the acknowledged failure may serve to indicate, that the passions and prejudices of the multitude were not enlisted on the side of the Monothelites.
— from The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Table of Contents with links in the HTML file to the two Project Gutenberg editions (12 volumes) by Edward Gibbon

As a safeguard against the infinite power secured for the master by Kuttichāttan, it is laid down that malign acts committed through his instrumentality recoil on the prompter, who dies either childless or after frightful physical and mental agony.
— from Omens and Superstitions of Southern India by Edgar Thurston

It is maintained that unswaddled infants would assume faulty positions and make movements which might injure the proper development of their limbs.
— from Emile by Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Straightway a scent steals into my nostril, [137] a form presses against my palm in all its dilating softness, with rounded petals, slightly curled edges, curving stem, leaves drooping.
— from The World I Live In by Helen Keller

And when he had hooked a fine perch, and Miss Bell made a dash at the line, And the fish flobbered back with a flop, Jack's escape from a cuss cut it fine.
— from Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 93. July 30, 1887 by Various

Upon the fresh, green coils of smilax, rich with fragrance, sweet, moist, dewy, exquisite, lay store upon store of the choicest flowers—rose-buds and rose-blossoms in cream and yellow and pink and crimson, carnations in white and red, heliotrope and hyacinth, and fairest pansies, and modest little violets, and gorgeous tulips, even great callas—the first flowers she had seen in years.
— from Campaigning with Crook, and Stories of Army Life by Charles King

"Well, then," said Tissaphernes, "if you will come to me, as well generals as captains, in a public manner, I will inform you who they are that tell [Pg 68] me that you are forming plots against me and my army."
— from The First Four Books of Xenophon's Anabasis by Xenophon

He was a forcible preacher, and many of the present membership were received into the church during his fruitful ministry.
— from Two Centuries of New Milford Connecticut An Account of the Bi-Centennial Celebration of the Founding of the Town Held June 15, 16, 17, and 18, 1907, With a Number of Historical Articles and Reminiscences by Various

When talk I needed; and when warmed to pray, The little birds my choristers should be, Who wear one suit for worship and for play, And make the whole year long one sabbath-day.
— from Poems by John Clare

Across the street a flaunting poster announced "Moving Picture Show for a Nickel."
— from Flamsted quarries by Mary E. (Mary Ella) Waller

The Infanta was to marry a French Prince, and mention was even made of the Duke of Guise, the son of the Duke who had been assassinated at Blois.
— from Memoirs of the life, exile, and conversations of the Emperor Napoleon. (Vol. III) by Las Cases, Emmanuel-Auguste-Dieudonné, comte de

Even Constantine of Africa, who lived 500 years after Aëtius, and, as the most learned physician of the school of Salerno, would certainly not have passed over so acceptable a subject of remark, knows nothing of such a memorable course of this disease arising from poison, and merely repeats the observations of his Greek predecessors.
— from The Black Death, and The Dancing Mania by J. F. C. (Justus Friedrich Carl) Hecker

Poor bloodhounds of the police, who had undertaken to protect the lives of a few people, and McCormick, who is unfortunate enough to own more property than perhaps any of us—to protect his property from being stoned, and his premises pillaged, and his men murdered.
— from Anarchy and Anarchists A History of the Red Terror and the Social Revolution in America and Europe; Communism, Socialism, and Nihilism in Doctrine and in Deed; The Chicago Haymarket Conspiracy and the Detection and Trial of the Conspirators by Michael J. Schaack

and I went up stairs to a window, and looked out and see the foot face the horse and beat them back, and stood bawling and calling in the street for a free Parliament and money.
— from Diary of Samuel Pepys — Volume 03: February 1659-1660 by Samuel Pepys