It is not an obligation on the part of a Mason, to the institution at large, but is in reality a special contract, in which the only parties are a particular lodge and its members,
— from The Principles of Masonic Law A Treatise on the Constitutional Laws, Usages and Landmarks of Freemasonry by Albert Gallatin Mackey

RETREAT AFTER A LOST BATTLE IN a lost battle
— from On War — Volume 1 by Carl von Clausewitz

Things did not seem—that is, there seemed a little cloud upon the spirits of some.—So it appeared to me at least, but I might be mistaken.
— from Emma by Jane Austen

“You mean to say, then, my dear Monsieur la Ramee----” “That unless Monsieur de Beaufort can contrive to metamorphose himself into a little bird, I will continue answerable for him.”
— from Twenty Years After by Alexandre Dumas

The bright Sunne beame a sickly eye may dim̃e, 30 A little babe in shallow heart may swim̃. Hee heavens wealth to a poore stable brings, Th'oxestall the Court unto the king of kings.
— from The Poems of John Donne, Volume 1 (of 2) Edited from the Old Editions and Numerous Manuscripts by John Donne

She always waited for me, a little piece away, and let on to be resting and greatly fatigued; which was a lie, but I believed it, for I still thought her honest long after I ought to have begun to doubt her, suspecting that this was no way for a high-minded bird to be acting.
— from The Mysterious Stranger, and Other Stories by Mark Twain

Alexander and Epimachus, of Alexandria, were apprehended for being christians: and, confessing the accusation, were beat with staves, torn with hooks, and at length burnt in the fire; and we are informed, in a fragment preserved by Eusebius, that four female martyrs suffered on the same day, and at the same place, but not in the same manner; for these were beheaded.
— from Fox's Book of Martyrs Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs by John Foxe

One morning when there was no business in Westminster Hall, and when Markham, after a late and lounging breakfast in his chamber, was preparing to saunter to the west, and spend his morning and, if Mr. Martindale pleased, his day with Clara Rivolta, just as he had drawn the brush round his hat, that daily author of ten thousand times ten thousand palpitations, the postman, brought him a letter, on which he recognised the hand-writing of his father; but the young man thought that the writing seemed of an unsteadier hand than usual, and he was alarmed.
— from Rank and Talent; A Novel, Vol. 3 (of 3) by William Pitt Scargill

A good chap, possibly, but a little boisterous in his manner.
— from Psmith in the City by P. G. (Pelham Grenville) Wodehouse

In her youth she had been pretty, had played the clavichord, and spoken French a little; but in the course of many years' wanderings with her husband, whom she had married against her will, she had grown stout, and forgotten music and French.
— from Fathers and Children by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev

It is unfortunate that even here I have to begin with the confession of another lie, but I have already confessed to so many, I am hoping that one more won't make me sink any lower in your estimation.
— from The Beautiful Miss Brooke by Louis Zangwill

We observed with concern that they looked a little burned in places when they came to the table, and the same attraction of variety was maintained in the disposition of salt.
— from Faces and Places by Lucy, Henry W. (Henry William), Sir

Another turn, and a little bay is discovered, most like, in all the world, a miniature scene from fairy-land.
— from Sketch-Book of the North by George Eyre-Todd

But, among ourselves, the man who can see no end to anything earthly, ever maintaining that the best always lies beyond, if he live long enough to succeed, may live long enough to discover that truth is always on an eminence, and that the downward course is only too easy to those who rush in so headlong a manner at its goal, as to suffer the impetus of the ascent to carry them past the apex.
— from Miles Wallingford Sequel to "Afloat and Ashore" by James Fenimore Cooper

"I may be old-fashioned in my notions, but to my mind a young girl always looks best in white, and to you, Miss Nita, it's wonderfully becoming," she said, as she shook out the soft, shining robe of feather-light Lansdowne, with its profuse, airy trimmings of white, embroidered chiffon.
— from They Looked and Loved; Or, Won by Faith by Miller, Alex. McVeigh, Mrs.

But the third and last ballet, in which the four principal dancers come out together, surpasses all the rest.
— from Anecdotes of the Manners and Customs of London during the Eighteenth Century; Vol. 2 (of 2) Including the Charities, Depravities, Dresses, and Amusements etc. by James Peller Malcolm