"The wheat is ripe," he said, "so run, And bring our friends at peep of day, Each with his sickle sharp and ready."
— from The Fables of La Fontaine Translated into English Verse by Walter Thornbury and Illustrated by Gustave Doré by Jean de La Fontaine

And then finally, when election day came, the packing houses posted a notice that men who desired to vote might remain away until nine that morning, and the same night watchman took Jurgis and the rest of his flock into the back room of a saloon, and showed each of them where and how to mark a ballot, and then gave each two dollars, and took them to the polling place, where there was a policeman on duty especially to see that they got through all right.
— from The Jungle by Upton Sinclair

Why, truly, for a pair of diamond ear-rings, a necklace, and a diamond ring for my finger; which would not become me: For a few paltry fine clothes, which, when I wore them, would make but my former poverty more ridiculous to every body that saw me; especially when they knew the base terms I wore them upon.
— from Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded by Samuel Richardson

Actions are pleasing or displeasing, either in themselves, or considered as a means to a greater and more desirable end.
— from An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding, Volume 1 MDCXC, Based on the 2nd Edition, Books 1 and 2 by John Locke

It was a pair of diamond ear-rings of great beauty, for which I had given fifteen thousand francs.
— from The Memoirs of Jacques Casanova de Seingalt, 1725-1798. Complete by Giacomo Casanova

And there was another pair of dark eyes that found it impossible not to wander thither, and rest on that round pink-and-white figure.
— from Adam Bede by George Eliot

But if I am called upon, I will prove it beyond all possibility of dispute; even though this proof should deprive these gentlemen of the singular satisfaction of considering their country as undone; and though the best civil government, the best constituted, and the best managed revenue that ever the world beheld, should be thoroughly vindicated from their perpetual clamors and complaints.
— from The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. 01 (of 12) by Edmund Burke

She longed to add, “But of his principles I have”; but her heart sunk under the appalling prospect of discussion, explanation, and probably non-conviction.
— from Mansfield Park by Jane Austen

Miss Melvil, not without difficulty, quieted her vexation with assurances of inviolable confidence and esteem, until a pair of diamond earrings vanished, when Teresa could no longer keep her affliction within bounds.
— from The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom — Complete by T. (Tobias) Smollett

When the Blackfeet smoke, they put a piece of dried earth, or a round mass made of the filaments and pods of certain water plants, on the ground, to rest the pipe on.
— from Maximilian, Prince of Wied's, Travels in the Interior of North America, 1832-1834, part 2 by Wied, Maximilian, Prinz von

The animal's owner, Mrs. Penibar, a portly old dame, enlisted our services in its recapture, and, armed with lanterns, my father, Uncle Herbert, and I made for its hiding-place.
— from The Treasure of the "San Philipo" by Percy F. (Percy Francis) Westerman

What's a piece Of dirty earth to me?
— from A Select Collection of Old English Plays, Volume 12 by Robert Dodsley

[171] This statement was strenuously denied at the time by many earnest moralists who refused to admit that it was possible for a woman who had sunk into so deep a pit of degradation ever to climb out again, respectably safe and sound.
— from Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 Sex in Relation to Society by Havelock Ellis

Thus you will see that in these rocks there is a prospect of discovering extensive deposits of valuable minerals.
— from The Unexploited West A Compilation of all of the authentic information available at the present time as to the Natural Resources of the Unexploited Regions of Northern Canada by Ernest J. Chambers

The singer is evidently in a position of dignity ("elevation," ver. 4), and one whose exhortations come with force to the "people" (ver.
— from The Expositor's Bible: The Psalms, Vol. 2 Psalms XXXIX.-LXXXIX. by Alexander Maclaren

Then a tall, sallow youth of sixteen, ungainly in limb and not well-featured, his nose unshapely, his mouth too large, but a pair of dark eyes gleaming with spirit to light up the homeliness of the face.
— from The Call of the Town: A Tale of Literary Life by Hammerton, John Alexander, Sir

She succeeds, in a measure, and Agathe confesses that she had felt a premonition of danger ever since a pious Hermit, to whom she had gone for counsel in the course of the day, had warned her of the imminency of a calamity which he could not describe.
— from A Book of Operas: Their Histories, Their Plots, and Their Music by Henry Edward Krehbiel

Now she no longer saw the mistakes in writing, now she saw between the clumsy characters a noble, grieving soul which had gazed at her yesterday from a pair of dark eyes--for the last time!
— from On the Cross: A Romance of the Passion Play at Oberammergau by Wilhelmine von Hillern

I remember being struck some years ago by the remark of a person of distinction, equally acquainted with social life in its highest and its lowest forms.
— from The Quest of the Simple Life by W. J. (William James) Dawson