An old friend, known to all of us, M. Boniface, a great sportsman and a connoisseur of wine, a man of wonderful physique, witty and gay, and endowed with an ironical and resigned philosophy, which manifested itself in caustic humor, and never in melancholy, suddenly exclaimed: “I know a story, or rather a tragedy, which is somewhat peculiar.
— from Complete Original Short Stories of Guy De Maupassant by Guy de Maupassant

At one time he was my most intimate friend, the friend who knows one's thoughts, with whom one passes long, quiet, happy evenings, to whom one tells one's secret love affairs, and who seems to draw out those rare, ingenious, delicate thoughts born of that sympathy that gives a sense of repose.
— from Complete Original Short Stories of Guy De Maupassant by Guy de Maupassant

The poet did as she bade him, and left her without a shred of reputation, and she was satisfied by getting fame though it was infamy.
— from Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

My mind was made up: there was a score of recruiting-parties in the town beating up for men to join our gallant armies in America and Germany; I knew where to find one of these, having stood by the sergeant at a review in the Phoenix Park, where he pointed out to me characters on the field, for which I treated him to drink.
— from Barry Lyndon by William Makepeace Thackeray

Next they brought pans made of clay, filled with glowing embers, on which they strewed a species of resin, smelling very much like our incense, with which they perfumed us.
— from The Memoirs of the Conquistador Bernal Diaz del Castillo, Vol 1 (of 2) Written by Himself Containing a True and Full Account of the Discovery and Conquest of Mexico and New Spain. by Bernal Díaz del Castillo

The first moment he set his dew-bright black eye on Dickon he knew he was not a stranger but a sort of robin without beak or feathers.
— from The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett

Houses without personality are a series of rooms with furniture in them.
— from Etiquette by Emily Post

Common interest and utility beget infallibly a standard of right and wrong among the parties concerned.
— from An Enquiry Concerning the Principles of Morals by David Hume

There was a scent of rain and mown hay.
— from Project Gutenberg Compilation of 233 Short Stories of Chekhov by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov

[In writing thus, the figure of another Secretariat official rises before me with reproachful looks.
— from Twenty-One Days in India, or, the Tour Of Sir Ali Baba K.C.B.; and, the Teapot Series by George Aberigh-Mackay

Mr. W. Smith considers that a species of rhinoceros could not have been indicated, as it is spoken of in one passage as a sacrificial animal, whereas the ceremonial ritual of the Jews forbade the use of any animal not possessing the double qualifications of chewing the cud and being cloven-footed.
— from Mythical Monsters by Charles Gould

With a sob of relief she realised that it was the voice of her fellow-traveller.
— from The Splendid Folly by Margaret Pedler

They had found the princess fast asleep under a rose-bush, to which the elvish little wind-puff had carried her, finishing its mischief by shaking a shower of red rose-leaves all over the little white sleeper.
— from The Light Princess by George MacDonald

He thus had a store of raisins for each rainy season.
— from An American Robinson Crusoe for American Boys and Girls by Samuel B. (Samuel Buell) Allison

Mrs. Reist chose an old hickory Windsor chair, Aunt Rebecca selected, with a sigh of relief, a fancy reed rocker, given in exchange for a book of trading stamps.
— from Amanda: A Daughter of the Mennonites by Anna Balmer Myers

Two half hitches round a spar or rope.
— from The Sailor's Word-Book An Alphabetical Digest of Nautical Terms, including Some More Especially Military and Scientific, but Useful to Seamen; as well as Archaisms of Early Voyagers, etc. by W. H. (William Henry) Smyth

During the discordant schisms which unhappily rent the Christian church, this splendid structure was reduced to a state of ruin, and it was reserved for the emperor Justinian to re-edify it.
— from Constantinople and the Scenery of the Seven Churches of Asia Minor Series One and Series Two in one Volume by R. (Robert) Walsh

He is also very much set on having dogmatic and doctrinal sermons, because dogma and doctrine are the bone and sinew of religion.
— from The Upton Letters by Arthur Christopher Benson

They were for some time unsuccessful the fit was a severe one, and Fleda was exceedingly terrified before any signs of returning life came to reassure her.
— from Queechy, Volume II by Susan Warner