But at sunset or the hour of salut , when the externes were gone home, and the boarders quiet at their studies; pleasant was it then to stray down the peaceful alleys, and hear the bells of St. Jean Baptiste peal out with their sweet, soft, exalted sound.
— from Villette by Charlotte Brontë

That the system which has, perhaps, taken no food since six in the evening, should be ready for any amount of labor in the morning before breakfast, does not seem a rational conclusion, and I believe that many nervous diseases must be charged to the [Pg 37] idea, that there is virtue in early rising, this implying, generally, either work before breakfast, or, at best, a shortening of the hours of sleep.
— from The Education of American Girls by Anna C. (Anna Callender) Brackett

A parvenu must be very careful; but a scion of the House of Shang, a descendant of the Yellow Emperor, could unbend and be jolly without loss of dignity;—and, were he a Confucius, would.
— from The Crest-Wave of Evolution A Course of Lectures in History, Given to the Graduates' Class in the Raja-Yoga College, Point Loma, in the College-Year 1918-19 by Kenneth Morris

The old chroniclers contain frequent notices of such calamities, and Giovanni Villani even records the destruction of fifty houses and the loss of many lives by a slide of what seems to have been a spur of the hill of San Giorgio in the city of Florence, in the year 1284.
— from The Earth as Modified by Human Action by George P. (George Perkins) Marsh

She must have looked charming in her rich black brocade, and some of the hoards of superb lace—which she is said to have inherited from her mother, Queen Charlotte—edged with strings of diamonds and agraffes of diamonds, while over her powdered hair was tied a fichu capuchin of Chantilly.
— from Life of Her Most Gracious Majesty the Queen — Volume 2 by Sarah Tytler

If suffered to grow, it will become a shrub of the height of six or seven feet.
— from The Botanical Magazine, Vol. 06 Or, Flower-Garden Displayed by William Curtis

The Queen appoints the Master, Brothers, and Sisters of the House of Shams in Regent's Park, just as her predecessors appointed those of St. Katherine's by the Tower.
— from As We Are and As We May Be by Walter Besant

There were constant deaths by accidents; p022 walls, frail and fissured, had a trick of collapsing and letting down their bushels of brick and stone on the heads of such as were in the streets; the street-car service was badly muddled, and several persons were killed while riding the precarious conveyances.
— from Through the South Seas with Jack London by Martin Johnson

for a long time was not in favor on American vessels, this prejudice being a survival of the hard old sailing-ship days, after America had ceased to be great with her white wings.
— from The Men on Deck: Master, Mates and Crew, Their Duties and Responsibilities by Felix Riesenberg