They would go to one end of it, in the line they were then in—for there was a straight green walk along the bottom by the side of the ha-ha—and perhaps turn a little way in some other direction, if it seemed likely to assist them, and be back in a few minutes.
— from Mansfield Park by Jane Austen

After some time the boy became ill, and for eight days could not leave his bed; but as soon as he could get up again, the first thing he did was to take his food to Our Lady.
— from Household Tales by Brothers Grimm by Wilhelm Grimm

“And whoever says the contrary,” said Don Quixote, “I will let him know he lies if he is a knight, and if he is a squire that he lies again a thousand times.” Our own barber, who was present at all this, and understood Don Quixote’s humour so thoroughly, took it into his head to back up his delusion and carry on the joke for the general amusement; so addressing the other barber he said: “Senor barber, or whatever you are, you must know that I belong to your profession too, and have had a licence to practise for more than twenty years, and I know the implements of the barber craft, every one of them, perfectly well; and I was likewise a soldier for some time in the days of my youth, and I know also what a helmet is, and a morion, and a headpiece with a visor, and other things pertaining to soldiering, I meant to say to soldiers’ arms; and I say—saving better opinions and always with submission to sounder judgments—that this piece we have now before us, which this worthy gentleman has in his hands, not only is no barber’s basin, but is as far from being one as white is from black, and truth from falsehood; I say, moreover, that this, although it is a helmet, is not a complete helmet.”
— from The History of Don Quixote, Volume 1, Complete by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

"My servant will be back in a few minutes, and I shall then go myself to see what can be done for this unfortunate man.
— from Middlemarch by George Eliot

When the house happens to have been built in a fairy track, the doors on the front and back, or the windows if they are in the line of the track, cannot be kept closed at night, for the fairies must march through.
— from The Fairy-Faith in Celtic Countries by W. Y. (Walter Yeeling) Evans-Wentz

Yet these foreign nations encourage big business itself and foster all honest business.
— from The Art of Public Speaking by J. Berg (Joseph Berg) Esenwein

She has a great many dolls, and every one of them has been broken in a fit of temper or ennui.
— from The Story of My Life With her letters (1887-1901) and a supplementary account of her education, including passages from the reports and letters of her teacher, Anne Mansfield Sullivan, by John Albert Macy by Helen Keller

The servant, who had not stayed long enough to have crossed the court to Conrad’s apartment, came running back breathless, in a frantic manner, his eyes staring, and foaming at the mouth.
— from The Castle of Otranto by Horace Walpole

At first Bathsheba assented with a mien of indifference to his proposition that they should go on to the church at once with their burden; but immediately afterwards, following Gabriel to the gate, she swerved to the extreme of solicitousness on Fanny's account, and desired that the girl might be brought into the house.
— from Far from the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy

Mr. Quincy said he agreed with the gentleman from New York in his opposition to the bill, because, if a fair experiment was intended, the appropriation was totally insufficient.
— from Abridgment of the Debates of Congress, from 1789 to 1856, Vol. 4 (of 16) by United States. Congress

Such was the fate of a man, who, had he not been born in a free state, would have been celebrated with posterity.
— from The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 by Livy

Not content with being born impersonal, a Far Oriental is constantly striving to make himself more so.
— from The Soul of the Far East by Percival Lowell

I tell you, Necker, you can't be born into a fat life without being born into a fat soul, too."
— from Sonnie-Boy's People by James B. (James Brendan) Connolly

Verhaeren must himself [Pg 49] have felt this insufficiency, for, conscious of not having solved his problems in terms of poetry, he has remoulded both aspects of the country, renewed both books in another form after many years: Les Moines in the tragedy Le Cloître, Les Flamandes in the great pentalogy Toute la Flandre.
— from Émile Verhaeren by Stefan Zweig

It brought back in a flash to him the faint damp scent of moss and roses.
— from Blackthorn Farm by Arthur Applin

Albert de Blancford remained with his brother; but I afterward found that the wound of my poor cousin had that very night assumed so unfavourable an appearance that he was obliged to relinquish the command to the other, who, terrified at the state to which he soon saw his brother reduced, divided the greater portion of the money I had left with him among the men, and suffered the shattered remnant of the regiment to disperse.
— from The Man-at-Arms; or, Henry De Cerons. Volumes I and II by G. P. R. (George Payne Rainsford) James

The heart mostly has its right side gorged with blood, but in a few cases it is empty and contracted.
— from Poisons, Their Effects and Detection A Manual for the Use of Analytical Chemists and Experts by Alexander Wynter Blyth

He’ll be back in a few minutes though.”
— from Chicken Little Jane on the Big John by Lily Munsell Ritchie

He went on— “Mr Brownrigg has gone for Dr Duncan, and will be back in a few moments.
— from Annals of a Quiet Neighbourhood by George MacDonald