The amount involved, it was true, was not very burdensome, the gipsy’s valuation being admitted by local assessors to be approximately correct.
— from The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame

By such arrangements as these, legislation would assume its proper place as a work of skilled labor and special study and experience; while the most important liberty of the nation, that of being governed only by laws assented to by its elected representatives, would be fully preserved, and made more valuable by being detached from the serious, but by no means unavoidable drawbacks which now accompany it in the form of ignorant and ill-considered legislation.
— from Considerations on Representative Government by John Stuart Mill

But, starting with species already somewhat like each other, the closest resemblance, if beneficial, could readily be gained by the above means, and if the imitated form was subsequently and gradually modified through any agency, the imitating form would be led along the same track, and thus be altered to almost any extent, so that it might ultimately assume an appearance or colouring wholly unlike that of the other members of the family to which it belonged.
— from The Origin of Species by Means of Natural Selection Or, the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life, 6th Edition by Charles Darwin

Sir Harry Towers, of Towers Park, in the county of Herts, has been making you an offer of his hand, eh?" "Have you been listening at the door, Mr. Audley?"
— from Lady Audley's Secret by M. E. (Mary Elizabeth) Braddon

e islet, the beach consisted first of sand, covered with black stones, which were now appearing little by little above the retreating tide.
— from The Mysterious Island by Jules Verne

Their vows extend to the strict keeping of the five great commandments of the Buddhist Law, and they diligently ply the rosary and the prayer-wheel, but they are not pledged to celibacy, nor do they adopt the tonsure.
— from The Travels of Marco Polo — Volume 1 by Rustichello of Pisa

He always managed to have one or two slaves to whip on Monday morning, so as to start his hands to their work, under the inspiration of a new assurance on Monday, that his preaching about kindness, mercy, brotherly love, and the like, on Sunday, did not interfere with, or prevent him from establishing his authority, by the cowskin.
— from My Bondage and My Freedom by Frederick Douglass

The whole structure of the Government is artificial and conventional; and it would be ill adapted to a people which has not been long accustomed to conduct its own affairs, or to one in which the science of politics has not descended to the humblest classes of society.
— from Democracy in America — Volume 1 by Alexis de Tocqueville

The artillery would have been lost among the morasses.
— from Les Misérables by Victor Hugo

The view to the southward takes in a lake of about three miles in length, of which the surface is covered with weeds and grass, and the opposite banks lined with thick woods and some cottages; the Recife and the bay behind it, formed by the entrance of the tide, extending to Olinda, but concealed in places by low and thick mangroves are also to be seen.
— from Travels in Brazil by Henry Koster

Baltal lies at the feet of a precipitous range, the peaks of which exceed Mont Blanc in height.
— from Among the Tibetans by Isabella L. (Isabella Lucy) Bird

She did, as he will see, if he will but look at the northern skies in the time of summer and autumn.
— from Traditions of the North American Indians, Vol. 1 by James Athearn Jones

Accidental injuries, as cuts, bruises, sprains, and broken limbs, are treated with considerable success by means of simple salves or gums, cold water, pine-bark bandages, and wooden splints.
— from The Native Races [of the Pacific states], Volume 1, Wild Tribes The Works of Hubert Howe Bancroft, Volume 1 by Hubert Howe Bancroft

I will confide to them valuable secret information about British preparations, and I will show up the British lion as the meanest kind of cur.
— from Greenmantle by John Buchan

The houses have one or two stories; their dimensions are regulated by law, according to the rank and condition of the owner, and, as in all Oriental dwellings, there are but few openings on the street.
— from The American Architect and Building News, Vol. 27, No. 733, January 11, 1890 by Various

If this principle were carried out to its logical result, and everybody played for amusement in the ludicrous sense in which this word is generally understood, it is manifest that—as no one would ever see either a card led or played, or know what suit was trumps—it would be useless continuing to ask each other for information on those abstruse points; and unless, by some alteration in the laws of whist, an intelligence department outside the table were provided to supplement the precarious knowledge acquired by looking at the last trick, the game would shortly collapse from its innate absurdity; unfortunately we seldom arr
— from Whist; or, Bumblepuppy? Thirteen Lectures Addressed to Children by John Petch Hewby

Indeed, the longer and the closer Thure and Bud looked at their situation, the more dreadful and impossible of remedy it appeared.
— from The Cave of Gold A Tale of California in '49 by Everett McNeil

Formerly a sobriquet for favourite veteran men-of-war, but latterly applied to iron and iron-clad ships.
— 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

Now if to these be likewise added the strong attractive force of these small Volatil Particles, occasioned from their Exiguity, it will be no difficult matter to conceive, that they are capable of penetrating the Vessels of our Bodies.
— from An Essay on Contagious Diseases more particularly on the small-pox, measles, putrid, malignant, and pestilential fevers by Clifton Wintringham