But on this occasion, too, Pseldonimov again answered absolutely nothing, and did not even wriggle.
— from Short Stories by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

As early as Calais they began to suspect it; in Paris they feared it; at Modane they knew it; at Mezzago they concealed it, driving out to Castagneto in two separate flys, the nose of the one almost touching the back of the other the whole way.
— from The Enchanted April by Elizabeth Von Arnim

Chains and shackles, which had been the portion of former captives, from whom active exertions to escape had been apprehended, hung rusted and empty on the walls of the prison, and in the rings of one of those sets of fetters there remained two mouldering bones, which seemed to have been once those of the human leg, as if some prisoner had been left not only to perish there, but to be consumed to a skeleton.
— from Ivanhoe: A Romance by Walter Scott

The rooms should be thus proportioned: let their breadth be one third of their length, excluding the niches for the washbowl and the bath basin.
— from The Ten Books on Architecture by Vitruvius Pollio

Ethics: or the "philosophy of desirability."—"Things ought to be otherwise," "things ought to become different": dissatisfaction would thus seem the heart of ethics.
— from The Will to Power: An Attempted Transvaluation of All Values. Book I and II by Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

Each of them equally appears a finger, whether seen in the D middle or at the extremity, whether white or black, or thick or thin—it makes no difference; a finger is a finger all the same.
— from The Republic of Plato by Plato

Nothing less than two fat sweltering one-pound notes that seemed to have been on terms of the warmest intimacy with all the cattle-markets in the county.
— from Great Expectations by Charles Dickens

Thou that didst imitate that life of mine When I in lonely sadness on the great Rock Pena Pobre sat disconsolate, In self-imposed penance there to pine; Thou, whose sole beverage was the bitter brine Of thine own tears, and who withouten plate Of silver, copper, tin, in lowly state Off the bare earth and on earth’s fruits didst dine; Live thou, of thine eternal glory sure.
— from The History of Don Quixote, Volume 1, Complete by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Realizing, however, that the situation of this aggrieved and disheartened man was such that his usefulness here was at an end, and finding it necessary to make a special communication to the Trustees, relative to the internal distractions among the first settlers; to the Board of Trade on the subject of exports and commercial relations; and to the Government, respecting the exposed situation of the Colony, he commissioned him to carry the despatches.
— from Biographical Memorials of James Oglethorpe Founder of the Colony of Georgia, in North America. by Thaddeus Mason Harris

I can well remember hours of fishing at a dark curve in the river where the water was black even at noon-day because of the overhanging trees.
— from Rural Problems of Today by Ernest R. (Ernest Rutherford) Groves

It is small wonder, then, that so many of our educational discussions and investigations to-day turn upon this problem; and among the various phases of the problem none is more significant than that which is covered by our topic of to-day,—How may we develop in the pupil a general power or capacity for gaining information independently of schools and teachers?
— from Craftsmanship in Teaching by William C. (William Chandler) Bagley

and how little respect do we pay to the breach of this or that commandment in comparison with ability?
— from Essays in Literature and History by James Anthony Froude

The fact is, he wants to jam the business of two or three centuries into a life-time.
— from Beauchamp's Career — Volume 6 by George Meredith

"Did'ja see that blaster on top of this place?"
— from On the Trail of the Space Pirates by Carey Rockwell

It is the fault of the municipalities that the towns are not better kept, it is because of the officials that justice is not better administered.
— from Prowling about Panama by George A. (George Amos) Miller

The three kept well together till they swung for home, then the white shirt began to bob up against the sky a second before the dark bodies of the other two showed.
— from Boy Woodburn: A Story of the Sussex Downs by Alfred Ollivant