Just so with whaling, which necessitates a three-years’ housekeeping upon the wide ocean, far from all grocers, costermongers, doctors, bakers, and bankers.
— from Moby Dick; Or, The Whale by Herman Melville

It is not the real, but the nominal price of corn, which can in any considerable degree be affected by the bounty.
— from An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith

First came Odin, accompanied by Frigga, the Valkyrjor and his ravens; then Frey in his car drawn by a boar named Gullinbursti or Slidrugtanni; Heimdall rode his horse called Gulltopp, and Freyja drove in her chariot drawn by cats.
— from The Elder Eddas of Saemund Sigfusson; and the Younger Eddas of Snorre Sturleson by Snorri Sturluson

The king of the cockneys is mentioned among the regulations for the sports and shows formerly held in the Middle Temple on Childermas Day, where he had his officers, a marshal, constable, butler, &c. See DUGDALE'S ORIGINES JURIDICIALES, p. 247.—Ray says, the interpretation of the word Cockney, is, a young person coaxed or conquered, made wanton; or a nestle cock, delicately bred and brought up, so as, when arrived a man's estate, to be unable to bear the least hardship.
— from 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue by Francis Grose

'Yes,' he went on to the Kamboh, 'I was in haste, and the cart, driven by a bastard, bound its wheel in a water-cut, and besides the harm done to me there was lost a full dish of tarkeean.
— from Kim by Rudyard Kipling

Its ancient splendor, and the two aeras of its downfall, (A.D. 431 and 489) are clearly discussed by Assemanni, (Biblioth.
— from The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Table of Contents with links in the HTML file to the two Project Gutenberg editions (12 volumes) by Edward Gibbon

I have looked upon the world for four times seven years, and since I could distinguish betwixt a benefit and an injury, I never found man that knew how to love himself.
— from The Complete Works of William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare

The raueled is a kind of cheat bread also, but it reteineth more of the grosse, and lesse of the pure substance of the wheat: and this being more sleightlie wrought vp, is vsed in the halles of the nobilitie, and gentrie onelie, whereas the other either is The size of bread is verie ill kept or not at all looked vnto in the countrie townes and markets. or should be baked in cities & good townes of an appointed size (according to such price as the corne dooth beare) and by a statute prouided by king Iohn in that behalfe.
— from Chronicles (1 of 6): The Description of Britaine by William Harrison

And Bruce, kneeling on the opposite side of his friend, listened, without interrupting him, to the arguments which Gloucester adduced to persuade him to abstain from discovering himself to Edward, or even uttering resentment against him till he could do both as became the man for whom Wallace had sacrificed so much, even till he was King of Scotland.
— from The Scottish Chiefs by Jane Porter

"It is very nearly," continued Nicholl, "the course described by a bomb launched from a mortar."
— from From the Earth to the Moon; and, Round the Moon by Jules Verne

“Is all your knowledge of mankind of so little use to you that you cannot distinguish between a born gentleman and an upstart?”
— from The Knight Of Gwynne, Vol. 1 (of 2) by Charles James Lever

Tuberculosis is, as everyone knows, a disease caused directly by a bacillus; and a disease to which immunity can not be acquired by any process of vaccination or inoculation yet known.
— from Applied Eugenics by Roswell H. (Roswell Hill) Johnson

Gould of the Fourth, or King's Own Regiment, who, as we have written, was wounded at the North Bridge and was then returning in a borrowed Concord chaise, drawn by a borrowed Concord horse.
— from The Battle of April 19, 1775 in Lexington, Concord, Lincoln, Arlington, Cambridge, Somerville and Charlestown, Massachusetts by Frank Warren Coburn

In the island of Vatulele, an upheaved coral reef honeycombed with caverns, the fortress of Korolamalama was a cave defended by a breastwork of stones, watered from a well in its inmost recesses, and provisioned for a siege of many months.
— from The Fijians: A Study of the Decay of Custom by Basil Thomson

Ole Lund, him that was froze worst about the hands, spoke up: "Someboady tak de corner dat blanket an' blow may nose."
— from Pardners by Rex Beach

Such eyes!—long, shadowy, with that languid fall Of the fringed lids which may be seen in all Who live beneath the sun's too ardent rays— Lending such looks as on their marriage days Young maids cast down before a bridegroom's gaze!
— from The Complete Poems of Sir Thomas Moore Collected by Himself with Explanatory Notes by Thomas Moore