CHAPTER XI Some women, I grant, would not appear to advantage seated on a pillion, and attired in a drab joseph and a drab beaver-bonnet, with a crown resembling a small stew-pan; for a garment suggesting a coachman's greatcoat, cut out under an exiguity of cloth that would only allow of miniature capes, is not well adapted to conceal deficiencies of contour, nor is drab a colour that will throw sallow cheeks into lively contrast.
— from Silas Marner by George Eliot

I stared at Captain Nemo in definite astonishment, and I answered him: "Sir, I understand perfectly how your nets can furnish excellent fish for your table; I understand less how you can chase aquatic game in your underwater forests; but how a piece of red meat, no matter how small, can figure in your menu, that I don't understand at all."
— from Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas: An Underwater Tour of the World by Jules Verne

It is indeed clear that they would do still less mischief than is the case in a state of society; especially in those countries in which, morals being still held in some repute, the jealousy of lovers and the vengeance of husbands are the daily cause of duels, murders, and even worse crimes; where the obligation of eternal fidelity only occasions adultery, and the very laws of honour and continence necessarily increase debauchery and lead to the multiplication of abortions.
— from The Social Contract & Discourses by Jean-Jacques Rousseau

The varher is a person of authority, "a wise fellow, and, what is more, an officer" the boutilier comes next in dignity; and the pâtre is under both.
— from A Night on the Borders of the Black Forest by Amelia Ann Blanford Edwards

[109] "Why can not I do as other boys?"
— from True to His Home: A Tale of the Boyhood of Franklin by Hezekiah Butterworth

Nasanski’s bright, clever blue eyes glistened with moisture, and his well-formed features were rendered still more engaging by the fresh colour of his complexion, although a keen eye could not, I daresay, avoid noticing a certain flabbiness—the infallible mark of every person addicted to drink.
— from The Duel by A. I. (Aleksandr Ivanovich) Kuprin

The rooms are clean and well kept; the children neat in dress, and orderly in manner.
— from Free Russia by William Hepworth Dixon

Meanwhile, he was hedged about with blessings clearly not in disguise, and he gave utterance to this truth as they drove away.
— from Taken Alive by Edward Payson Roe

This sight with like joy fir'd the king, who thus let forth the flame In crying out to both the dukes: "O you of equal name, I must not cheer, nay, I disclaim all my command of you, Yourselves command with such free minds, and make your soldiers show As you nor I led, but themselves.
— from The Iliads of Homer Translated according to the Greek by Homer

My evenings are solitary enough, for I ask nobody to come; nor, indeed, does any body's evening begin till I am going to bed.
— from The Letters of Horace Walpole, Earl of Orford — Volume 4 by Horace Walpole

To him, making the inquiry what founder it was that had erected a Grecian city on the Italian shores, one of the more aged natives, who was not unacquainted with the history of the past, thus replied: “The son of Jove, enriched with the oxen of Iberia, is said to have reached the Lacinian shores, 1 from the ocean, after a prosperous voyage, and, while his herd was straying along the soft pastures, himself to have entered the abode of the great Croton, no inhospitable dwelling, and to have rested in repose after his prolonged labours, and to have said thus at departing: ‘In the time of thy grandsons this shall be the site of a city;’ and his promise was fulfilled.
— from The Metamorphoses of Ovid, Books VIII-XV by Ovid

But the coincidence of the Christian names is devilish awkward; the service takes no cognizance of surnames; and I have merely united a Francis and a Dorothy."
— from Gallantry: Dizain des Fetes Galantes by James Branch Cabell

Washington's letter to Colonel Nicola is dated at Newburgh, 22d May, 1782.
— from The Pictorial Field-Book of the Revolution, Vol. 2 (of 2) or, Illustrations, by Pen And Pencil, of the History, Biography, Scenery, Relics, and Traditions of the War for Independence by Benson John Lossing