They reached Green Gables not a moment too soon and were joined at the door by Marilla, who had been hustling her ducks and chickens under shelter.
— from Anne of Avonlea by L. M. (Lucy Maud) Montgomery

But the worst of all is, that if it leaves us any leisure, and we apply ourselves to the consideration of any subject, it constantly obtrudes itself in the midst of our researches, and occasions trouble and disturbance, and confounds us so that we are not able, by reason of it, to discern the truth.
— from Apology, Crito, and Phaedo of Socrates by Plato

Forty-five minutes at least must be allowed for dinner, and children under sixteen must not be employed unless they can read and write English; none at all under fourteen.
— from How the Other Half Lives: Studies Among the Tenements of New York by Jacob A. (Jacob August) Riis

Alas, said Sir Beaumains, I were a shameful knight an I would do your father any disworship; and so he kissed her, and so she departed and came unto Sir Persant her father, and told him all how she had sped.
— from Le Morte d'Arthur: Volume 1 by Malory, Thomas, Sir

[Coleridge’s “Ancient Mariner.”] Continuing thus, I came at length opposite to the inn at which the various diligences and carriages usually stopped.
— from Frankenstein; Or, The Modern Prometheus by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

because, instead of dropping anchor close under shore, where we should have to deal with one corner of Bocca Chica only, we had opened the harbour, and exposed ourselves to the whole fire of the enemy from their shipping and Fort St. Joseph, as well as from the castle we intended to cannonade; that, besides, we lay at too great a distance to damage the walls, and three parts in four of our shot did not take place; for there was scarce anybody on board who understood the pointing of a gun.
— from The Adventures of Roderick Random by T. (Tobias) Smollett

At another time he devoted himself entirely to music, and in a long latticed room, with a vermilion-and-gold ceiling and walls of olive-green lacquer, he used to give curious concerts in which mad gipsies tore wild music from little zithers, or grave, yellow-shawled Tunisians plucked at the strained strings of monstrous lutes, while grinning Negroes beat monotonously upon copper drums and, crouching upon scarlet mats, slim turbaned Indians blew through long pipes of reed or brass and charmed—or feigned to charm—great hooded snakes and horrible horned adders.
— from The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

From this beginning the senate became involved in great dispute and contention until some one said that if for no other reason it must be considered necessary to spare them for the Romans' own sake.
— from Dio's Rome, Volume 1 (of 6) An Historical Narrative Originally Composed in Greek during the Reigns of Septimius Severus, Geta and Caracalla, Macrinus, Elagabalus and Alexander Severus: and Now Presented in English Form by Cassius Dio Cocceianus

These vehicles, which have no counterparts nowadays, had something distorted and hunchbacked about them; and when one saw them passing in the distance, and climbing up some road to the horizon, they resembled the insects which are called, I think, termites, and which, though with but little corselet, drag a great train behind them.
— from Les Misérables by Victor Hugo

While Mattison was gone, Harvey felt his way through the Treasurer's office and paused to listen; then he drew up a chair which stood near the door, and climbing up, slipped off his coat and hung it over the half-open transom.
— from The Short Line War by Samuel Merwin

The boat was insufficiently provided, and it seemed scarcely short of murder to despatch a crew under such circumstances.
— from The Columbia River: Its History, Its Myths, Its Scenery, Its Commerce by William Denison Lyman

Drain and cook until soft in two and one-half cupfuls of milk, adding a teaspoonful of salt when the rice is nearly soft.
— from The Myrtle Reed Cook Book by Myrtle Reed

I kept our small Malay force together in the stockade with Penglima Seman, as a panic might arise among them, and the besieged become desperate, and charge us; so the gun was ready with grape and canister to be discharged at a moment's notice.
— from A History of Sarawak under Its Two White Rajahs 1839-1908 by C. A. Bampfylde

On the left of the entrance is the descent into the catacombs, with the inscription: "In hoc sacrosancto loco qui dicitur ad Catacumbas, ubi sepulta fuerunt sanctorum martyrum corpora 174,000 ac 46 summorum pontificium pariterque martyrum.
— from Walks in Rome by Augustus J. C. (Augustus John Cuthbert) Hare

Das Allgemeine Concil und seine Bedeutung für unsere Zeit.
— from The Pope, the Kings and the People A History of the Movement to Make the Pope Governor of the World by a Universal Reconstruction of Society from the Issue of the Syllabus to the Close of the Vatican Council by William Arthur

“So the fust chance you get you might as well walk straight into him, call him all the names you can lay tongue to, and when he makes a move for his gun beat him to the draw and come up shootin’.
— from Desert Dust by Edwin L. (Edwin Legrand) Sabin