The article of CERTIFICATE GOODS re-exported, a vast branch of our commerce, admits of no error, (except some smaller frauds which cannot be estimated,) as they have all a drawback of duty, and the exporter must therefore correctly specify their quantity and kind.
— from The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. 01 (of 12) by Edmund Burke

I must get up a diversion; anything to employ me while I could think, and while these poor fellows could have a chance to come to life again.
— from A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court by Mark Twain

For example, if, instead of saying that tastes are different, and that every man has his own peculiar one, you should let off a proverb, and say, That what is one man’s meat is another man’s poison; or else, Every one as they like, as the good man said when he kissed his cow; everybody would be persuaded that you had never kept company with anybody above footmen and housemaids.
— from The Gentlemen's Book of Etiquette and Manual of Politeness Being a Complete Guide for a Gentleman's Conduct in All His Relations Towards Society by Cecil B. Hartley

As is usually the case with a large tribe occupying an extensive territory, the language is spoken in several dialects, the principal of which may, for want of other names, be conveniently designated as the Eastern, Middle, and Western.
— from Myths of the Cherokee Extract from the Nineteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology by James Mooney

He was the most deliberate person in the world, yet always reached his destination at the exact moment.
— from Around the World in Eighty Days by Jules Verne

Cast it down among the eight millions of Negroes whose habits you know, whose fidelity and love you have tested in days when to have proved treacherous meant the ruin of your firesides.
— from Up from Slavery: An Autobiography by Booker T. Washington

He was now very anxious on my account, and disturbed at the evident magnitude of the trouble.
— from The War of the Worlds by H. G. (Herbert George) Wells

Before ten years had elapsed, their camps were seated on the Danube and the Elbe, many Bulgarian and Sclavonian names were obliterated from the earth, and the remainder of their tribes are found, as tributaries and vassals, under the standard of the Avars.
— 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

In short, it cures all sick persons of the most mortal diseases; and if the patient is dying it will recover him immediately and restore him to perfect health; and this is done after the easiest manner in the world, which is by the patient’s smelling the apple.”
— from The Blue Fairy Book by Andrew Lang

Since you are so importunate, replied Arabella, I must tell you that I will not do you so great a diskindness as to explain myself; nor will I be the first who shall acquaint you with your misfortune, since you will, haply, too soon arrive at the knowledge of it by other means.
— from The Female Quixote; or, The Adventures of Arabella, v. 1-2 by Charlotte Lennox

—These unfortunate birds, cursed for all time by the commercially valuable "aigrette" plumes that they bear, have had a very narrow escape from total extinction in the United States, despite all the efforts made to save them.
— from Our Vanishing Wild Life: Its Extermination and Preservation by William T. (William Temple) Hornaday

The town council seriously discussed applying to Emperor Maximilian to give his consent to the expulsion of the Jews, allowing about twenty-four families to remain.
— from History of the Jews, Vol. 4 (of 6) by Heinrich Graetz

You threaten to break open my doors, and to expose my property outside the house, to be spoiled by sun and rain and night-dews; try it, sir, and lay yourself and your gallant chief open to a civil action in the Supreme Court.
— from The Humour and Pathos of Anglo-Indian Life Extracts from his brother's note-book, made by Dr. Ticklemore by J. E. Mayer

There are Cobb's Poems, Fawke's Poems, Broom's, Mrs. Hoole's, and so on; there are also Cowley's Works—Folio, Warton's "Milton," Waller, and a Life of Chatterton; nor can he have been devoid of miscellaneous learning after the perusal of Watson's "Electricity," Aristotle's Works, Gasse's "Voyages," "Nature Display'd," and the European Magazine ("fine heads and plates").
— from Poems Chiefly from Manuscript by John Clare

Either we commit idolatry to Neptune, and will put him alone stil to fight for vs as he did the last yeere, or we be inchanted with some diuelish opinions, that trauell nothing more then to diminish the reputation of them, vpon whose shoulders the burden of our defence against the enemie must lie when occasion shall be offred.
— from The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques and Discoveries of the English Nation — Volume 07 England's Naval Exploits Against Spain by Richard Hakluyt

Hardly had I changed back into Miss Harding, and finished my evening meal, when a knock came to the door, and there entered Mrs Travers.
— from The Lady of the Basement Flat by Vaizey, George de Horne, Mrs.

Their leader knew that the fortunes of the day were still in doubt, and that every man must throw his weight into the scale if victory was to be assured.
— from The Thin Red Line; and Blue Blood by Arthur Griffiths