One day they are seized with that infinite, dreamy sensation which is entirely opposed to the remainder of their private and public life, like a delicious enigma, full of golden splendour, and impossible to be described by mere words or similes.
— from The Dawn of Day by Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

Slowly, very slowly, she pressed the door open behind her, walking backwards still, with a sad despairing look in her large dark eyes fixed on Genefer.
— from John Herring: A West of England Romance. Volume 3 (of 3) by S. (Sabine) Baring-Gould

They always appear delighted to converse with an European female who seems disposed to meet them half way; and they do so with a frankness and ease which at once destroy every feeling of gène on the part of the stranger.
— from The City of the Sultan; and Domestic Manners of the Turks, in 1836, Vol. 2 (of 2) by Miss (Julia) Pardoe

The mango with its umbrageous arms, affording a delightful shade to the weary traveller—the plantain and the banana, disputing every foot of ground, on the banks of the river, the tall and graceful bamboo overtopping every thing around it—extensive fields of cane, waving gently their green leaves to the passing breeze, with fields of paddy, exhibiting the green spiral leaf of the plant above the flooded meadows; numberless cottages were seen, deeply seated in the midst of luxuriant fruit-trees, and a massive church or convent was always in view, in some delightful spot.
— from Embassy to the Eastern Courts of Cochin-China, Siam, and Muscat In the U. S. Sloop-of-war Peacock, David Geisinger, Commander, During the Years 1832-3-4 by Edmund Roberts

Only the third course, therefore, remained, and this was, to continue on the defensive, to dispute every foot of ground, and to maintain the war until new chances should arise.
— from Memoirs of the life, exile, and conversations of the Emperor Napoleon. (Vol. IV) by Las Cases, Emmanuel-Auguste-Dieudonné, comte de

Even when darkness had fallen, a muffled roar sounded from Windward House, where Captain Drake would be reading the newspaper aloud, denouncing every form of government, and declaring that nothing sailed between the British Empire and disaster except the ships of the mercantile marine.
— from A Drake by George! by John Trevena

The word was given to retreat, lest they be surrounded, and they fell back slowly disputing with desperation every foot of ground that they gave up.
— from The Guns of Shiloh: A Story of the Great Western Campaign by Joseph A. (Joseph Alexander) Altsheler

However, in place of being welcomed by the republican Swiss, they [79] were met on all sides by armed peasants who defended every foot of ground before giving way.
— from Female Warriors, Vol. 2 (of 2) Memorials of Female Valour and Heroism, from the Mythological Ages to the Present Era. by Ellen C. (Ellen Creathorne) Clayton

Then, finding himself unable to resist the impetuosity of the British attack, he retired, still disputing every foot of ground, and took to the narrow pass of Runa.
— from With Moore at Corunna by G. A. (George Alfred) Henty