At teas and musicales and all entertainments where the hostess herself is obliged to stand at the door, her husband or a daughter (if the hostess is old enough, and lucky enough to have one) or else a sister or a very close friend, should look after the guests, to see that any who are strangers are not helplessly wandering about alone, and that elderly ladies are given seats if there is to be a performance, or to show any other courtesies that devolve upon a hostess.
— from Etiquette by Emily Post

Bending closely over him, I at length drank in the hideous import of his words.
— from The Works of Edgar Allan Poe — Volume 2 by Edgar Allan Poe

The mind flags beneath the weight of thought, and droops in the heartless intercourse of those whose sole aim is amusement.
— from The Last Man by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

With regard to the two boys, it was much the same; only instead of accomplishments, I was to get the greatest possible quantity of Latin grammar and Valpy’s Delectus into their heads, in order to fit them for school—the greatest possible quantity at least without trouble to themselves.
— from Agnes Grey by Anne Brontë

You might have given it to me no doubt, in the house, instead of out of it.
— from The Moonstone by Wilkie Collins

Others again affirm that he ordered the shrine of Asclepius in Ecbatana to be razed to the ground; which was an act of barbarism, and by no means in harmony with Alexander’s general behaviour, but rather in accordance with the arrogance of Xerxes in his dealings with the deity, who is said to have let fetters down into the Hellespont, in order to punish it forsooth.
— from The Anabasis of Alexander or, The History of the Wars and Conquests of Alexander the Great by Arrian

It was a strange old place, built of a kind of shingle, inlaid, as it were, with cross-beams, with gabled-topped windows projecting completely over the pathway, and a low door with a dark porch, and a couple of steep steps leading down into the house, instead of the modern fashion of half a dozen shallow ones leading up to it.
— from The Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens

In these cases Nature seems to have triumphed by direct interposition; to have insisted on her darlings having their rights, and encouraged disobedience, secrecy, falsehood, even flight from home and occasional vagabondism, rather than the world should lose what it cost her so much pains to produce.—E. P. WHIPPLE.
— from Pushing to the Front by Orison Swett Marden

I have brought the cheque with me, and all I have to do is to hand it over to you, and to take your receipt for it.
— from Aaron the Jew: A Novel by B. L. (Benjamin Leopold) Farjeon

"Not yet," said I. "In common decency, and for the sake of appearances, I must stay for a couple of days in the house, in order that I may be able to give a satisfactory report to the Duke.
— from Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol. 70, No. 431, September 1851 by Various

But Walter is young and high-spirited; nor do I think he is of a nature to love long where there is no return!"
— from Eugene Aram — Volume 01 by Lytton, Edward Bulwer Lytton, Baron

How many modest and straitened American homes would have new parlor carpets this year, if henceforth, on the first days of January and July, drafts to their address were to be dropped in the mail in every capital of the world which the work done in those homes instructs or cheers!
— from The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 120, October, 1867 A Magazine of Literature, Science, Art, and Politics by Various

It lay with those about him to make this event a deep injury to him, instead of the blessing which all trials are meant by Providence eventually to be.
— from The Crofton Boys by Harriet Martineau

By means of this inclosure, the artificers may likewise more readily descend into the hold, in order to examine the state of the pumps, and repair them, as occasion requires.
— from An Universal Dictionary of the Marine Or, a Copious Explanation of the Technical Terms and Phrases Employed in the Construction, Equipment, Furniture, Machinery, Movements, and Military Operations of a Ship. Illustrated With Variety of Original Designs of Shipping, in Different Situations; Together With Separate Views of Their Masts, Sails, Yards, and Rigging. to Which Is Annexed, a Translation of the French Sea-terms and Phrases, Collected from the Works of Mess. Du Hamel, Aubin, Saverien, &c. by William Falconer

It was a strange old place, built of a kind of shingle, inlaid, as it were, with cross-beams, with gable-topped windows projecting completely over the pathway, and a low door with a dark porch, and a couple of steep steps leading down into the house, instead of the modern fashion of half a dozen shallow ones leading up to it.
— from The Posthumous Papers of the Pickwick Club, v. 1 (of 2) by Charles Dickens

More birds were to be seen, and there were many signs of land; but the crew, so often disappointed in their hopeful interpretations of the phenomena surrounding them, kept on murmuring and complaining.
— from Christopher Columbus and the New World of His Discovery — Complete by Filson Young