In this trouble, I went to take a walk in Westminster Hall and by chance met with Mr. Child, who went forth with my Lady to-day, but his horse being bad, he come back again, which then did trouble me more, so that I did resolve to go to her; and so by boat home and put on my boots, and so over to Southwarke to the posthouse, and there took horse and guide to Dartford and thence to Rochester (I having good horses and good way, come thither about half-an-hour after daylight, which was before 6 o’clock and I set forth after two), where I found my Lady and her daughter Jem., and Mrs. Browne’ and five servants, all at a great loss, not finding me here, but at my coming she was overjoyed.
— from The Diary of Samuel Pepys — Complete by Samuel Pepys

When they were gone, how did Dr. Johnson astonish me by asking if I had observed what an ugly cap Miss Gregory had on?
— from The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay — Volume 1 by Fanny Burney

There is a nameless charm in holding converse with one who has lived in our own world, and who can yet tell us how her mother met Dr. Johnson and Miss Burney.”— Academy.
— from Birds of the wave and woodland by Phil Robinson

Experiments would seem to show that such a crop as the mangold derives just as much benefit as do the cereals; while in Germany practical experience on a very large scale has demonstrated its value as a manure for beetroots.
— from Manures and the principles of manuring by Charles Morton Aikman

Hastings, Warren , first Governor-General of India, born at Churchill, Oxfordshire; early left an orphan, he was maintained at Westminster School by his uncle, and at 17 received a clerkship in the East India Company; for 14 years his life was occupied in mercantile and political work, at the close of which time he returned to England; in 1769 he was back in India as a member of the Madras Council; married the divorced wife of Baron Imhoff, and in 1772 was appointed President of the Council in Bengal; under the new arrangement for the governing of the provinces, Hastings was raised to the position of Governor-General in 1773; despite jealousies and misrepresentations both among his colleagues in India and the home authorities, he steadily, and with untiring energy, extended and brought into orderly government the British dominions; in 1785 he voluntarily resigned, and on his return he was impeached before the House of Lords for oppression of the natives, and for conniving at the plunder of the Begums or dowager-princesses of Oudh; the trial brought forth the greatest orators of the day, Burke, Fox, and Sheridan leading the impeachment, which, after dragging on for nearly eight years, resulted in the acquittal of Hastings on all the charges; his fortune having been consumed by the enormous expenses of the trial, he was awarded a handsome pension by the Company, and thereafter lived in honoured retirement (1732-1818).
— from The Nuttall Encyclopædia Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge by P. Austin Nuttall

[552] I am informed by Mr. Langton, that a great many years ago he was present when this question was agitated between Dr. Johnson and Mr. Burke; and, to use Johnson's phrase, they 'talked their best;' Johnson for Homer, Burke for Virgil.
— from Life of Johnson, Volume 3 1776-1780 by James Boswell

They arrived in time to attend the evening service at the parish church, to which, mirabile dictu , John and Martha Bolland accompanied them.
— from The Revellers by Louis Tracy

Unfortunately, the west end, the towers of which were left unfinished, was sacrificed to the stupid taste of the 18th century; Mansard de Jouy and Moreau being allowed to replace what an old print shows to have been an interesting façade , in keeping with the rest of the church, by the heavy structure we all know, because, forsooth, the artistic gentlemen of the day found the original to be in a " goût barbare qui choquait les yeux! "
— from The Churches of Paris, from Clovis to Charles X by Sophia Beale

It was circulated only by the general public till it reached, through that unbiassed medium, Dr. Johnson and Mr. Burke, and thence it wanted no patron.
— from The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay — Volume 3 by Fanny Burney

The failure of the attempts made under the intendant, Don Jose Avalo, must be attributed solely to the ignorance of the persons employed by the Spanish government who mistook mica and hornblende for metallic substances.
— from Personal Narrative of Travels to the Equinoctial Regions of America, During the Year 1799-1804 — Volume 3 by Alexander von Humboldt