She did the rooms as she had been accustomed to every morning; she swept and dusted, and, towards eight o'clock, prepared M. Lemonnier's breakfast.
— from Complete Original Short Stories of Guy De Maupassant by Guy de Maupassant

If you'll find disappointment, then return and let us once again make offerings to the gods together.
— from Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse

Not having the moral force to be open, his Reverence walked up and down the room and said nothing or spoke in hints.
— from Project Gutenberg Compilation of 233 Short Stories of Chekhov by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov

Poor as he was, and determined to rise as he was, he nevertheless hired one servant to take the heavy work off of Marian’s hands.
— from Martin Eden by Jack London

“Yes, sir, I will advertise immediately: and meantime, I suppose—” I was going to say, “I suppose I may stay here, till I find another shelter to betake myself to:” but I stopped, feeling it would not do to risk a long sentence, for my voice was not quite under command.
— from Jane Eyre: An Autobiography by Charlotte Brontë

But a lost reputation is so difficult to regain and always remains so fragile that, in spite of the shy reserve of La Blanchotte, they already gossiped in the neighborhood.
— from Complete Original Short Stories of Guy De Maupassant by Guy de Maupassant

The Emperor had sent me to take some orders to General Rapp, whom I found it very difficult to reach amid the appalling confusion of the embattled soldiery.
— from The Memoirs of General Baron de Marbot by Marbot, Jean-Baptiste-Antoine-Marcelin, baron de

He may then take the main turnpike, which he passed over early in the day, or, following the alternative road marked on the chart, may come down through Riverdale and the villages along the bank of the Hudson, meeting the Kingsbridge road at Kingsbridge again.
— from Harper's Round Table, May 7, 1895 by Various

Earnest gravity and a deep-seated determination to repress all show of the enthusiasm of which everybody was full, was very manifest.
— from The Story of the Atlantic Telegraph by Henry M. (Henry Martyn) Field

During the summer Pierrot allowed his dogs to run at large on a small island in the centre of a lake two or three miles away, and twice a week he netted fish for them.
— from Baree, Son of Kazan by James Oliver Curwood

Now, imprudence as well as poverty urged {66} him, while, wounded so sorely by the action of the Armours both in his love and his vanity, he had little desire to remain at home.
— from Robert Burns by Gabriel Setoun

On October 1, [174] 1792, he spoke to the Secretary of his desire to retire at the end of his term as President.
— from The Book of Courage by John T. (John Thomson) Faris

[Footnote: ib., ii, 423.] which may serve to excuse him for implying the use of veritable chairs and a table where neither existed, and for describing the remainder as sitting down to dinner.
— from Houses and House-Life of the American Aborigines by Lewis Henry Morgan

Not a tone of anger was uttered; and yet the severest scolding of a practised Xantippe could not have secured such contrition, and determination to reform, as was gained by this method.
— from A Treatise on Domestic Economy; For the Use of Young Ladies at Home and at School by Catharine Esther Beecher