The men wavered in indecision for a moment, and then with a long, wailful cry the dilapidated regiment surged forward and began its new journey.
— from The Red Badge of Courage: An Episode of the American Civil War by Stephen Crane

Fleying (frightening) a bird is no the way to catch it.
— from Dictionary of Quotations from Ancient and Modern, English and Foreign Sources Including Phrases, Mottoes, Maxims, Proverbs, Definitions, Aphorisms, and Sayings of Wise Men, in Their Bearing on Life, Literature, Speculation, Science, Art, Religion, and Morals, Especially in the Modern Aspects of Them by Wood, James, Rev.

Here the only sounds disturbing the stillness were steady munchings of many mouths, and stentorian breathings from all but invisible noses, ending in snores and puffs like the blowing of bellows slowly.
— from Far from the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy

If flesh and blood is not good enough for you you must go without: that's all.
— from Man and Superman: A Comedy and a Philosophy by Bernard Shaw

Stavrogin would have shot his opponent in a duel, and would have faced a bear if necessary, and would have defended himself from a brigand in the forest as successfully and as fearlessly as L—n, but it would be without the slightest thrill of enjoyment, languidly, listlessly, even with ennui and entirely from unpleasant necessity.
— from The Possessed (The Devils) by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Such caprices, abruptest alternation of frowns and beauty, I never knew.
— from Complete Prose Works Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My Fancy by Walt Whitman

As we all know, the season demands—or rather, will it ever be out of season?—that America learn to better dwell on her choicest possession, the legacy of her good and faithful men—that she well preserve their fame, if unquestion'd—or, if need be, that she fail not to dissipate what clouds have intruded on that fame, and burnish it newer, truer and brighter, continually.
— from Complete Prose Works Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My Fancy by Walt Whitman

Hence our old dramatists constantly used the word for a person employed in love messages, a go-between in the worst sense, and only differing from a bawd in not being stationary.’
— from The Devil is an Ass by Ben Jonson

Many observers, with no particular philosophy to adduce, feel that the arts among us are somehow impotent, and they look for a better inspiration, now to ancient models, now to the raw phenomena of life.
— from The Life of Reason: The Phases of Human Progress by George Santayana

The priest had opened his prayer book, and, waiting an instant for the pair to face about, began: “ In nomine patris, et filii, et —” A smothered cry came from Bess’ lips the next moment, as she looked at the face of Berenice Morton.
— from The Brand: A Tale of the Flathead Reservation by Therese Broderick

Thus, the loss of a limb, by cutting off a portion of the old sensations through which the organism may be said to be immediately felt, and by introducing new and unfamiliar feelings, will distinctly give a shock to our consciousness of self.
— from Illusions: A Psychological Study by James Sully

With sounding axes to the grove they go, Fell, split, and lay the fuel on a row, Vulcanian food: a bier is next prepared, On which the lifeless body should be rear'd, Cover'd with cloth of gold, on which was laid 910 The corpse of Arcite, in like robes array'd.
— from The Poetical Works of John Dryden, Volume 2 With Life, Critical Dissertation, and Explanatory Notes by John Dryden

It was in his flesh and bones if not in his mind, and the priest had hypnotized his mind.
— from The Blood of the Conquerors by Harvey Fergusson

Building on established foundations, Alert Bay is now an Indian reservation, with an Indian agent and government school.
— from Romantic Canada by Victoria Hayward

of the foregoing, and, be it noted, with far less cost for cultivation, and the subsequent preparation of the fibre.
— from Bamboo, Considered as a Paper-making Material With remarks upon its cultivation and treatment. Supplemented by a consideration of the present position of the paper trade in relation to the supply of raw material. by Thomas Routledge