He picked up his coat from the grass and brought out of a pocket a lumpy little bundle tied up in a quiet clean, coarse, blue and white handkerchief.
— from The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett

Nor will it suffice to take a single interest group and base our interpretation upon it, not even for a special time and a special place.
— from Introduction to the Science of Sociology by E. W. (Ernest Watson) Burgess

, Christie answered, brushing back her hair, as if to get a better out-look at creation generally: "Oh, yes, indeed!
— from Work: A Story of Experience by Louisa May Alcott

Not that his parents had any reason to disown or renounce their offspring, or that there was anything preternatural in the circumstances of his generation and birth; on the contrary, he was, from the beginning, a child of promising parts, and in due course of nature ushered into the world amidst a whole cloud of witnesses.
— from The Adventures of Ferdinand Count Fathom — Complete by T. (Tobias) Smollett

The whole situation's a little mixed, as I see it—but there used to be an aunt somewhere, a diffuse and innocent person, who was great at bridging over chasms she didn't see … Ah, in New York, is she?
— from The House of Mirth by Edith Wharton

hat time gravedigger and bearer of the dead.
— from A Journal of the Plague Year Written by a Citizen Who Continued All the While in London by Daniel Defoe

The Chinese government, a bureaucracy of Mandarins, is, as far as known to us, another apparent example of the same qualities and defects.
— from Considerations on Representative Government by John Stuart Mill

Then came also the grandmother, a bent old woman with eyes like Maia's.
— from The Romance of Leonardo da Vinci, the Forerunner by Dmitry Sergeyevich Merezhkovsky

She ran crouchingly, seeking the higher grasses and brambles of the ridge to escape observation from the meadow until she could descend upon the barn from the rear.
— from Cressy by Bret Harte

Mr. Dugdale told me, that, about the time of king Henry III., the pope gave a bull, or patent, to a company of Italian architects, to travel up and down Europe to build churches.
— from The Every-day Book and Table Book. v. 3 (of 3) Everlasting Calerdar of Popular Amusements, Sports, Pastimes, Ceremonies, Manners, Customs and Events, Incident to Each of the Three Hundred and Sixty-five Days, in past and Present Times; Forming a Complete History of the Year, Month, and Seasons, and a Perpetual Key to the Almanac by William Hone

He altered his position so that he could get a bend of the thong against the nail point, and then he tried gently rubbing it, or rather letting the nail peck at the hide.
— from Motor Matt in Brazil; or, Under The Amazon by Stanley R. Matthews

On the other hand this very trait sometimes annoyed him, for in the moments when the desire to break his bonds grew all but overpowering, he felt that the little he gave could not for a day have satisfied another woman.
— from Donna Teresa by Frances Mary Peard

“Why, you’ve got a blanket on under it!”
— from Steve Young by George Manville Fenn

A broad, shallow groove across base of transverse process, the anterior edge of which is emarginate proximally.
— from The Beaked Whales of the Family Ziphiidae An Account of the Beaked Whales of the Family Ziphiidae in the Collection of the United States Museum... by Frederick W. (Frederick William) True

He gulped and bent over the tiller.
— from Sir Christopher: A Romance of a Maryland Manor in 1644 by Maud Wilder Goodwin

The grandeur and beauty of the Madeleine will enchant him; but not more than the massive solemnity and stupendous magnificence of St. Paul's.
— from Shakespeare's England by William Winter

Several of the companies have halls of great architectural beauty, or curious on account of their antiquity.
— from Collins' Illustrated Guide to London and Neighbourhood Being a Concise Description of the Chief Places of Interest in the Metropolis, and the Best Modes of Obtaining Access to Them: with Information Relating to Railways, Omnibuses, Steamers, &c. by Anonymous