Besides, when we meet such a title as the Gunpowder Plot, or any other connected with general history, each reader, before he has seen the book, has formed to himself some particular idea of the sort of manner in which the story is to be conducted, and the nature of the amusement which he is to derive from it.
— from Ivanhoe: A Romance by Walter Scott

The greatest height ever reached by man was that of 25,000 feet, attained in the aeronautic expedition of Messieurs Gay-Lussac and Biot.
— from The Works of Edgar Allan Poe, The Raven Edition Table Of Contents And Index Of The Five Volumes by Edgar Allan Poe

the fins next to the gills have eleven rays each.
— from The Journals of Lewis and Clark, 1804-1806 by William Clark

The wondrous mortal, whose flashing eyes had long been fixed on me in the greatest excitement, worked his muscles in the peculiarly fantastic fashion which we are accustomed to associate with a music-making automaton, the mechanism of which has been duly wound up: his lips quivered, his teeth gnashed, his eyes rolled convulsively, until finally there broke forth, in a hoarse oily voice, an uncommonly trivial street-ballad.
— from My Life — Volume 1 by Richard Wagner

I don't know if any of you gentlemen have ever read or heard anything of that old fort.
— from The Sign of the Four by Arthur Conan Doyle

Gildas, historian, editorial references to, xxii , 5 n., 19 n., 25 n., 42 n.; his “De Excidio Liber Querulus,” quoted, 42 .
— from Bede's Ecclesiastical History of England by Bede, the Venerable, Saint

For example: [“Hannibal conquered, but knew not how to make the best use of his victorious venture.”—Petrarch, Son., 83.] Such as would improve this argument, and condemn the oversight of our leaders in not pushing home the victory at Moncontour, or accuse the King of Spain of not knowing how to make the best use of the advantage he had against us at St. Quentin, may conclude these oversights to proceed from a soul already drunk with success, or from a spirit which, being full and overgorged with this beginning of good fortune, had lost the appetite of adding to it, already having enough to do to digest what it had taken in: he has his arms full, and can embrace no more: unworthy of the benefit fortune has conferred upon him and the advantage she had put into his hands: for what utility does he reap from it, if, notwithstanding, he give his enemy respite to rally and make head against him?
— from Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Complete by Michel de Montaigne

His mouth opened instinctively; his hands dropped the rushes, and seized the glass; his eyes raised from their horizontal stare to the heavens; and the whole man was lost, for a moment, in a new sensation.
— from The Pioneers; Or, The Sources of the Susquehanna by James Fenimore Cooper

Thirty or forty ox-teams had gathered here, either ready to make the ascent, or resting, after having come down the mountain.
— from In Indian Mexico (1908) by Frederick Starr

I looked at them, and at a glance saw that old Gregory had either received his education abroad, or had lived for a long time upon the continent when a young man.
— from The Place of Dragons: A Mystery by William Le Queux

His hand, on which still glittered his episcopal ring, lay on a counterpane of faded rose silk, soft as down.
— from Joan of the Sword Hand by S. R. (Samuel Rutherford) Crockett

M. Fouquet, therefore, would be able, by stirring up parliament, to maintain himself even against the king; and the king could as easily, by humoring M. Fouquet, get his edicts registered in spite of every opposition and objection.
— from Louise de la Valliere by Alexandre Dumas

He had no instructions on the subject—he would refer the case to the envoy at Teheran—he was not aware that the British Government had ever received official information from the Persian Government, of Herat being annexed to that state, whilst a branch of the Suddozye family, which the [248] British Government, in conjunction with Futteh Ali Shah, had acknowledged as sovereign in Afghanistan, still held possession of the place.
— from History of the War in Afghanistan, Vol. 1 (of 3) Third Edition by Kaye, John William, Sir

Study to get harmonizing effects rather than contrasting ones.
— from The Library of Work and Play: Needlecraft by Effie Archer Archer