from the pt. found it about 100 foot high, on the top is 2 graves, or mouns, a Delightfull prospect from this hill which Comds.
— from The Journals of Lewis and Clark, 1804-1806 by William Clark

It was dexterously wielded in the schools of the Saracens, but as it is more effectual for the detection of error than for the investigation of truth, it is not surprising that new generations of masters and disciples should still revolve in the same circle of logical argument.
— from The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Table of Contents with links in the HTML file to the two Project Gutenberg editions (12 volumes) by Edward Gibbon

In this delicate and important circumstance of personal responsibility, the President of Confederated America would stand upon no better ground than a governor of New York, and upon worse ground than the governors of Maryland and Delaware.
— from The Federalist Papers by Alexander Hamilton

Ascending from the consideration of the narrow question of the political and military situation in Kentucky, and the extent of force necessary to redeem the State from rebel thraldom, forecasting in his sagacious intellect the grand and daring operations which, three years afterward, he realized in a campaign, taken in its entirety, without a parallel in modern times, General Sherman expressed the opinion that, to carry the war to the Gulf of Mexico, and destroy all armed opposition to the Goverment, in the entire Mississippi Valley, at least two hundred thousand troops were absolutely requisite.
— from Memoirs of General William T. Sherman — Complete by William T. (William Tecumseh) Sherman

Bless his counsels, his undertakings, and his work; strengthen his kingdom by Thine almighty hand, and give him victory over his enemy, even as Thou gavest Moses the victory over Amalek, Gideon over Midian, and David over Goliath.
— from War and Peace by Tolstoy, Leo, graf

This earth is dug from the ground outside, making a ditch, or huang , running parallel with the ch’êng .
— from Myths and Legends of China by E. T. C. (Edward Theodore Chalmers) Werner

which violates that first natural right of mankind, equality and independency, and gives one man a dominion over his fellows which God could never intend!
— from The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, Or Gustavus Vassa, The African Written By Himself by Olaudah Equiano

"Film companies do not hire girls of my age, do they?"
— from Nan Sherwood's Winter Holidays; Or, Rescuing the Runaways by Annie Roe Carr

Even the great square, the centre of life and of devotion, was deserted; and the principal pyramid, a huge and mountainous mass, consecrated to the most sanguinary of deities, though its sanctuaries were lighted by the ever-blazing urns, and though the town of temples circumscribed by the great Coatepantli, or Wall of Serpents , which surrounded this Mexican Olympus, sent up the glare of many a devotional torch,—yet did it seem, nevertheless, to be inhabited by beings as inanimate as those monstrous reptiles which writhed in stone along the infernal wall.
— from Calavar; or, The Knight of The Conquest, A Romance of Mexico by Robert Montgomery Bird

Just before sunset we were ready to leave our sad associates, and we rode down to the river to give our mules a drink.
— from How Marcus Whitman Saved Oregon A True Romance of Patriotic Heroism Christian Devotion and Final Martyrdom by Oliver W. (Oliver Woodson) Nixon

Since I laid my eyes on dear brother George, and saw him alive and well—and since I have spent a week in camp, down there opposite Fredericksburg, and seen what well men, and sick men, and mangled men endure—it seems to me I can be satisfied and happy henceforward if I can get one meal a day, and know that mother and all are in good health, and especially be with [Pg 52] you again, and have some little steady paying occupation in N. Y. or Brooklyn.
— from The Wound Dresser A Series of Letters Written from the Hospitals in Washington during the War of the Rebellion by Walt Whitman

There was a girl used to go out milking at daybreak, and she awoke, and the moon was shining, and she thought it was day, and got up and looked out, and she saw him doing it."
— from The Kiltartan History Book by Lady Gregory

In Europe, wherever the new gospel of marriage and divorce has had!
— from The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Complete Contents Dresden Edition—Twelve Volumes by Robert Green Ingersoll

There is no character of an ordinary modern English church which appears to me more to be regretted than the peculiar pompousness of the furniture of the pulpits, contrasted, as it generally is, with great meagreness and absence of color in the other portions of the church; a pompousness, besides, altogether without grace or meaning, and dependent merely on certain applications of upholstery; which, curiously enough, are always 381 in worse taste than even those of our drawing-rooms.
— from The Stones of Venice, Volume 2 (of 3), by John Ruskin

You may object that these Imperialists were but a group of monomaniacs and did not represent the nation.
— from The German War by Arthur Conan Doyle

And the king, his father, gratified his ministers and the citizens of his capital, with presents of elephants, horses, garments, ornaments, meat, and drink, suited to the worth of the recipient, beginning with the circle of dependent monarchs, and ending with the parrots and pet mainas .
— from The Kathá Sarit Ságara; or, Ocean of the Streams of Story by active 11th century Somadeva Bhatta