Before you stake your all on this chance; before you suffer yourself to be carried to the highest point of hope; reflect for a few moments, my dear child, on Rose's history, and consider what effect the knowledge of her doubtful birth may have on her decision: devoted as she is to us, with all the intensity of her noble mind, and with that perfect sacrifice of self which, in all matters, great or trifling, has always been her characteristic.' 'What do you mean?' 'That I leave you to discover,' replied Mrs. Maylie.
— from Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens

And so to talk; and by and by did eat some curds and cream, and thence away home, and it being night, I did walk in the dusk up and down, round through our garden, over Tower Hill, and so through Crutched Friars, three or four times, and once did meet Mercer and another pretty lady, but being surprized I could say little to them,, although I had an opportunity of pleasing myself with them, but left them, and then I did see our Nell, Payne’s daughter, and her je did desire venir after me, and so elle did see me to, Tower Hill to our back entry there that comes upon the degres entrant into nostra garden..., and so parted, and je home to put up things against to-morrow’s carrier for my wife; and, among others, a very fine salmon-pie, sent me by Mr. Steventon, W. Hewer’s uncle, and so to bed.
— from The Diary of Samuel Pepys — Complete by Samuel Pepys

Tim Keenan stepped in and bent over Cherokee, fondling him on both sides of the shoulders with hands that rubbed against the grain of the hair and that made slight, pushing-forward movements.
— from White Fang by Jack London

I couldn’t have enjoyed such a thing with my notions; and it wouldn’t have been fair, anyway, because as far back as I could go, our tribe had always been short of the bar sinister.
— from A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court by Mark Twain

They were scandalized by the title, the pomp, the Latin cross of the legate, the friend of those impious men who shaved their beards, and performed the divine office with gloves on their hands and rings on their fingers: Isidore was condemned by a synod; his person was imprisoned in a monastery; and it was with extreme difficulty that the cardinal could escape from the hands of a fierce and fanatic people.
— 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

The Nunnery on Fire Seeing all these gods arrive to help the novice, the Superior, I Yu, held consultation with the choir-mistress, saying: “We assigned to the Princess the burdensome work of the kitchen because she refused to return to the world; but since she has entered on her duties the gods of the eight caves of Heaven have come to offer her fruit, Ch’ieh Lan sweeps the kitchen, the dragon has dug a well, the God of the Hearth and the tiger bring her fuel, birds collect vegetables for her, the nunnery bell every evening at dusk booms of itself, as if struck by some mysterious hand.
— from Myths and Legends of China by E. T. C. (Edward Theodore Chalmers) Werner

And so I say to you, do not compel us to assign to the guardians a sort of happiness which will make them anything but guardians; E for we too can clothe our husbandmen in royal apparel, and set crowns of gold on their heads, and bid them till the ground as much as they like, and no more.
— from The Republic of Plato by Plato

Did we not say that the true artist or guardian ought to have an eye, not only to the many, but to the one, and to order all things with a view to the one?
— from Laws by Plato

When we stood still, he got opposite to him, and drawing his hand across and across his open mouth with a curious expression of a sense of power, and turning up his eyes, and lowering his grey eyebrows until they appeared to be shut, seemed to scan every lineament of his face.
— from Bleak House by Charles Dickens

"rec" Groups oriented towards hobbies and recreational activities.
— from The Online World by Odd De Presno

So we go off to have a soda, and I said to him, 'That sure was a lovely film, Gus!'
— from Indiscretions of Archie by P. G. (Pelham Grenville) Wodehouse

Abel Dorales had given out that he, and he alone, intended to deal with Thady Shea whenever the latter was found.
— from The Mesa Trail by H. (Henry) Bedford-Jones

When they have wanted to exalt peoples or armies under them, they have opened out to them the glories of their history, and called on them to admit into their souls the spirit of their fathers.
— from The Old Irish World by Alice Stopford Green

A fire glowed on the hearth, and a little brass kettle sang merrily on the hob.
— from A Sweet Girl Graduate by L. T. Meade

How much be I goin’ to get of them hundred and sixty dollars?”
— from The Mail Carrier by Harry Castlemon

Even for Frank’s truly fraternal indifference the radiance and derision of his sister still seemed to sparkle and ring; he could hear her laughter still from the garden of the hotel, and he stared at his sombre adviser in puzzledom.
— from The Wisdom of Father Brown by G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton

I reckon it's——" "It's not death then," she hastened, "shure it's a little thing, but poor Matty's that crazy that the child has gone out to her aunty's and wurra a bit will she come home."
— from Fairfax and His Pride: A Novel by Marie Van Vorst

I'm thinking of staying a few days in that greasy Todgers to get on to her all I can from the standpoint of her fellow boarders."
— from Mary Louise and Josie O'Gorman by Emma Speed Sampson

it's a gallop over the hills and far away that'll make the roses bloom on ye'r cheeks.
— from Nuggets in the Devil's Punch Bowl, and Other Australian Tales by Andrew Robertson

When he met me on the gravel outside the house at a quarter to eight on the following morning, clad in a dingy mackintosh which, swinging open, revealed a purple bathing-suit, I confess that my heart sank.
— from Love Among the Chickens by P. G. (Pelham Grenville) Wodehouse