When she was seated, when he had placed the pillow at her back, he took a well-burnt pipe—the well-burnt pipe that he had smoked before under other circumstances than these—and filled it slowly from a tobacco jar.
— from Sally Bishop: A Romance by E. Temple (Ernest Temple) Thurston

We had scarcely broke up our camp, when we perceived at some distance a company consisting of five Koriac sledges, drawn by rein deer.
— from Travels in Kamtschatka, during the years 1787 and 1788, Volume 2 by Lesseps, Jean-Baptiste-Barthélemy, baron de

Through the medium of these marine sentries, whose eyes are always upon the ocean, disasters at sea are speedily made known to the underwriters, and in those cases where the telegraph is at hand, a ship has scarcely broken up or come ashore, before hundreds are reading the account of the disaster upon the “Board” at Lloyd’s.
— from Curiosities of Civilization by Andrew Wynter