The moment I came on deck, my old friend Oscar greeted me with his usual joyous bark, and with the sagacity peculiar to his species, proceeded to shew me all the damage done to the vessel during the night.
— from Roughing It in the Bush by Susanna Moodie

Which of the species shall be represented by the greatest number of individuals certainly often depends upon casual conditions, a slight change in one direction or the other doubtless often playing a decisive rôle; but apart from this it appears that morphological and biological features, for example, development at a different season, may change the nature of the competition.
— from Introduction to the Science of Sociology by E. W. (Ernest Watson) Burgess

However, it chanced one day that Madam Lisetta, being in dispute with a gossip of hers upon the question of female charms, to set her own above all others, said, like a woman who had little wit in her noddle, 'An you but knew whom my beauty pleaseth, in truth you would hold your peace of other women.'
— from The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio by Giovanni Boccaccio

I had never had such a misfortune, unless as the result of complete exhaustion, or from a strong mental impression capable of destroying my natural faculties.
— from The Memoirs of Jacques Casanova de Seingalt, 1725-1798. Complete by Giacomo Casanova

Now the good man was used to come whiles into Florence, where being succoured, according to his occasions, of the friends of God, he returned to his hut, and it chanced one day that, his son being now eighteen years old and Filippo an old man, the lad asked him whither he went.
— from The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio by Giovanni Boccaccio

The act said that in case of difference of opinion, there must be a ballot.
— from Anna Karenina by Tolstoy, Leo, graf

Those, therefore, who have placed too great a confidence in such writers, have experienced their error when it was too late; and have found that love was no more capable of allaying hunger, than a rose is capable of delighting the ear, or a violin of gratifying the smell.
— from History of Tom Jones, a Foundling by Henry Fielding

The lively song gave a special flavor to the tone of free and easy gaiety with which Zherkóv spoke, and to the intentional coldness of Dólokhov’s reply.
— from War and Peace by Tolstoy, Leo, graf

(1) There is condensation of details frequently in a proportion so great as one for ten and one for twenty; (2) displacement of details, or ‘a transvaluation of all values’; (3) much dramatization; (4) regression, a retrograde movement of abstract mental processes toward their primary conceptions; and (5) secondary elaboration, an attempt to rationalize all dream-material.
— from The Fairy-Faith in Celtic Countries by W. Y. (Walter Yeeling) Evans-Wentz

, the very earth which received that holy water, had the power of saving grace in casting out devils from the bodies of persons possessed.
— from Bede's Ecclesiastical History of England by Bede, the Venerable, Saint

On the contrary, it appears far more likely that the would-be murderer should connect the thought of it with the possibilities of his own future in case of detection and arrest, and that he should, thus, be rather deterred from crime by it.
— from A Review of the Systems of Ethics Founded on the Theory of Evolution by Cora May Williams

Not an officer or man was there but knew his station and his lifeboat in case of disastrous meeting with a submarine.
— from Uncle Sam's Boys with Pershing's Troops Or, Dick Prescott at Grips with the Boche by H. Irving (Harrie Irving) Hancock

Even his sexual fancies translate themselves instantly into concepts of dollars and cents; the thing that confines him so miserably to one wife, and to one, alas, so unappetizing and depressing, is simply his lack of money; if he only had the wealth of Diamond Jim Brady
— from Prejudices, Third Series by H. L. (Henry Louis) Mencken

He shall from time to time give to the Congress Information of the State of the Union, and recommend to their Consideration such Measures as he shall judge necessary and expedient; he may, on extraordinary Occasions, convene both Houses, or either of them, and in Case of Disagreement between them, with Respect to the time of Adjournment, he may adjourn them to such Time as he shall think proper; he shall receive Ambassadors and other public Ministers; he shall take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed, and shall Commission all the officers of the United States.
— from The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government, Volume 1 by Jefferson Davis

Their occurrence in cases of diarrhœa has been explained as being due to the increased peristalsis, which has detached the parasites from the epithelium.
— from The Animal Parasites of Man by Fred. V. (Frederick Vincent) Theobald

I only wanted to get some superior explosive for my brother, who is in charge of driving the railroad tunnel through a spur of the Andes.
— from Tom Swift and His Big Tunnel; Or, The Hidden City of the Andes by Victor Appleton

“I can only do that with someone to corroborate it, and I’ve been thinking, Lawrence, if you wouldn’t mind helping me, you’re just the man.”
— from Paddy-The-Next-Best-Thing by Gertrude Page

These rescripts were usually couched in the following terms:— "Citizen, you are desired to betake yourself immediately to ———, (naming the prison,) under pain of being conveyed there by an armed force in case of delay.
— from A Residence in France During the Years 1792, 1793, 1794 and 1795, Complete Described in a Series of Letters from an English Lady: with General and Incidental Remarks on the French Character and Manners by Charlotte Biggs

Thanks to these dry sails, he fiddles away with an intensity capable of drowning the Toads' fugue.
— from The Wonders of Instinct: Chapters in the Psychology of Insects by Jean-Henri Fabre