Negative magic or taboo says, “Do not do this, lest so and so should happen.”
— from The Golden Bough: A Study of Magic and Religion by James George Frazer

For a whole hour the weird visitor winked and burned in its lofty solitude, and still the thousands of uplifted eyes watched it with fascinated interest.
— from Roughing It by Mark Twain

These warm Trade Winds, at least, that in the clear heavens blow straight on, in strong and steadfast, vigorous mildness; and veer not from their mark, however the baser currents of the sea may turn and tack, and mightiest Mississippies of the land swift and swerve about, uncertain where to go at last.
— from Moby Dick; Or, The Whale by Herman Melville

She stood a minute looking at the party vanishing above, and as Demi's short plaid legs toiled up the last stair, a sudden sense of loneliness came over her so strongly that she looked about her with dim eyes, as if to find something to lean upon, for even Teddy had deserted her.
— from Little Women by Louisa May Alcott

Towards the end of May, when everything had been more or less satisfactorily arranged, she received her husband’s answer to her complaints of the disorganized state of things in the country.
— from Anna Karenina by Tolstoy, Leo, graf

They live solitary, alone, sequestered from all company but heart-eating melancholy; and for want of meat, must eat that bread of affliction, prey upon themselves.
— from The Anatomy of Melancholy by Robert Burton

Cournet was a man of lofty stature; he had broad shoulders, a red face, a crushing fist, a bold heart, a loyal soul, a sincere and terrible eye.
— from Les Misérables by Victor Hugo

After dinner he and his officers joined the ladies and gentlemen in the ladies’ saloon, and shared in the singing and piano playing, and helped turn the music.
— from Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World by Mark Twain

Up and to church, where a lazy sermon, and so home to dinner to a good piece of powdered beef, but a little too salt.
— from The Diary of Samuel Pepys — Complete by Samuel Pepys

This it is which lends such a strange fascination to the Falls; however pressingly one is desirous of getting away, one is obliged to turn back again, and yet again, like the disturbed needle to the magnetic pole.
— from The Sea: Its Stirring Story of Adventure, Peril, & Heroism. Volume 4 by Frederick Whymper

So Frank had to go back and relate what had occurred at the time Andy dropped from the hydroplane into Lake Sunrise, and saved little Tommy Cragan from becoming food for the fishes.
— from The Airplane Boys among the Clouds Or, Young Aviators in a Wreck by John Luther Langworthy

This morning we awoke to hear the wind still blustering, and blowing up clouds, with fitful little showers, and soon blowing them away again, and letting the brightest of sunshine fall over the plashy waste of sand.
— from Passages from the English Notebooks, Complete by Nathaniel Hawthorne

she said, “it shall be loved as it deserves: who could help loving such a silly creature!”
— from The History of Pendennis by William Makepeace Thackeray

In St. Cloud there was at least a little freedom, a little solitude and stillness.
— from Marie Antoinette and Her Son by L. (Luise) Mühlbach

[68] would seem the natural earnestness of her disposition overcame her proper attitude of ladylike superficiality and she began to ask questions.
— from The Sea Lady by H. G. (Herbert George) Wells

He put a hand, large, strong, and shapely, over Mrs. Alison's slender ivory one.
— from Foes by Mary Johnston

Yet she was slightly melancholy at losing such a satisfactory lot of reliable familiars: unlike older people, victims of the most disconcerting moods and mysterious changes, chairs could always be counted on to remain secure in their individual peculiarities.
— from Java Head by Joseph Hergesheimer