‘It’s a very extraordinary thing,’ she said, ‘a most extraordinary thing, that they should have invited Miss La Creevy.
— from Nicholas Nickleby by Charles Dickens

The Ogress presently knew the voice of the Queen and her children, and being quite mad that she had been thus deceived, she commanded next morning, by break of day (with a most horrible voice, which made everybody tremble), that they should bring into the middle of the great court a large tub, which she caused to be filled with toads, vipers, snakes, and all sorts of serpents, in order to have thrown into it the Queen and her children, the clerk of the kitchen, his wife and maid; all whom she had given orders should be brought thither with their hands tied behind them.
— from The Blue Fairy Book by Andrew Lang

There lies the mill at the bottom of the sea, and still, day by day, it grinds on; and that is why the sea is salt.(1) (1) Asbjornsen and Moe. H2 anchor THE MASTER CAT; OR, PUSS IN BOOTS There was a miller who left no more estate to the three sons he had than his mill, his ass, and his cat.
— from The Blue Fairy Book by Andrew Lang

But the fact which clearly opened my eyes to the true state of the case, was the affair of the bullet, found by Mr. G. in the carcass of the horse.
— from The Works of Edgar Allan Poe, The Raven Edition Table Of Contents And Index Of The Five Volumes by Edgar Allan Poe

Certainly there is a mighty force in these evils which compel a man—according to them, even a wise man—to cease to be a man that he may escape them, though they say, and say truly, that it is as it were the first and strongest demand of nature that a man cherish himself, and naturally therefore avoid death, and should so stand his own friend as to wish and vehemently aim at continuing to exist as a living creature, and subsisting in this union of soul and body.
— from The City of God, Volume II by Augustine, Saint, Bishop of Hippo

blow! Make no parley—stop for no expostulation, Mind not the timid—mind not the weeper or prayer, Mind not the old man beseeching the young man, Let not the child's voice be heard, nor the mother's entreaties, Make even the trestles to shake the dead where they lie awaiting the hearses, So strong you thump O terrible drums—so loud you bugles blow.
— from Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman

that by this interview, [4954] the purer spirits are infected, the one eye pierceth through the other with his rays, which he sends forth, and many men have those excellent piercing eyes, that, which Suetonius relates of Augustus, their brightness is such, they compel their spectators to look off, and can no more endure them than the sunbeams.
— from The Anatomy of Melancholy by Robert Burton

This form of suggestion—talking to oneself vigorously, earnestly—seems to arouse the sleeping forces in the subconscious self more effectually than thinking the same thing.
— from Pushing to the Front by Orison Swett Marden

But charity is not an accidental habit, since it is a more excellent thing than the soul itself: whereas no accident is more excellent than its subject.
— from Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) Translated by Fathers of the English Dominican Province by Thomas, Aquinas, Saint

Several members expressing themselves to the same effect, Mr. Sergeant extended the time to 4 o'clock on Monday evening.
— from Thirty Years' View (Vol. 2 of 2) or, A History of the Working of the American Government for Thirty Years, from 1820 to 1850 by Thomas Hart Benton

A fierce south wind came up in the night, and there are situations more enviable than trying to sleep in a houseboat with three boats using her for a punching bag.
— from The Houseboat Book: The Log of a Cruise from Chicago to New Orleans by W. F. (William Francis) Waugh

"But I seen out of the corner of my eye that that there shadow had its hand on its gun.
— from The Ridin' Kid from Powder River by Henry Herbert Knibbs

Sir Hiram's theory is that if the screw is placed in front, the backwash strikes the machine, which offers a good deal of resistance to the passage of the air, and retards action; but if the propeller is placed in the rear, the resistance of the machine imparts a forward motion to the air with which it comes in contact, and the screw, running in air that is moving forward, has less slip, and is, therefore, more efficient than the tractor screw.
— from The Library of Work and Play: Mechanics, Indoors and Out by Fred. T. (Frederick Thomas) Hodgson

“The queen regent opened the Cortes in Madrid yesterday, saying, in her speech from the throne: ‘I have summoned the Cortes to defend our rights, whatever sacrifice they may entail, trusting to the Spanish people to gather behind my son’s throne.
— from The Boys of '98 by James Otis

And more even than this, to set forth a standard of faith for all the ages which were to come; not an arbitrary system of dogmas, but those which the Scriptures most directly and emphatically recognized.
— from The Old Roman World : the Grandeur and Failure of Its Civilization. by John Lord

The orderly-room whispers: "June the fifteenth"; the senior officers' quarters murmur: "France on June the fifteenth"; the mess echoes to the tidings spread by the subaltern-who-knows: "We're for it on June the fifteenth, me lad"; through the men's hutments the word is spread: "It's good-bye to this blinking hole on June the fifteenth"; the Home receives a letter and confides to other homes: "Reginald's lot are going to the war on June the fifteenth"; finally, if we are to believe Mr. [Pg 4] William le Queux, the Military Intelligence Department of the German Empire dockets a report: "Das zwölfzigste Battalion (Batterie oder Escadrille) geht am 15 Juni nach Frankreich."
— from Cavalry of the Clouds by Alan Bott

Glancing my eye then to the south,—"See," said I, "while the Kamtschadale is providing his supply of furs and of fish, for the long winter which is already knocking at the door of his hut, the gay and voluptuous native of the Sandwich and other islands between the tropics.
— from A Voyage to the Moon With Some Account of the Manners and Customs, Science and Philosophy, of the People of Morosofia, and Other Lunarians by George Tucker