Another peculiarity is, the rooms are not plastered, but the ceiling and sides are covered with matched cypress boards, painted such color as most pleases the owner's taste.
— from Twelve Years a Slave Narrative of Solomon Northup, a Citizen of New-York, Kidnapped in Washington City in 1841, and Rescued in 1853, from a Cotton Plantation near the Red River in Louisiana by Solomon Northup

In the original Lives of the Popes, we often discover the city and republic of Rome: and the events of the xivth and xvth centuries are preserved in the rude and domestic chronicles which I have carefully inspected, and shall recapitulate in the order of time.
— 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

But if thou resist and go about vim vi repellere , as the custom of the world is, to right thyself, or hast given just cause of offence, 'tis no injury then but a condign punishment; thou hast deserved as much: A te principium, in te recredit crimen quod a te fuit; peccasti, quiesce , as Ambrose expostulates with Cain, lib.
— from The Anatomy of Melancholy by Robert Burton

But a study of the actual facts of society shows that resentment plays an important part in that repression of injuries which is necessary to social wellbeing; accordingly, the reflective moralist shrinks from excluding it altogether.
— from The Methods of Ethics by Henry Sidgwick

Sarpedon then aimed a spear at Patroclus and missed him, but he struck the horse Pedasus in the right shoulder, and it screamed aloud as it lay, groaning in the dust until the life went out of it.
— from The Iliad by Homer

Let the columns be so placed as to leave a space, the width of an intercolumniation, all round between the walls and the rows of columns on the outside, thus forming a walk round the cella of [78] the temple, as in the cases of the temple of Jupiter Stator by Hermodorus in the Portico of Metellus, and the Marian temple of Honour and Valour constructed by Mucius, which has no portico in the rear.
— from The Ten Books on Architecture by Vitruvius Pollio

It is a picture of a future state of things called up by knowledge of the present state of things, the future being viewed as standing to the present in the relation of effect to cause.
— from The Common Law by Oliver Wendell Holmes

It is not my purpose, in this record, though in all other essentials it is my written memory, to pursue the history of my own fictions.
— from David Copperfield by Charles Dickens

The ship Paralus, with Chaereas, son of Archestratus, on board, an Athenian who had taken an active part in the revolution, was now without loss of time sent off by the Samians and the army to Athens to report what had occurred; the fact that the Four Hundred were in power not being yet known.
— from The History of the Peloponnesian War by Thucydides

But that’s not the point,” and he turned again to the general with whom he was talking seriously; “we mustn’t forget that those who are taking part in the race are military men, who have chosen that career, and one must allow that every calling has its disagreeable side.
— from Anna Karenina by Tolstoy, Leo, graf

Then he would fancy that his son was drowning, that he had twice sunk: he was prepared to plunge into the river to save him, as he floated for the last time: every moment appeared an hour until he rose.
— from Observations on Madness and Melancholy Including Practical Remarks on those Diseases together with Cases and an Account of the Morbid Appearances on Dissection by John Haslam

She passed into the Rue de l’Ecole de Medecine.
— from Theresa Raquin by Émile Zola

That official swore such portraits in their rings as an indispensable mark of distinction may be deduced from the negotiations of Claudius (preserved by Pliny) confining the entrée at court to such as had received from him a gold ring having the imperial bust carved on it.’
— from Finger-Ring Lore: Historical, Legendary, Anecdotal by Jones, William, F.S.A.

Ben Lomond, and other Highland hills, soon appeared on the horizon; we passed Douglas Castle on a point of land projecting into the river; and, passing under the precipitous height of Dumbarton Castle, which we had long before seen, came to our voyage's end at this village, where we have put up at the Elephant Hotel.
— from Passages from the English Notebooks, Complete by Nathaniel Hawthorne

It was the first time she had seen it in repose since the young lady's visit to Beaumanoir, and she was struck with an increase of thought and pain in the rare, fine countenance.
— from Latter-Day Sweethearts by Harrison, Burton, Mrs.

Evil-disposed persons in the rear of our armies, who do not themselves engage directly in these lawless acts, encourage by refusing to interfere, or give any information by which such acts can be prevented or the perpetrators punished.
— from The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government, Volume 2 by Jefferson Davis

Occasionally Virgil’s own invention, or perhaps the guidance of some Greek predecessor, suggests signs of a less trivial significance—such as that of the meteor or line of light marking out the way from the burning city to Mount Ida— Illam, summa super labentem culmina tecti, Cernimus Idaea claram se condere silva, Signantemque vias 542 ; but for the most part the formal, superstitious, prosaic element in the Roman religion—the same element which made their generals before some decisive battle allow themselves to draw their auguries from the mode in which chickens ate their food,—is present in the religious guidance of the action.
— from The Roman Poets of the Augustan Age: Virgil by W. Y. (William Young) Sellar

This we should pitch into the rubbish-basket after reading the first two chapters, did it not serve to illustrate what we have often noted—the profound and barbarous ignorance of French literary men on the subject of England and the English.
— from Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 64, No. 397, November 1848 by Various

; Newgate, visits Baretti in, ii. 97, n. 1; Nugent, Dr., his father-in-law, i. 477, n. 4; opponent, as an, ii. 450; 'parcel of boys,' iv. 297, n. 2; parliament: See above, House of Commons; 'party,' defines, ii. 223, n. 1; party, sticking to his, ii. 223; v. 36; Paymaster of the Forces, iv. 223, n. 1; poetry is truth rather than history, ii. 366, n. 1; portrait at Streatham, iv.
— from Life of Johnson, Volume 6 Addenda, index, dicta philosophi, etc. by James Boswell

There are other places I know of in this county, where much might be done in the way of instructing the people in the right way, and they would be very glad to receive it; but the aid is wanting.
— from The American Missionary — Volume 32, No. 06, June, 1878 by Various