It was really a pretty house, and in it were a happy pair.
— from Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen by H. C. (Hans Christian) Andersen

Slang represents that evanescent language, ever changing with fashion and taste, which has principally come into vogue during the last seventy or eighty years, spoken by persons in every grade of life, rich and poor, honest and dishonest.
— from The Slang Dictionary: Etymological, Historical and Andecdotal by John Camden Hotten

v [A; a2] roast a pig, have a roast pig or, by extension, a fowl.
— from A Dictionary of Cebuano Visayan by John U. Wolff

The demon did so; the student revived, and putting his arm through that of his unearthly murderer, walked very lovingly with him in sight of all the people.
— from Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds by Charles Mackay

This formidable host, the like of which is not to be found in eastern history, and has scarcely been imagined in eastern romance, was discomfited in a great battle, in which the Roman Alexander proved himself an intrepid soldier and a skilful general.
— 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

The moment we were freed of our bonds he sprang up, in his fantastic rags, with face bruised out of all recognition, and proclaimed himself Arthur, King of Britain, and denounced the awful penalties of treason upon every soul there present if hair of his sacred head were touched.
— from A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court by Mark Twain

But, after having resisted all persuasions, he at last took pity on my musical education, which, as he soon discovered from a fugue which I had brought with me, was exceedingly faulty.
— from My Life — Volume 1 by Richard Wagner

And she saw him laboriously—oh, laboriously—laying out the grounds and herself running after, putting here a tree and there a flowery shrub and here a handful of glittering fish in a pool.
— from Bliss, and Other Stories by Katherine Mansfield

H2 anchor EPISODE 25 — RUSSIA AND POLAND H2 anchor CHAPTER XIX My Stay at Riga—Campioni St. Heleine—D’Asagon—Arrival of the Empress—I Leave Riga and Go to St. Petersburg—I See Society—I Buy Zaira Prince Charles de Biron, the younger son of the Duke of Courland, Major-General in the Russian service, Knight of the Order of St. Alexander Newski, gave me a distinguished reception after reading his father’s letter.
— from The Memoirs of Jacques Casanova de Seingalt, 1725-1798. Complete by Giacomo Casanova

Firmly resolved, after putting his affairs in order in the regiment, to retire from the army and return and marry Sónya, Nicholas, serious, sorrowful, and at variance with his parents, but, as it seemed to him, passionately in love, left at the beginning of January to rejoin his regiment.
— from War and Peace by Tolstoy, Leo, graf

You may read the greatest part of Dickens, as you may read the greatest part of Hawthorne or Tolstoy, and not once be reminded of literature as a business or a cult, but you can hardly read a paragraph, hardly a sentence, of Thackeray's without being reminded of it either by suggestion or downright allusion.
— from Complete Project Gutenberg William Dean Howells Literature Essays by William Dean Howells

he says, coming into the room and putting his arm around me.
— from Believe You Me! by Nina Wilcox Putnam

The head of the Ohio River, at Pittsburgh, has an elevation of eleven hundred and fifty feet above the sea, while in the long descent to its mouth there is a gradual fall of only four hundred feet; hence its current, excepting during the seasons of freshets, is more gentle and uniform than that of any other North American river of equal length.
— from Four Months in a Sneak-Box A Boat Voyage of 2600 Miles Down the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers, and Along the Gulf of Mexico by Nathaniel H. (Nathaniel Holmes) Bishop

She rose and put her arms round her foster-mother's neck.
— from The Princess Galva: A Romance by David Whitelaw

But on the other wall are the colors of the courts in which Rubens passed so many of his days,—the dyes of tapestry, the sheen of jewels and velvet, the glaring crimson and yellow of royal displays; while the harmonies that he strikes out with his rapid and powerful hand are like those of the music of some great military band.
— from The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 01, No. 01, November, 1857 A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics by Various

Like Sant'Agostino and San Pietro, Santa Maria has her share of faded fresco; but this Madonna in her splendid robes, in the midst of her gracious court of angels and saints and kneeling donors, is a vision of the glories of that Gubbio which once raised a proud head among the principalities of the Quattrocento.
— from A Little Pilgrimage in Italy by Olave M. (Olave Muriel) Potter

D'Artagnan smiled in his mustache, made a sign to Raoul, and placed himself at the window.
— from The Vicomte De Bragelonne by Alexandre Dumas

That on the 26th Day of November, 1708. a little before break of Day, a Canoe coming near the Ship Duke, as she rode at Anchor at the Island of Grande on the Coasts of Brazile; they hal’d her, she not answering, they fir’d at her; upon which she row’d away, and the Captain order’d the Boat to get ready and pursue her: And Mr. Carleton Vanbrugh, Agent of the said Ship, putting off the Boat, without the Order of his Captain, or before any Commanding Officer was in pursuit of her, fir’d, or order’d to be fir’d, at her several Muskets at a distance: But coming nearer, he order’d the Men to fire into the Boat; and the Corporal firing, as we have reason to believe, kill’d an Indian, and took the Canoe, and sent her away with two of the Duke’s Men, the Corporal and a Padre, and afterwards brought the rest of the {35} People in the Ship’s Pinnace; since which time we are inform’d by the Padre, Master of the dead Indian, that he lost a quantity of Gold to the Value of 200 l. which he says he carry’d ashore, and hid in hopes to preserve (he taking them for Frenchmen by their firing and chasing) which could not afterwards be found, altho, he says, he does verily believe it was not taken by any of the Ships People, but alledges it was lost by means of their chasing and surprizing him.
— from A Cruising Voyage Around the World by Woodes Rogers