Gravelin the Ricaras enterpreter whome we had Sent down with a Ricaras Chief in the Spring of 1805 and old Mr. Durion the Sieux enterpreter, we examined the instructions of those interpreters and found that Gravelin was ordered to the Ricaras with a Speach from the president of the U. States to that nation and some presents which had been given the Ricara Cheif who had visited the U. States and unfortunately died at the City of Washington, he was instructed to teach the Ricaras agriculture & make every enquirey after Capt Lewis my self and the party Mr. Durion was enstructed to accompany Gravelin and through his influence pass him with his presents & by the tetons bands of Sieux, and to provale on Some of the Principal chiefs of those bands not exceeding six to Visit the Seat of the Government next Spring he was also enstructed to make every enquirey after us.
— from The Journals of Lewis and Clark, 1804-1806 by William Clark

Be it said, that in this vocation of whaling, sinecures are unknown; dignity and danger go hand in hand; till you get to be Captain, the higher you rise the harder you toil.
— from Moby Dick; Or, The Whale by Herman Melville

His proclamation promised a constitutional convention to be called later (and which was duly called later) to elect a President and Cabinet, in whose favor he would resign the emergency authority now assumed; referred to the United States as “undoubtedly disinterested” and as considering the Filipinos “capable of governing for ourselves our unfortunate country”; and formally announced the temporary assumption of supreme authority as dictator.
— from The American Occupation of the Philippines 1898-1912 by James H. (James Henderson) Blount

She had not the slightest passion for the stage, and utterly devoid as she was of any levity or coquetry, she merely saw in a theatrical career the means of earning a quick, and possibly even a rich, livelihood.
— from My Life — Volume 1 by Richard Wagner

Mrs. Ferrars at first reasonably endeavoured to dissuade him from marrying Miss Dashwood, by every argument in her power;—told him, that in Miss Morton he would have a woman of higher rank and larger fortune;—and enforced the assertion, by observing that Miss Morton was the daughter of a nobleman with thirty thousand pounds, while Miss Dashwood was only the daughter of a private gentleman with no more than THREE; but when she found that, though perfectly admitting the truth of her representation, he was by no means inclined to be guided by it, she judged it wisest, from the experience of the past, to submit—and therefore, after such an ungracious delay as she owed to her own dignity, and as served to prevent every suspicion of good-will, she issued her decree of consent to the marriage of Edward and Elinor.
— from Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen

It lacks the chief excellences of construction—unity of interest, subordination of detail, steady and uninterrupted development, and prompt conclusion.
— from The Devil is an Ass by Ben Jonson

Sharpe was one of those Englishmen who seem made for the admiration of foreigners—possessing all the Englishman's sense and unaffected dignity and none of his morbid reserve or insularity.
— from On Love by Stendhal

Li Ch`uan says: "we puzzle him by strange and unusual dispositions;" and Tu Mu finally clinches the meaning by three illustrative anecdotes—one of Chu-ko Liang, who when occupying Yang-p`ing and about to be attacked by Ssu-ma I, suddenly struck his colors, stopped the beating of the drums, and flung open the city gates, showing only a few men engaged in sweeping and sprinkling the ground.
— from The Art of War by active 6th century B.C. Sunzi

Pao Chu, after the rites of an unmarried daughter, mourned before the coffin to such an unwonted degree, as if bent upon snapping her own life; while the members of the entire clan, as well as the inmates of the Mansions, each and all, readily observed, in their conduct, the established mourning usages, without of course any transgression or confusion.
— from Hung Lou Meng, or, the Dream of the Red Chamber, a Chinese Novel, Book I by Xueqin Cao

On her arrival there, however, she was doomed to sustain an unexpected disappointment, as she found a note from Lord Glenmore, dated from the House; in which he told her not to be uneasy if he were late, for that the business of the morning was likely to be followed by a protracted debate on an important question.
— from The Exclusives (vol. 2 of 3) by Bury, Charlotte Campbell, Lady

While in one sense it was real and intensely painful, in another the experiences were so new and strange that it all seemed an unreal dream, a distressing nightmare of trouble and danger, from which they might awaken to their old life.
— from What Can She Do? by Edward Payson Roe

“Gentlemen,” he said, “an unhappy difference, as some of you have witnessed, has arisen between the Lord Chudleigh and myself.
— from The Chaplain of the Fleet by James Rice

There is a dog there which is actually allowed to eat, in defiance of all those Times' correspondents whose sole idea of this stimulating and unfailingly devoted animal is that it is personified greed on four legs.
— from Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 152, April 25, 1917 by Various

To Raymond, Sabina appeared unmeasurably distant at this midnight hour.
— from The Spinners by Eden Phillpotts

And he too was tortured with shame, and ultimate dislike, and with acute pity for her, because he did not want to meet her eyes, he did not want to receive her flare of recognition.
— from Women in Love by D. H. (David Herbert) Lawrence

With these words, Horse Shoe gave his adversary some half dozen overpowering blows, in such quick succession as utterly defied and broke down the others guard; and then, seizing him by the breast, he threw the tall and stalwart form of Curry at full length upon the ground.
— from Horse-Shoe Robinson: A Tale of the Tory Ascendency by John Pendleton Kennedy

The steward, on his part, would reply that his master must have made that baseless confession from the benevolent motive of saving his, the steward’s life, but that he was not so mean and depraved as to seek an unmerited deliverance at the cost of his venerable master’s life.
— from Three Years in Tibet by Ekai Kawaguchi

It is here that all kinds of meetings are held, all speculations and undertakings discussed, and concerts, balls, and other entertainments given.
— from A Woman's Journey Round the World From Vienna to Brazil, Chili, Tahiti, China, Hindostan, Persia and Asia Minor by Ida Pfeiffer

I am afraid that he will be greatly distressed at my sudden and unaccountable disappearance,” answered Dick.
— from Two Gallant Sons of Devon: A Tale of the Days of Queen Bess by Harry Collingwood