It was the sad confession and continual exemplification of the shortcomings of the composite man, the spirit burdened with clay and working in matter, and of the despair that assails the higher nature at finding itself so miserably thwarted by the earthly part.
— from Mosses from an Old Manse, and Other Stories by Nathaniel Hawthorne

He had, said Chankery, a case coming on with a 'very nice point.'
— from The Forsyte Saga, Volume I. The Man Of Property by John Galsworthy

The white wooden houses (so white that it makes one wink to look at them), with their green jalousie blinds, are so sprinkled and dropped about in all directions, without seeming to have any root at all in the ground; and the small churches and chapels are so prim, and bright, and highly varnished; that I almost believed the whole affair could be taken up piecemeal like a child’s toy, and crammed into a little box.
— from American Notes by Charles Dickens

C H A P. II T HE abbess of Andoüillets, which if you look into the large set of provincial maps now publishing at Paris, you will find situated amongst the hills which divide Burgundy from Savoy, being in danger of an Anchylosis or stiff joint (the sinovia of her knee becoming hard by long matins), and having tried every remedy——first, prayers and thanksgiving; then invocations to all the saints in heaven promiscuously——then particularly to every saint who had ever had a stiff leg before her——then touching it with all the reliques of the convent, principally with the thigh-bone of the man of Lystra, who had been impotent from his youth——then wrap- 4 ping it up in her veil when she went to bed—then cross-wise her rosary—then bringing in to her aid the secular arm, and anointing it with oils and hot fat of animals——then treating it with emollient and resolving fomentations——then with poultices of marsh-mallows, mallows, bonus Henricus, white lillies and fenugreek—then taking the woods, I mean the smoak of ’em, holding her scapulary across her lap——then decoctions of wild chicory, water-cresses, chervil, sweet cecily and cochlearia——and nothing all this while answering, was prevailed on at last to try the hot-baths of Bourbon ——so having first obtained leave of the visitor-general to take care of her existence—she ordered all to be got ready for her journey: a novice of the convent of about seventeen, who had been troubled with a whitloe in her middle finger, by sticking it constantly into the abbess’s cast poultices, &c.—had gained such an interest, that overlooking a sciatical old nun, who might have 5 been set up for ever by the hot-baths of Bourbon, Margarita, the little novice, was elected as the companion of the journey.
— from The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman by Laurence Sterne

It is not difficult to imagine the process of evolution by which the horns of such insignificant devils turned to the asinine ears of such devils as this stall carving at Corbeil, near Paris ( Fig. 19 ), which represented the popular view [ 295 ] of the mastery obtained by witches over devils.
— from Demonology and Devil-lore by Moncure Daniel Conway

Co. Camp Fire and Wigwam Ellis Winston Co. Camp Fire Musings W. C. Gray Revell Camping and Camp Cooking Bates Camping and Camp Outfits G. O. Shields Camping for Boys Gibson Association Press Camping Out Stephens Hurst & Co. Camp Kits and Camp Life Hanks Scribners {380} Camp Life in the Woods Gibson Campmates C. K. Munroe Canoemates Kirk Munroe Canoe and Boat Building Stephens Forest and Stream Canoe and Camp Cookery Seneca Forest and Stream Canoe Boys and Camp Fires Graydon Grosset and Dunlap Captain Thomas A. Scott, Master Diver F. H. Smith Comrades in Camp Victor Chatterton Co. Economical Cook Book Mrs. Sarah Paul John C. Winston & Co.
— from Boy Scouts Handbook The First Edition, 1911 by Boy Scouts of America

In this paper, the author spans three centuries in discussing the specialization, configuration, and change of woodworking tools in the United States.
— from Woodworking Tools 1600-1900 by Peter C. Welsh

On it are set silver salvers, candlesticks, and Christmas presents of silver.
— from Miss Civilization: A Comedy in One Act by Richard Harding Davis

I should just like to be strong enough to meet that brown Spaniel chap and chuck my cap at him.”
— from !Tention: A Story of Boy-Life during the Peninsular War by George Manville Fenn

We were sitting in the small cabin and Captain Crane was searching my face with those discomforting, violet-lighted gray eyes.
— from The Winged Men of Orcon: A Complete Novelette by David R. Sparks

What one has done another can do under the same conditions and circumstances.
— from Hidden Treasures; Or, Why Some Succeed While Others Fail by Harry A. Lewis

They cast the dignity of man from their downtrod selves upon the shoulders of a hero, and will perish to add one drop of blood to make that great heart beat, those giant sinews combat and conquer.
— from Essays by Ralph Waldo Emerson by Ralph Waldo Emerson

In this valuable paper Dr. Billings says: “When we come to examine the reports of deaths for five years furnished by these Jewish families, we find that they give an average annual death-rate of only 7.1 per 1000, which would be about one-half of the annual death-rate among other persons of the same average social class and condition living in this country.”
— from History of Circumcision from the Earliest Times to the Present Moral and Physical Reasons for its Performance by P. C. (Peter Charles) Remondino

At the second cry a clear, gay, and young voice answered from the elephant's belly, "Yes!"
— from Les Misérables, v. 4/5: The Idyll and the Epic by Victor Hugo