My great fear was that he was already somewhere near us, preparing the Punjab lasso.
— from The Phantom of the Opera by Gaston Leroux

"Not till I had long despaired of success; not until poverty and I had become such old companions and bed-fellows, that looking back at my past life, I wondered whether that dashing, reckless, extravagant, luxurious, champagne-drinking dragoon could have really been the same man who sat on the damp ground gnawing a moldy crust in the wilds of the new world.
— from Lady Audley's Secret by M. E. (Mary Elizabeth) Braddon

Siyay naglapung ug pangulitáwu sa tulu námù ka tindíra, He courted all the three of our salesgirls at one time.
— from A Dictionary of Cebuano Visayan by John U. Wolff

Granted, that the Chinese are in no sense a desirable element of the population, that they serve no useful purpose here, whatever they may have done elsewhere in other days, yet to this it is a sufficient answer that they are here, and that, having let them in, we must make the best of it.
— from How the Other Half Lives: Studies Among the Tenements of New York by Jacob A. (Jacob August) Riis

The book contains everything on the subject of First Aid which the Boy Scout ought to know and is free from technical details which serve no useful purpose and only result in confusing the student.
— from Boy Scouts Handbook The First Edition, 1911 by Boy Scouts of America

268 “Qui computandi modus plurimum habet verecundiæ et modestiæ, quum ibi sistit, nec ulterius progreditur.”
— from The Natural History of Pliny, Volume 1 (of 6) by the Elder Pliny

It depends upon a unity of purpose to which details are subordinated, not upon presenting a multitude of disconnected details.
— from Democracy and Education: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Education by John Dewey

I was possessed by unaccountable animal terror, and I cannot understand why I was so frightened: was it that I wanted to live, or that some new unknown pain was in store for me? Upstairs, overhead, some one moaned or laughed.
— from Project Gutenberg Compilation of 233 Short Stories of Chekhov by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov

I was told by a credible American that the chief deputy sheriff of the court, an ex-insurgent officer, one of the “peace-at-any-price” policy appointees, had remarked among some of his own people where he did not expect the remark to be repeated: “I see no use persecuting our brethren in the hills.”
— from The American Occupation of the Philippines 1898-1912 by James H. (James Henderson) Blount

Ma or ti s'attraversa un altro passo dinanzi a li occhi, tal che per te stesso non usciresti: pria saresti lasso.
— from La Divina Commedia di Dante: Complete by Dante Alighieri

"Don't say 'no use'," preached Carrie.
— from Loyal to the School by Angela Brazil

'Item, the king shall also cause to be given to the duke of Burgundy similar declarations under the seals of such churchmen, nobles, and principal towns of the realm under the king's obedience as the duke of Burgundy shall name, under penalties both corporal and pecuniary on failure, together with such securities for the due performance of their engagements as the lords cardinals and prelates commissioned by the pope may think proper and advisable.
— from The Chronicles of Enguerrand de Monstrelet, Vol. 07 [of 13] Containing an account of the cruel civil wars between the houses of Orleans and Burgundy, of the possession of Paris and Normandy by the English, their expulsion thence, and of other memorable events that happened in the kingdom of France, as well as in other countries by Enguerrand de Monstrelet

The ill-chosen ambassador performed his mission by showing that, in Sir Francis's opinion, the whole passage would be sheer nonsense, unless 'Page' were inserted in the vacant place.
— from A Book About Lawyers by John Cordy Jeaffreson