As a rule, a knight is a lummux, and some times even a labrick, and hence open to pretty poor arguments when they come glibly from a superstition-monger, but even he could see the practical side of a thing once in a while; and so of late you couldn’t clean up a tournament and pile the result without finding one of my accident-tickets in every helmet.
— from A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court by Mark Twain

When I say, therefore, that Mycroft has better powers of observation than I, you may take it that I am speaking the exact and literal truth.”
— from The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes by Arthur Conan Doyle

Sara was sent on errands in all weathers, and scolded and driven hither and thither; she was scarcely allowed to speak to Ermengarde and Lottie; Lavinia sneered at the increasing shabbiness of her clothes; and the other girls stared curiously at her when she appeared in the schoolroom.
— from A Little Princess Being the whole story of Sara Crewe now told for the first time by Frances Hodgson Burnett

He is mortally wounded, and, as he lies dying, he says to Edgar (at line 162, more than a hundred lines after he gave that commission to the captain): What you have charged me with, that have I done; And more, much more; the time will bring it out; 'Tis past, and so am I. In 'more, much more' he seems to be thinking of the order for the deaths of Lear and Cordelia (what else remained undisclosed?); yet he says nothing about it.
— from Shakespearean Tragedy: Lectures on Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth by A. C. (Andrew Cecil) Bradley

In short, for some time Chichikov made it impossible for smugglers to earn a living.
— from Dead Souls by Nikolai Vasilevich Gogol

It has been said there exists a literary Slang, or the Slang of Criticism—dramatic, artistic, and scientific.
— from The Slang Dictionary: Etymological, Historical and Andecdotal by John Camden Hotten

Besides, she MUST go on seeming to encourage Adam, lest her uncle and aunt should be angry and suspect her of having some secret lover.
— from Adam Bede by George Eliot

But the Turks could protract their resistance and secure their escape, as long as they were masters of the Lake 82 Ascanius, which stretches several miles to the westward of the city.
— 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 eyebrows are likewise brought together through the simultaneous contraction of the corrugators; [703] and this latter action generates vertical furrows, separating the exterior and lowered part of the skin of the forehead from the central and raised part.
— from The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals by Charles Darwin

Behold!' He drew from his breast a bottle of cheap whisky—such as is sold to explorers at Leh—and cleverly forced a little between the lama's teeth.
— from Kim by Rudyard Kipling

On Saturday I spent the evening at Lady Charlotte Lindsay's, who has a very kind regard for you, and spoke of your brother Barry with great affection.
— from Records of Later Life by Fanny Kemble

When he dies you git him the tightest coffin you kin buy, to keep him f'm spilin' the earth as long as may be, an' then you send me the hull bill.
— from David Harum A Story of American Life by Edward Noyes Westcott

In the attempts of purification by suspending the malarial action, which have been devised by man, the same thing has been done; that is to say, it has been sought, to eliminate at least one of the three conditions essential to the development of the specific ferment contained in the infected soil.
— from Scientific American Supplement, No. 458, October 11, 1884 by Various

"Yes," said the engineer, "and like to stay there too—blast him!"
— from One Woman: Being the Second Part of a Romance of Sussex by Alfred Ollivant

A famous English anatomist says starfishes may be considered as mere walking stomachs, their office in the economy of nature being to devour all kinds of garbage which would otherwise accumulate on the shores; they eat also live crustaceans, mollusks, and even small fish, and are believed to be very destructive to oysters.
— from The Chautauquan, Vol. 03, December 1882 A Monthly Magazine Devoted to the Promotion of True Culture. Organ of the Chautauqua Literary and Scientific Circle by Chautauqua Institution

It seems safe to say that elements at least of hysteria appear in this history, such as the profound retroactive amnesia and appearance of simulation in the conduct of the patient.
— from Benign Stupors: A Study of a New Manic-Depressive Reaction Type by August Hoch

There is generally an opening for young students to earn a little at such times by instructing younger boys than themselves in reading, writing, and arithmetic; and the surrounding farmers, who want schooling for their boys, are glad enough to take the master in on the "boarding round" system, for the sake of his usefulness in overlooking the lads in the preparation of their home lessons.
— from Biographies of Working Men by Grant Allen

Since that evening at Lady Halifax's, when Janet saw John Kendal reddening so unaccountably, she had felt singularly more tolerant of Elfrida's theories.
— from A Daughter of To-Day by Sara Jeannette Duncan

They were solemnly warned of the enormous power and resources of the great king, with whom it was hopeless for them to protract a struggle sure to end at last in their uttermost destruction.
— from PG Edition of Netherlands series — Complete by John Lothrop Motley

Next day he proceeded to Urbino, where, Castiglione tells us, "he was met by swarms of children bearing olive-boughs, and hailing his auspicious arrival; by aged sires tottering under their years, and weeping for joy; by men and women; by mothers with their babes; by crowds of every age and sex; nay, the very stones seemed to exult and leap.
— from Memoirs of the Dukes of Urbino, Volume 2 (of 3) Illustrating the Arms, Arts, and Literature of Italy, from 1440 To 1630. by James Dennistoun