That evening at the opera Rastignac chose his words carefully, lest he should give Mme.
— from Father Goriot by Honoré de Balzac

That part of Devonshire in which Nicholas had been himself bred was named as the most favourable spot; but this advice was cautiously coupled with the information, that whoever accompanied him thither must be prepared for the worst; for every token of rapid consumption had appeared, and he might never return alive.
— from Nicholas Nickleby by Charles Dickens

At this name the count, who had hitherto saluted everyone with courtesy, but at the same time with coldness and formality, stepped a pace forward, and a slight tinge of red colored his pale cheeks.
— from The Count of Monte Cristo, Illustrated by Alexandre Dumas

If every one of them, which, attended with success, would signify anything to our revenue, can have no effect but to add to our distractions and dangers, we shall be if possible in a still worse condition from his projects of cure, than he represents us from our original disorders.
— from The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. 01 (of 12) by Edmund Burke

Miss Sharp put out her right forefinger, and gave him a little nod, so cool and killing, that Rawdon Crawley, watching the operations from the other room, could hardly restrain his laughter as he saw the Lieutenant's entire discomfiture; the start he gave, the pause, and the perfect clumsiness with which he at length condescended to take the finger which was offered for his embrace.
— from Vanity Fair by William Makepeace Thackeray

With its rich mines of copper and its forests of firs and stately cedars, the island naturally attracted a commercial and maritime people like the Phoenicians; while the abundance of its corn, its wine, and its oil must have rendered it in their eyes a Land of Promise by comparison with the niggardly nature of their own rugged coast, hemmed in between the mountains and the sea.
— from The Golden Bough: A Study of Magic and Religion by James George Frazer

The whole transaction of religious conversion has been made mechanical and spiritless.
— from The Pursuit of God by A. W. (Aiden Wilson) Tozer

Still retaining traces of remarkable comeliness, his bright, black, oblong eyes had a peculiar attraction, and his every well-bred, refined feature showed that symmetry of youth, that air of superiority to the rest of the world which usually disappears when once the twenties have been passed.
— from Fathers and Sons by Ivan Sergeevich Turgenev

If the principal tower of Rochester Castle had suddenly walked from its foundation, and stationed itself opposite the coffee-room window, Mr. Winkle’s surprise would have been as nothing compared with the profound astonishment with which he had heard this address.
— from The Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens

And I well remember thinking, at the moment that I made this stroke—and so saved my life by it, for the fellow was pressing me very closely—how happy it would have made the old Rittmeister could he have seen me deliver it.
— from The Aztec Treasure-House by Thomas A. (Thomas Allibone) Janvier

I had no idea then that this was a fish other than the one R. C. had hooked.
— from Tales of Fishes by Zane Grey

There was the wooden trap-door, let in the floor of the turret chamber, and a foot or two of rusty chain hanging down.
— from Jack Hardy: A Story of English Smugglers in the Days of Napoleon by Herbert Strang

After Ajax had fallen a sacrifice to his disappointed pride, and to the ingratitude of the Greeks, his sepulchre was erected on the ground where he had defended the navy against the rage of Jove and of Hector; and the citizens of the rising town of Rhaeteum celebrated his memory with divine honors.
— from History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire — Volume 2 by Edward Gibbon

The old religious conceptions have been largely outgrown by the educated.
— from Evolution Of The Japanese, Social And Psychic by Sidney Lewis Gulick

Some thousands of reindeer came home in the morning, which were milked by the men as well as the women, who kneeled down on one knee.
— from Lachesis Lapponica; Or, A Tour in Lapland, Volume 1 by Carl von Linné

The original requirement cannot have concerned freeholders in the usual legal sense, but free and lawful men, 'worthy of were and wite'—a 390 description which would cover the great bulk of the villains and exclude slaves and their progeny.
— from Villainage in England: Essays in English Mediaeval History by Paul Vinogradoff

Whether his savage heart was for the moment softened by their anguish, or whether he wished to heighten their pain by a momentary taste of joy, it is certain that on reaching camp he paroled Francrois until sunset.
— from Myths and Legends of Our Own Land — Complete by Charles M. (Charles Montgomery) Skinner

This old rogue committed himself to my predecessor's care, under medical certificates; the order he signed himself.”
— from A Terrible Temptation: A Story of To-Day by Charles Reade

But the old religious command has become a tradition which has survived amid conditions totally unlike those under which it arose.
— from Essays in War-Time: Further Studies in the Task of Social Hygiene by Havelock Ellis