It would be tedious to relate the several steps by which I advanced to a more regular conversation; but the first account I gave of myself in any order and length was to this purpose: “That I came from a very far country, as I already had attempted to tell him, with about fifty more of my own species; that we travelled upon the seas in a great hollow vessel made of wood, and larger than his honour’s house.
— from Gulliver's Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World by Jonathan Swift

In Peru they rode post upon men, who took them upon their shoulders in a certain kind of litters made for that purpose, and ran with such agility that, in their full speed, the first couriers transferred their load to the second without making any stop.
— from Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Complete by Michel de Montaigne

—Deo Singh, the great-grandfather of the Pokaran chief alluded to, used to sleep in the great hall of the palace with five hundred of his clan around him.
— from Annals and Antiquities of Rajasthan, v. 1 of 3 or the Central and Western Rajput States of India by James Tod

For while all other young men of that time used to sue in marriage with their own lips, this man was afflicted with so faulty an utterance that he was ashamed to be heard not only by strangers, but by those of his own house.
— from The Danish History, Books I-IX by Grammaticus Saxo

Professor Challenger has devised means for getting us on to this plateau when it appeared to be inaccessible; I think that we should now call upon him to use the same ingenuity in getting us back to the world from which we came.
— from The Lost World by Arthur Conan Doyle

I was immediately handled and tossed up to see if I were sound by some of the crew; and I was now persuaded that I had gotten into a world of bad spirits, and that they were going to kill me.
— from The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano, Or Gustavus Vassa, The African Written By Himself by Olaudah Equiano

Embryology will reveal to us the structure, in some degree obscured, of the prototypes of each great class.
— from On the Origin of Species By Means of Natural Selection Or, the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for Life by Charles Darwin

A portage of several miles in which some small lakes occurred would take us, they said, into a large lake.
— from The Long Labrador Trail by Dillon Wallace

True, I made fair money—but the urge to spend it recklessly dominated me.
— from Tarrano the Conqueror by Ray Cummings

He and Babo took up their stand in the corner of the market-place, and began bawling, “Doctor Knowall!
— from Twilight Land by Howard Pyle

In turning up the snow, in searching for bones, I found several pieces of bark which proved a valuable acquisition as we were almost destitute of dry wood proper for kindling the fire.
— from The Journey to the Polar Sea by John Franklin

The children became more familiar, and some of the youngest actually came up to us, to share in our meal.
— from Soldiering in North Carolina Being the experiences of a 'typo' in the pines, swamps, fields, sandy roads, towns, cities, and among the fleas, wood-ticks, 'gray-backs,' mosquitoes, blue-tail flies, moccasin snakes, lizards, scorpions, rebels, and other reptiles, pests, and vermin of the 'Old North State.' Embracing an account of the three-years and nine-months Massachusetts regiments in the department, the freedmen, etc., etc., etc. by Thomas Kirwan

"I thought you had the idea of dedicating it to Somerled, as he'll be taking us through Scotland in his car."
— from The Heather-Moon by A. M. (Alice Muriel) Williamson

They tell us that suicide is the greatest piece of cowardice; that only a madman could be guilty of it; and other insipidities of the same kind; or else they make the nonsensical remark that suicide is wrong ; when it is quite obvious that there is nothing in the world to which every man has a more unassailable title than to his own life and person.
— from The Essays of Arthur Schopenhauer; Studies in Pessimism by Arthur Schopenhauer

'"A hunt, a hunt, your Royal Highness," said Hanger, "I am in chace of a d——d fine girl, whom I met with at Mrs. Simpson's in Duke's Place; and, although I have taken private apartments for her in St. Anne's East, yet the hussy takes it into her head every now and then to absent herself for a few days; and I have now been given to understand that she is carrying on some intrigue with a fellow in this place.
— from Florizel's Folly by John Ashton

But even while they fell back, almost as soon as they found themselves under the steadying influence of the 75’s of the XXth Corps and General Dubail’s left wing, the change began.
— from Verdun to the Vosges: Impressions of the War on the Fortress Frontier of France by Gerald Campbell