I would rather my body would starve and die than your mind should hunger and wither away in this lonely land.”
— from The Gilded Age: A Tale of Today by Charles Dudley Warner

They spoke by signs—that is, not spoke at all; And looking like two incubi, they glared As Baba with his fingers made them fall To heaving back the portal folds: it scared Juan a moment, as this pair so small With shrinking serpent optics on him stared; It was as if their little looks could poison Or fascinate whome'er they fix'd their eyes on.
— from Don Juan by Byron, George Gordon Byron, Baron

He was alone in the larger laboratory when the thing happened.
— from The Country of the Blind, and Other Stories by H. G. (Herbert George) Wells

The climate in general is warm, and in the lowlying lands skirting the rivers is rather unhealthy.
— from The New Gresham Encyclopedia. A to Amide Vol. 1 Part 1 by Various

that very blade of steel More mercy for a foe would feel: I grant him liberal, to fling Among his clan the wealth they bring, When back by lake and glen they wind, And in the Lowland leave behind, Where once some pleasant hamlet stood, A mass of ashes slaked with blood.
— from The Lady of the Lake by Walter Scott

Old age is always wakeful; as if, the longer linked with life, the less man has to do with aught that looks like death.
— from Moby Dick; Or, The Whale by Herman Melville

Even the name of Tadmor, or Palmyra, by its signification in the Syriac as well as in the Latin language, denoted the multitude of palm-trees which afforded shade and verdure to that temperate region.
— 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

At this, for a minute, their lightness gave way to their gravity; it was as if the long look they exchanged held them together.
— from The Beast in the Jungle by Henry James

“I am that Ancient Evil, that Life which endures out of the first death; I am that Death which abides in the living life.
— from The World's Desire by H. Rider (Henry Rider) Haggard

They were alone, in the Lindsays’ library, and Phyllis, looking demure enough in a little white house gown, was in perverse mood.
— from The Luminous Face by Carolyn Wells

He can be readily recognized whether attired in the long, loose, shabby shirt of the laborer, or the citizen's dress of the storekeeper.
— from Donahoe's Magazine, Volume 15, No. 4, April, 1886 by Various

And while we are in the leafy line, why isn't a Fern as good as any other kind of grass?
— from Caper-Sauce: A Volume of Chit-Chat about Men, Women, and Things. by Fanny Fern

It was as if the last life boat had been launched from a sinking ship, leaving those who were too late to die!
— from The Lady of Big Shanty by F. Berkeley (Frank Berkeley) Smith

She pointed to where, in a position corresponding to that of the "mark of the Valdeschi" in her own hand, there was an indentation that looked like a half-obliterated scar.
— from The Lady Paramount by Henry Harland

This is shown in the words "presently" and "employ," which are in the last line of writing of this exhibit, and this is repeated in the standard writing as shown by chart A, item 2, the word "support," item 3, the word "port" and the word "transportation."
— from Warren Commission (04 of 26): Hearings Vol. IV (of 15) by United States. Warren Commission

The shadows of impalpable blank deeps— Deep upon deep accumulate—close down, Around my head concentered, while above, In the lit, loftier blue, star after star Spins endless orbits betwixt me and heaven; And at my feet mysterious Chaos breaks, Abrupt, immeasurable.
— from Ebony and Crystal: Poems in Verse and Prose by Clark Ashton Smith