Instead of going to Newfoundland as the Pyrates threat’ned, they came back to the Islands, and to Windward of St. Christophers , on the 4th of June last, took a Sloop, Nicholas Trot Master, belonging to St. Eustatia , and wanting a little Diversion, they hoisted the Men as high as the Main and Fore Tops, and let them run down amain, enough to break all the Bones in their Skins, and after they had pretty well crippled them by this cruel Usage, and whipp’d them about the Deck, they gave Trot his Sloop, and let him go, keeping back only 2 of his Men, besides the Plunder of the Vessel.
— from A General History of the Pyrates: from their first rise and settlement in the island of Providence, to the present time by Daniel Defoe

He took a good look at us all, and then to my amazement he advanced to me and handed me a bundle of paper.
— from The Valley of Fear by Arthur Conan Doyle

“Bring me writing materials, and have a trusty messenger at my disposal.”
— from The Memoirs of Jacques Casanova de Seingalt, 1725-1798. Complete by Giacomo Casanova

Alexander commanded the battlements of houses to be pulled down, mules and horses to have their manes shorn off, and many common soldiers to be slain, to accompany his dear Hephestion's death; which is now practised amongst the Tartars, when [2327] a great Cham dieth, ten or twelve thousand must be slain, men and horses, all they meet; and among those the [2328] Pagan Indians, their wives and servants voluntarily die with them.
— from The Anatomy of Melancholy by Robert Burton

There the saw mills are humming and the merchants are measuring out goods over the counter.
— from Riddle of the Storm A Mystery Story for Boys by Roy J. (Roy Judson) Snell

There is a characteristic story, that an Alexandrian who had lived for a considerable time in Macedonia and had adopted the manners and the dress of that country, on returning to his native city, now looked upon himself as a man and upon the Alexandrians as little better than slaves.
— from The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) by Theodor Mommsen

"Then the Lord made a house appear to me, an' He said to me that I was to walk on till I saw that house, an' then go in an' ask the people to take me.
— from The Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, 1995, Memorial Issue by Various

It was deemed best that she should contribute part of the rent to insure her mother a home and to maintain a natural human tie.
— from The Leaven in a Great City by Lillian William Betts

After an orgy at this time he committed a murder, and he attempted to murder a man who had won a large sum from him in gambling.
— from The Criminal by Havelock Ellis

And man, as degenerate, is too much an hypocrite, and too much a self-flatterer, thus to confess against himself, unless made simple and honest about the thing through the power of conviction upon his heart.
— from Works of John Bunyan — Complete by John Bunyan

"Ay," she said at length, "love's a pretty thing; but yet it breaks many a heart and turns many a brain.
— from A Whim, and Its Consequences Collection of British Authors Vol. CXIV by G. P. R. (George Payne Rainsford) James

He’s not expecting to hear from me, and it might annoy him,” and the man allowed the boat to drift down stream again before he brought it to anchor.
— from The Heroes of the School; or, The Darewell Chums Through Thick and Thin by Allen Chapman

He was as much at home at the most aristocratic courts of Europe as when treading the deck of a man-of-war.
— from Revolutionary Reader: Reminiscences and Indian Legends by Sophie Lee Foster