I sat down to the table; but seeing before me a wooden spoon, I pushed it back, asking for my silver spoon and fork to which I was much attached, because they were a gift from my good old granny.
— from The Memoirs of Jacques Casanova de Seingalt, 1725-1798. Complete by Giacomo Casanova

A cannon ball struck the very end of the earth work by which he was standing, crumbling down the earth; a black ball flashed before his eyes and at the same instant plumped into something.
— from War and Peace by Tolstoy, Leo, graf

And after all was built, Deïokes established the rule, which he was the first to establish, ordaining that none should enter into the presence of the king, but that they deal with him always through messengers; and that the king should be seen by no one; and moreover that to laugh or to spit in presence is unseemly, and this last for every one without exception.
— from The History of Herodotus — Volume 1 by Herodotus

I would only beg the reader again and again, to turn over frequently in his mind what I have said in Part I from Prop. xvi.
— from Ethics by Benedictus de Spinoza

In the "Chorographia Regionis Huronum," attached to Father du Creux's Map of New France, of the date 1660, given in Bressani's Abridgment of "the Relations," we have the following places conspicuously marked as stations or sub-missions in the peninsula bounded by Notawasaga bay, Matchedash or Sturgeon bay, the river Severn, Lake Couchichin, and Lake Simcoe, implying population in and round each of them:—St.
— from Toronto of Old Collections and recollections illustrative of the early settlement and social life of the capital of Ontario by Henry Scadding

Whoever has a credit of this kind with one of those companies, and borrows a thousand pounds upon it, for example, may repay this sum piece-meal, by twenty and thirty pounds at a time, the company discounting a proportionable part of the interest of the great sum, from the day on which each of those small sums is paid in, till the whole be in this manner repaid.
— from An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith

Oh oh! was such Indigo produced in this land!
— from Nil Darpan; or, The Indigo Planting Mirror, A Drama. Translated from the Bengali by a Native. by Dinabandhu Mitra

"Suppose," he was thinking, "suppose—even if Carmichael traces the people to Moscow—the little girl they took from Madame Pascal's school in Paris is NOT the one we are in search of.
— from A Little Princess Being the whole story of Sara Crewe now told for the first time by Frances Hodgson Burnett

He couldn’t play any such game with this matter-of-fact man stalking along by their side, explaining to Douglas some intricate point in philosophy.
— from The Carter Girls' Mysterious Neighbors by Nell Speed

These mongrel Christians were of great service in procuring information.
— from Chronicle of the Conquest of Granada, from the mss. of Fray Antonio Agapida by Washington Irving

We'd supposed we was alone and to say we was surprised is puttin' it mild.
— from The Postmaster by Joseph Crosby Lincoln

In a speech in Parliament in 1783, he said: "England has erected no churches, no palaces, no hospitals, no schools; England has built no bridges, made no high roads, cut no navigations, dug out no reservoirs.
— from From Egypt to Japan by Henry M. (Henry Martyn) Field

"Shall I put it around his neck and make a hitch over his nose, like you do a horse?" he asked, glad for the opportunity to exhibit his newly acquired knowledge of ropes and horses and things.
— from When A Man's A Man by Harold Bell Wright

This will explain the fact, which is familiar to most persons, that the odor of different substances is perceptible in the breath, or expired air, long after the mouth is free from these substances.
— from A Treatise on Anatomy, Physiology, and Hygiene (Revised Edition) by Calvin Cutter

"The process of cleaning has now been completed, and the sirup is pumped into the covered vessel previously alluded to, called the vacuum pan.
— from Scientific American, Volume 22, No. 1, January 1, 1870 A Weekly Journal of Practical Information, Art, Science, Mechanics, Chemistry, and Manufactures. by Various

"Oh, the Lord bless yir honor!" said Darby sheepishly; "it's very [Pg 549] hard to know what to do with a large sum of money now-a-days: it's dangerous keepin' by you, you know, sir; so I put it out to interest !"
— from Bentley's Miscellany, Volume I by Various

64 The outfield is a-creepin’ in to catch the kaiser’s pop, 177 The rivers of France are ten score and twain, 79 The sick man said: “I pray I shall not die,
— from Great Poems of the World War by William Dunseath Eaton

So I put it back.
— from Back Home by Eugene Wood