The catholic rabble turned the women's petticoats over their heads, and so fastened them as to continue their exposure, and their subjection to a newly invented species of chastisement; for nails being placed in the wood of the battoirs in the form of fleur-de-lis , they beat them till the blood streamed from their bodies, and their cries rent the air.
— from Fox's Book of Martyrs Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs by John Foxe

The poor woman had indeed been loading her heart with foul language for some time, and now it scoured out of her mouth, as filth doth from a mud-cart, when the board which confines it is removed.
— from History of Tom Jones, a Foundling by Henry Fielding

A more careful inquiry soon demonstrated, that the offenders did not exceed seven thousand; a number indeed sufficiently alarming, when considered as the object of public justice.
— 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

For you St. Paul said: "How knowest thou, O Woman, but thou mayest save thy husband and thy child," and saving them a nation is saved.
— from Five Sermons by Henry Benjamin Whipple

I only meant to be kind and bring you some tea; and now it seems SO improper.
— from McTeague: A Story of San Francisco by Frank Norris

Even from my court I came to see thyself; And now I see that fame speaks naught but truth.
— from Robert Greene: [Six Plays] by Robert Greene

No sooner do the buds begin to show then a natural impatience seizes the possessor's of well-budded camellias to have the flowers opened.
— from Scientific American Supplement, No. 508, September 26, 1885 by Various

For the divine law not only shields me from injury, but almost renders me too sacred to attack; not indeed so much from the privation of my sight, as from the overshadowing of those heavenly wings, which seem to have occasioned this obscurity; and which, when occasioned, he is wont to illuminate with an interior light, more precious and more pure.
— from The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb — Volume 5 The Letters of Charles and Mary Lamb, 1796-1820 by Charles Lamb

They say that all nature is smiling and gay, But the smiles are all needed to sweeten The struggle we see so incessantly waged To eat, and avoid being eaten.
— from Mountain Idylls, and Other Poems by Alfred Castner King

In addition, some figures were originally out of numerical sequence; they are now in sequence (all but Fig.
— from Time and Its Measurement by James Arthur

They say that all nature is smiling and gay, But the moss often covers the rock; Every animal form is beset by a foe, For the wolf always follows the flock.
— from Mountain Idylls, and Other Poems by Alfred Castner King

The engine, in charge of the driver, had been left in the clearing, Jack judging it would be quite safe there, as no Indians seemed to be in the vicinity.
— from The Harlequin Opal: A Romance. Vol. 3 (of 3) by Fergus Hume