Then, perhaps feeling that she may have offended me, she quickly added: "Not of course that I doubt that there are maidenlike ladies in America."
"Walking-Stick Papers"
Robert Cortes Holliday
He as much as hinted, under instigation, that he was entitled to defend her; and his claim being by-and-by yawningly allowed by Edward, and presuming that he now had Edward in his power and need not fear him, he exhibited his weakness in the guise of a costly gem, that he intended to present to Mrs. Lovell-an opal set in a cross pendant from a necklace; a really fine opal, coquetting with the lights of every gem that is known: it shot succinct red flashes, and green, and yellow; the emerald, the amethyst, the topaz lived in it, and a remote ruby; it was veined with lightning hues, and at times it slept in a milky cloud, innocent of fire, quite maidenlike.
"The Complete Project Gutenberg Works of George Meredith"
George Meredith