"Overshot" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... for my comrade, Speed," I said, "I should be in one of Mornac's fortress cells. He overshot the mark when he left us together and stepped into his cabinet to spread my dossier before you. He counted on an innocent man going through hell itself to prove his innocence; he counted on me, and left Speed out of his calculations. He had your testimony, he ...
— The Maids of Paradise • Robert W. (Robert William) Chambers
... was a sharp-witted lad. He understood the case, (partly at least), in a moment, and proceeded to appropriate action. Being intimately acquainted with that part of London, he took a short cut, overshot Mr Sparks, and was first to give the alarm at the fire-station. When, therefore, Mr Sparks ran in, panting and shouting "fire!" great was his surprise to find the men already roused, and the horses ...
— Life in the Red Brigade - London Fire Brigade • R.M. Ballantyne
... hoping to reach; but my perplexity was at length relieved by the advent of a tall youth whose cadaverous features were shown up by the street lamp overhead. He gave his directions clearly enough, but although I followed them carefully right up the hill past the cathedral, I began to think that I had overshot the mark, when another passer-by appeared in the silent street. I found that I was within a few yards of the hotel; but on hurrying forward, I found to my astonishment, that the whole building was ...
— Normandy, Complete - The Scenery & Romance Of Its Ancient Towns • Gordon Home
... Majesty was pleased, their joys were crowned. He knew, the fairest garden hath some weeds, He did accept their kind intents, for deeds: One man there was, that with his zeal too hot, And furious haste, himself much overshot. But what man is so foolish, that desires To get good fruit from thistles, thorns and briars? Thus much I thought good to demonstrate here, Because I saw how much they grieved were; That any way, the least part of offence, Should make them seem offensive to their Prince. Thus three nights was I staid ...
— The Pennyles Pilgrimage - Or The Money-lesse Perambulation of John Taylor • John Taylor
... a meagre and evasive creed, much like the confession of Arius and Euzoius, prefacing it with a declaration that they were not followers of Arius, but his independent adherents. They overshot their mark, for the conservatives were not willing to go so far as this, and, moreover, had older standards of their own. Instead, therefore, of drawing up a new creed, they put forward a work of the venerated martyr Lucian of Antioch. Such it was said to be, and such in the main it probably ...
— The Arian Controversy • H. M. Gwatkin
... fresh pork having been cured, the lieutenant-governor had forty tons of salt provisions to spare, which he offered to this colony. The wharf and crane at Cascade were rather improved than simply repaired, and an overshot water-mill had been erected at the trifling expence of three ewe sheep to the constructor, which ground and dressed eighteen bushels of flour ...
— An Account of the English Colony in New South Wales, Vol. 1 • David Collins
... believes that the author has put himself in the class with most iconoclasts, in that he has overshot his mark. There seems to be a very important point, however, on which he has touched, namely, the lack of care exercised by most designers with regard to those items which most nearly correspond with the so-called "details" of structural ...
— Some Mooted Questions in Reinforced Concrete Design • Edward Godfrey
... up the slope, and seated himself under a stunted oak tree. The light was growing stronger. The east was overshot with ripples of crimson and orange, here blending into lines each more gorgeous than a moment before. The wind was chasing in from the bosom of Adria, and driving the fleeting mists up the little valley. The hills were springing out ...
— A Friend of Caesar - A Tale of the Fall of the Roman Republic. Time, 50-47 B.C. • William Stearns Davis
... separate, after all! That there was, as it were, some universal cement. But instants passed, and, indubitably, the world was a broken field! Enmity still existed, full-veined. It would be like this Alexander, who had overshot another Alexander, to send challenge after challenge, never to rest satisfied with one crossing of weapons, with blood drawn once! Or if there was no challenge, no formal duel, still there would be duel. He would pursue—he would cry, "Turn!"—there would be perpetuity of encounter. ...
— Foes • Mary Johnston
... royal liege, in aiming at your love, It may be sometimes I have overshot My duties to our Holy Mother Church, Tho' all the world allows I fall no inch Behind this Becket, rather go beyond In scourgings, macerations, mortifyings, Fasts, disciplines that clear the spiritual eye, And break the soul from earth. Let all that be. I boast not: but you know thro' ...
— Becket and other plays • Alfred Lord Tennyson
... had to stop several times to look at the section-posts, it was quite an excitement to mark every new number we came to. Our road took us pretty straight to the Mouse Mountain trail; but at a shanty being advised to leave the track and go straight over the prairie, we overshot the tents we were in search of by a ...
— A Lady's Life on a Farm in Manitoba • Mrs. Cecil Hall
... loyalty had in the end overshot itself. His zeal fatigued the King, and in 1677 he was recalled to England. As Governor of Virginia he had been long popular at first but in his old age detested. He had great personal courage, fidelity, and generosity for those things that ran with the current of a deep and narrow ...
— Pioneers of the Old South - A Chronicle of English Colonial Beginnings, Volume 5 In - The Chronicles Of America Series • Mary Johnston
... themselves by some trees, the buffalo coming to a sandbar in the middle of the river, halted a while, & those on the other shore, poured out upon him a shower of bullets. I looked for him to fall every moment, but they overshot him, for their balls struck the water on this side; a dog was sent into the river, he made for the buffalo, & seizing him by the tail, he made for our shore & as he neared it, the dog still hanging to his tail, & swimming, as he rose upon the bank, he commenced to ...
— Across the Plains to California in 1852 - Journal of Mrs. Lodisa Frizzell • Lodisa Frizell
... hatred on their tall, gaunt, rawboned figures, their long, matted hair and wild faces. One wounded tory, as he lay watching them, noticed their deadly accuracy of aim, and saw also that the loyalists, firing from the summit, continually overshot their foes. ...
— The Winning of the West, Volume Two - From the Alleghanies to the Mississippi, 1777-1783 • Theodore Roosevelt
... young men who did not look quite as hungry as most Darians, but there was a reason for that. Their leader introduced himself and the others. They were the astrogators of the ship Dara had built to try to bring food from Orede. They were not, said their self-appointed leader, good enough. They'd overshot their destination. They came out of overdrive too far off line. ...
— This World Is Taboo • Murray Leinster
... paralyzed. They stood and watched us. When they finally did fire, in their excitement, they overshot us. The next instant we burst upon them. Our bayonets came down to a charge. They couldn't stand before us, comrades. Corbleu! the white snow was red with blood that day! A squadron of cavalry, the Emperor's escort, struck them in the rear at the same time and between us we cut them to ...
— The Eagle of the Empire - A Story of Waterloo • Cyrus Townsend Brady
... from me and I shot him through the belly, he fell to his knees and on his wright elbow from which position he partly raised himself up and fired at me, and turning himself about crawled in behind a rock which was a few feet from him. he overshot me, being bearheaded I felt the wind of his bullet very distinctly. not having my shotpouch I could not reload my peice and as there were two of them behind good shelters from me I did not think it prudent to rush on them ...
— The Journals of Lewis and Clark • Meriwether Lewis et al
... untimbered hills on the left bank of the Aramak Creek. After leaving the tracks we made for the river, and reached it at a point a short distance above an old camp of mine where there is a tree marked L over LXIX. At the river we found we had overshot our party, so we had to follow the river up to find their encampment. Our path today went fifteen miles over unwooded, undulating, rich ground bearing abundance of grass; then eleven and a half miles over a country with higher undulations and ...
— Journal of Landsborough's Expedition from Carpentaria - In search of Burke and Wills • William Landsborough
... this moment feeling aggrieved by the Holbeins' neglect. If only they had been bidden, these contemptuously amused men would have had partners, even though the list of names in the society papers might have excited some derision. Mrs. Holbein had aimed high and overshot the mark. The result was tragic. And though her vulgar nature, writhing in humiliation, judged others by itself and believed all to be laughing maliciously, there were some ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... at the box to the minute so as not to keep Mrs. Gurley waiting. And her promptness was rewarded; the stern face seemed to relax. At the mere hint of this, Laura grew warm through and through; and as she could neither control her feelings nor keep them to herself, she rushed to an extreme and overshot the mark. ...
— The Getting of Wisdom • Henry Handel Richardson
... followed. Nineteen ballots were taken. Douglas's chief competitor proved to be, not Young, but Breese, who finally secured the nomination of the caucus by a majority of five votes.[147] The ambition of Judge Douglas had overshot ...
— Stephen A. Douglas - A Study in American Politics • Allen Johnson
... England and France, and, as we expect next month accounts of great attempts made by our colonies, we think war unavoidable, notwithstanding both nations are averse to it. The French have certainly overshot themselves; we took it upon a higher style than they expected, or than has been our custom. The spirit and expedition with which we have equipped so magnificent a navy has surprised them, and does exceeding honour to my Lord Anson, who has breathed new life into our affairs. The minister ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 • Horace Walpole
... way, and one only, the Boer guns had the advantage over us in shooting, that is, with their shrapnel shell, many of which were fitted with a special long range time fuse (double-ringed); here they certainly overshot us, but failed to make much use of the advantage, as they invariably burst their shrapnel, through incorrect setting of fuse, either too high up in the air to hurt much or else on striking the ground. Another great advantage the Boer guns as a rule possessed ...
— With the Naval Brigade in Natal (1899-1900) - Journal of Active Service • Charles Richard Newdigate Burne
... Chatterton to give you this invitation for his studio tea to-morrow, in person, and I fear that I have rather overshot my promise. Best way to get that brute up will be from the bank wall,—will damage your fruit less. I will have a derrick sent up to-morrow, or if possible this afternoon. I'm awfully sorry, Mrs. Evan, but I think you'll bear me witness that the accident was quite out of my control. May I beg ...
— People of the Whirlpool • Mabel Osgood Wright
... &c., to be supplied; and what they had fairly bought, they clearly had a right to. No one, so far as I could notice, tried to take more than his proper share; except, indeed, Eustace and myself. In our first eagerness to conform to custom, we both overshot the mark, and grabbed at disproportionate helpings. The waiters politely observed that we were taking what was meant for two; and as the courses followed in interminable sequence, we soon acquired the tact of ...
— New Italian sketches • John Addington Symonds
... was intended to call in at Yamada on the way down, but by some unaccountable reason we overshot the mark and found ourselves in Kama-ichi instead. The mistake was, of course, speedily discovered; the squadron hove around ...
— In Eastern Seas - The Commission of H.M.S. 'Iron Duke,' flag-ship in China, 1878-83 • J. J. Smith
... into play his prodigious strength intensified that strength to a sudden and astonishing degree. The consequence was that the tiger, instead of making the leap he intended, made one twice as great and overshot the mark. From out the gloom the beautiful sinewy body, of which only a glimpse could be caught, emerged as if fired from the throat of a Columbiad and, curving over the shoulders of the man and the boat, dropped into the stream with a splash that sent the water flying ...
— The Jungle Fugitives • Edward S. Ellis
... the still more primitive hand-mill, or quern; and I myself have seen it at work in the Shetland Islands, and even the north of Scotland, though it is now done away with even there, still more farther south, and its place supplied and its work done by overshot and under-shot wheel-gear, and improved machinery attached, of less or more complexity. One of the most recent improvements is the Turbine, a sort of Barker's mill; it is of great power, small compass, and acts under a good fall with ...
— Lectures on Popular and Scientific Subjects • John Sutherland Sinclair, Earl of Caithness
... gorgeous temples of Fifth Avenue than for even the most ambitious of country churches. Mrs. Allen hoped to make a profound impression on the country people, and by this one dress parade to secure standing and cordial recognition among the foremost families. But she overshot the mark. The failure of Mr. Allen was known. The costly mourning suits and the little house did not accord, the solid, sensible people were unfavorably impressed, and those of fashionable and aristocratic tendencies felt that investigation was needed before the ...
— What Can She Do? • Edward Payson Roe
... was so cleverly casual that no one could have guessed the girl's consuming interest in the answer. But its cleverness had overshot the mark, for so colourless was the tone in which it was asked that Mary did not notice it at all. Instead she retreated ...
— Up the Hill and Over • Isabel Ecclestone Mackay
... Perhaps he overshot the mark. By dint of hearing morality, art and literature depreciated, and seeing him preoccupied with boating, and listening to his own accounts of love affairs which he did not always carry on in the highest class, many ...
— Une Vie, A Piece of String and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant
... "it is still the study of Nosology; but in hitting the Elector upon the nose you have overshot your mark. You have a fine nose, it is true; but then Bluddennuff has none. You are damned, and he has become the hero of the day. I grant you that in Fum-Fudge the greatness of a lion is in proportion to the size of his proboscis—but, good heavens! there ...
— The Works of Edgar Allan Poe - Volume 4 (of 5) of the Raven Edition • Edgar Allan Poe
... bitterness prevailing in Scotland after the Union. Fortunately the loyalty of the Scotch Jacobites was not put to the test. As in the case of the Spanish Armada, accident fought on our side. The French fleet succeeded in reaching the coast of Scotland before the ships of the defenders; but it overshot its arranged landing-point, and had no hope but to sail back ingloriously to Dunkirk. Meantime, Defoe had satisfactorily discharged himself of his mission. Godolphin showed his appreciation of his services by recalling him as soon as ...
— Daniel Defoe • William Minto
... it." This, and expressions of a similar nature, was the tone of the small talk. My own impression is, that the Prussians were firing at the ramparts, and that, as often occurs, their projectiles overshot the mark. I did not see anyone either killed or wounded, and it seems to me that the most astonishing thing in a bombardment is the little damage it does to life and limb. I saw a bit of iron cut away a branch from one of ...
— Diary of the Besieged Resident in Paris • Henry Labouchere
... overshot, and breast wheels were not very efficient; they wasted about 75 per cent of the power applied to them. A modern impulse wheel, on the other hand, operates at an efficiency of 80 per cent and over. The loss is mainly through friction and leakage, and cannot ...
— Electricity for the farm - Light, heat and power by inexpensive methods from the water - wheel or farm engine • Frederick Irving Anderson
... their wigwams. A great hubbub ensued; and Indians, old and young, squaws, children, and warriors, all sallied out with loud screams, to save their property from the greedy spoilers. Kenton and his friends saw that they had overshot their mark, and that they must ride for their lives. Even in this extremity, however, they could not reconcile their minds to the surrender of a single horse which they had haltered; and while two of them rode in front and led a great number of horses, the other brought up the rear, and, plying ...
— Thrilling Adventures by Land and Sea • James O. Brayman
... say, preaching from a cathedral pulpit, that chanting should be abandoned in cathedral services. By such an assertion he would have overshot his mark and rendered himself absurd, to the delight of his hearers. He could, however, and did, allude with heavy denunciations to the practice of intoning in parish churches, although the practice was all but unknown in the diocese; and from thence he came round to the undue preponderance ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... they were not more than two yards behind, and for the first time I twisted so that they overshot me, which gave me another start. Three times they came up and three times I wrenched or twisted. The wood was not so far away now, ...
— The Mahatma and the Hare • H. Rider Haggard
... family of the Skinflints, and a widow; it was a strange match for Sir Murtagh; the people in the country thought he demeaned himself greatly,[E] but I said nothing: I knew how it was; Sir Murtagh was a great lawyer, and looked to the great Skinflint estate; there, however, he overshot himself; for though one of the co-heiresses, he was never the better for her, for she outlived him many's the long day—he could not see that to be sure when he married her. I must say for her, she made him the best of wives, being a very notable, stirring woman, ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. IV • Maria Edgeworth
... his judicial office, and he made out a good case for himself as far as industry and despatch are concerned. Nobody ever denied him the merit of the former quality. The virulent attacks of the Tory press (that is, of the 'Morning Post,' by Praed, for the 'Standard' rather defends him) have overshot their mark, and, though the general opinion of the Bar seems to condemn him as a bad Chancellor, he is probably not near so bad as they endeavour to make him out. A mind so vigorous as his will master difficulties in a short time at which an inferior capacity would in vain hammer ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. III • Charles C. F. Greville
... in the center of a large, green meadow, through which the road ran, was built in two parts, of hewn logs, with one great stone chimney on the outside, protected by an overshot in the roof, but that one in which the log-heap burned that night was inside. One end had been an Indian fort when Gen. Braddock tried to reach Fort Pitt by that road. The other end and stone barn had been built by its present ...
— Half a Century • Jane Grey Cannon Swisshelm
... in the chase, hid himself beneath the large leaves of a Vine. The huntsmen, in their haste, overshot the place of his concealment. Supposing all danger to have passed, the Hart began to nibble the tendrils of the Vine. One of the huntsmen, attracted by the rustling of the leaves, looked back, and seeing the Hart, shot an arrow from his bow and struck it. The Hart, at the point of death, ...
— Aesop's Fables • Aesop
... score of farms cleared on too-steep hills; lightning had destroyed the overshot grist mill, and the two big stones had been cracked in the hot flames; a feud had opened graves before the allotted time of the victims. It seemed to Elijah, sitting there in his cabin, as though damnation had visited the faithful, and that death was ...
— The River Prophet • Raymond S. Spears
... attract no love, to him it could bring no happiness. Probably it caused him to play the piano better; if this justifies Nature, she is welcome to the plea. For my part, I felt that it was monstrously bad taste in him to come and be miserable here and now in Forstadt. But he overshot his mark. ...
— The King's Mirror • Anthony Hope
... these two sentences are selected by memory—a critic you may always trust to—is admirable; except in one or two places where Thomson seems to have striven to be strongly pathetic, and where he seems to us to have overshot his mark, and to have ceased to be perfectly ...
— Recreations of Christopher North, Volume 2 • John Wilson
... to Sligo Bay, and there land his men and arms; and if he found it impracticable to land them there, he was to proceed to some other place in Ireland. Some days after this, they came in sight of the coast of the county of Limerick, and then they sailed towards Sligo; but they overshot the mark, and arrived off the coast of Donegal. They then turned back, and arrived at Sligo Bay on ...
— The Dock and the Scaffold • Unknown
... Gerald's words, while Adrian threw himself on the rock, sobbing and screaming, while Fergus sat still, hugging his bag. Anna could have screamed with her brother, for the boat seemed to have overshot the mark, and to be going quite aloof, when all depended upon a few minutes. She could hardly hear the words of the Preventive woman, who had found a second glass: "Never you fear, miss, the boat will be ...
— The Long Vacation • Charlotte M. Yonge
... with the miscellaneous assaults and batteries, kickings, fisticuffings, ropes'-endings, marline-spikings, which the inferior officers continually perpetrate, as the only mode of keeping up anything like discipline. As in many other instances, philanthropy has overshot itself by the prohibition of flogging, causing the captain to avoid the responsibility of solemn punishment, and leave his mates to make devils of themselves, by habitual and hardly avoidable ill treatment of ...
— Passages From the English Notebooks, Complete • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... charge and the final hand-to-hand fight, however, there was shelling. There was much shelling. Shells from the German guns that fell short or overshot the mark descended in the fields, and for a mile round these fields were plowed as though hundreds of plowshares had sheared the sod this way and that, until hardly a blade of grass was left to grow in its ordained place. Where shells had ...
— Paths of Glory - Impressions of War Written At and Near the Front • Irvin S. Cobb
... purpose. But the individuals do not seem to have calculated very reasonably: nobody can explain why a parrot should live ten times as long as a dog, and a turtle be almost immortal. In the case of man, the operation has overshot its mark: men do not live long enough: they are, for all the purposes of high civilization, mere children when they die; and our Prime Ministers, though rated as mature, divide their time between the golf course ...
— Back to Methuselah • George Bernard Shaw
... intensive cultivation of demand which constitutes nearly the whole of modern trade. The industrial revolution of the nineteenth century with all its labour-saving machines was originally an economy of necessary production; by the middle of the century it overshot its mark, and hastened the world to the brink of the opposite disaster of over-production. In the present commercial era we are still suspended over that dreadful brink. Nothing can stop the accelerated flux of mechanical production; and we are saved from falling into ...
— The World in Chains - Some Aspects of War and Trade • John Mavrogordato
... works. That imperishable little classic "Daisy Miller" is a very exquisite and typical specimen of the American suggestiveness of style; indeed, as I have hinted (Chapter IV.), its suggestiveness almost overshot the mark and required the explanation of a dramatic key. His dislike of the obvious and the commonplace sometimes leads Mr. James to become artificial and even obscure,[21] but at its best his style is as perspicuous as it is distinguished, dainty, ...
— The Land of Contrasts - A Briton's View of His American Kin • James Fullarton Muirhead
... own story. Cabot overran Cape Race and went south of St. Pierre and Miquelon without seeing them, and, continuing on a westerly course, hit Cape Breton at its most easterly point. An apt illustration occurs in a voyage made by the ship Bonaventure in 1591, recorded in Hakluyt. She overshot Cape Race without knowing it and came to the soundings on the bank south of St. Peter's, where they found twenty fathoms, and then the course was set northwest by north for Cape Ray. The course was sharply altered toward a definite and known point, but, if he did not see Cape Race, not ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 8 - The Later Renaissance: From Gutenberg To The Reformation • Editor-in-Chief: Rossiter Johnson
... which was once an excellent remedy, is a detestable regimen! It is a horrible instrument of oppression and tyranny, ready-made for all hands, suitable for every despotism, and under it France stifles and wastes away. You must agree with me yourself, Durocher; in this sense the Revolution overshot its mark, and placed in jeopardy even its purposes; for you, who love liberty, and do not wish it merely for yourself alone, as some of your friends do, but for all the world, surely you can not admire centralization, which proscribes liberty as manifestly as night obscures ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... Ptolemy Philometor, wrote an "Explanation of the Mosaic Laws," in which he anticipated, in many ways, the modern interpretation of the early traditions found in the opening books of the Old Testament. Like all Alexandrian scholars, however, he overshot the mark under the influence of the allegorical or symbolic type of interpretation. Other Jewish writers appealed to the older Greek historians and poets. Adopting the unprincipled methods of their persecutors, ...
— The Makers and Teachers of Judaism • Charles Foster Kent
... stranger drew out a well-lined purse, and, after jerking it in his hand, he again replaced it in his pocket, and more boldly than before renewed his gallantries to fair Janet. Emboldened, however, by what he conceived to have been his recent success, he now overshot the mark; and, as Andrew again reached the house, he was aroused ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Volume III • Various
... high note of its overdriven engines as it rolled and rocked toward the rising chute. For a moment the white spot showed against its gray side, then tossed and pitched wildly in the wake of the propellers as, driven too hastily and frenziedly, the ship overshot its mark and the captain missed ...
— Disowned • Victor Endersby
... done before in the Case of the banish'd King, how impolitick these high Solunarian Church-men acted in all their Proceedings, for had they contented themselves by little and little to ha' done their Work, they had done it effectually; but pushing at Extremities they overshot themselves, ...
— The Consolidator • Daniel Defoe
... water needed slight tremors to teach it the tenderness of its calm; then my guide used his blade, and cut into glassiness. We crept noiselessly along by the lake-edge, within the shadows of the pines. With never a plash we slid. Rare drops fell from the cautious paddle and tinkled on the surface, overshot, not parted by, our imponderable passage. Sometimes from far within the forest would come sounds of rustling branches or crackling twigs. Somebody of life approaches with stealthy tread. Gentlier, even gentlier, my steersman! Take up no pearly drop from the lake, mother ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 62, December, 1862 • Various
... their cowardice, preached openly in the capital, and even went so far as to address a letter to the regent calling upon her to open her mind for the reception of the truth.[13] By this public challenge, however, he overshot the mark, and not being gifted with any particular desire to suffer martyrdom for the faith, he left Scotland suddenly and retired to the Continent (1556). For years he was the leading spirit in many of the fierce and unseemly disputes ...
— History of the Catholic Church from the Renaissance • Rev. James MacCaffrey
... coverlet has become a pall woven by the black monks? Yet it shall, it shall. Christopher Harflete's seed shall sit where the Abbots of Blossholme sat, and from father to son tell the tale of the last of them—the Spaniard who plotted against England's king and overshot himself." ...
— The Lady Of Blossholme • H. Rider Haggard
... with a Teufelsdrockh there ever hovers some shade of doubt. In the mean while, if satire were actually intended, the case is little better. There are not wanting men who will answer: Does your Professor take us for simpletons? His irony has overshot itself; we see through it, and ...
— Sartor Resartus - The Life and Opinions of Herr Teufelsdrockh • Thomas Carlyle
... into silence, and his thoughts flew on apace. The unwashed face grew meaner and more brooding, the fair brows drew closer over the large blue eyes, the jaws were shut as tight as they well could be, for he was painfully overshot, and his chin was almost hidden, so far receding was it under the ...
— The Watchers of the Plains - A Tale of the Western Prairies • Ridgewell Cullum
... following day, in their morning editions. This bolt from the blue proved more alarming than anything we had dared to imagine. The shock was so unexpected that certain journals, losing their composure, seemed to regard the Vienna Cabinet's arraignment as having overshot the mark. "Austria-Hungary," said the Vossische Zeitung, "will have to justify the grave charges that she makes against the Serbian Government and people by publishing the results of the preliminary ...
— World's War Events, Vol. I • Various
... pair of bellows, whose noses meet at a little hole near the bottom: these are compressed together by certain buttons placed on the axis of a very large wheel, which is turned round by water, in the manner of an overshot mill. As soon as these buttons are slid off, the bellows are raised again by a counterpoise of weights, whereby they are made to play alternately, the one giving its blast ...
— The Forest of Dean - An Historical and Descriptive Account • H. G. Nicholls
... the elegant and disillusioned young men overshot their mark. Mere health reasserted itself; an inherent repressed vitality sought new channels. Arthur Symons deserted his hectic Muse, Richard Le Gallienne abandoned his preciosity, and the group began to disintegrate. ...
— Modern British Poetry • Various
... things filled again, we put off from Hatorask, being the number of nineteen persons in both boats; but before we could get to the place where our planters were left, it was so exceeding dark, that we overshot the place a quarter of a mile, where we espied towards the North end of the island the light of a great fire through the woods to the which we presently rowed: when we came right over against it we let fall our grapnel near the shore, and sounded with a trumpet a call, ...
— The White Doe - The Fate of Virginia Dare • Sallie Southall Cotten
... to prove 'more hurtful to the shooter than to the target.' Looking back at the crisis, after an interval of more than forty years, the same criticism seems to apply with added force to the Durham Letter. Lord John overshot the mark, and his accusations wounded those whom he did not intend to attack, and in the recoil of public opinion his own reputation suffered. He resented, with pardonable warmth, the attitude of the Vatican, and was jealous of any infringement, from that or any other quarter, ...
— Lord John Russell • Stuart J. Reid
... points, [1] and in about two minutes heard a series of reports right astern of us. It was evident that our ruse had succeeded and that he had overshot the mark. ...
— The Diary of a U-boat Commander • Anon
... boots on, and——" He saw the look of cold surprise in her face and went on quickly, "I swear, Princess, that I will not return to you again without his head." He took a quick step in the direction of the castle and found himself soaring over it; turned eleven miles off and stepped back a pace; overshot it again, and arrived at the very ...
— Happy Days • Alan Alexander Milne
... that he had overshot his mark, and that there was a point at which even the hesitating Godfrey might be driven into decision. But he said, with an air ...
— Silas Marner - The Weaver of Raveloe • George Eliot
... she came to the stone wall, she took the other side from that taken by the fox, and kept about the same distance from it, being thus separated several yards from his track, with the fence between her and it. At the point where the fox turned sharply to the left, the hound overshot a few yards, then wheeled, and, feeling the air a moment with her nose, took up the scent again and was off on his trail as unerringly as Fate. It seemed as if the fox must have sowed himself broadcast as he went along, and ...
— The Writings of John Burroughs • John Burroughs
... pendulous or pricked ears, weak jaws, snipy muzzle, full staring or light eyes, crooked legs, large, flat or hare feet, curly or soft coat, cow hocks, and brush twisted or carried right over the back, under or overshot mouth. ...
— Dogs and All About Them • Robert Leighton
... is careful to remark at the outset that this poem is not intended for the virtuous. The frivolous gallants, whose sole end in life is dissipation, with the objects of their licentious passion, are the readers for whom he caters. But he had overshot his mark; The Amores had been tolerated, for they had followed precedent. But even they had raised him enemies. The Art of Love produced a storm of indignation, and without doubt laid the foundations of that severe displeasure ...
— A History of Roman Literature - From the Earliest Period to the Death of Marcus Aurelius • Charles Thomas Cruttwell
... brutality of Alva had already overshot the mark. Too politic, however, openly to reprove so powerful a functionary, he continued to speak of him and of his administration to Philip in terms of exalted eulogy. He was a "sage seignior," a prudent governor, one on whom his Majesty could entirely repose. He was a man of long experience, ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... camp was an old, unused grist-mill, with a huge, decaying overshot oaken water-wheel. We all perched on the wheel ...
— Under the Maples • John Burroughs
... what he hadn't been before. I duly noticed that he had more trouble in making "everything else" literary than he had at first allowed for; but this was largely counteracted by the ease with which he was able to obtain that his mark should not be overshot. He had taken well to heart the old lesson of the Beacon; he remembered that he was after all there to keep his contributors down much rather than to keep them up. I thought at times that he kept them down a trifle too far, but he assured me that I needn't ...
— Embarrassments • Henry James
... overshot the mark, but she retorted, gallantly reckless: "That's what yer Aunt Malviny useter declar' fur gospel sure, when she war a gal. An' she hev got ten chil'ren, an' hev buried two husbands; an' ef all they say air true, she's tollin' in the third man ...
— The Wit of Women - Fourth Edition • Kate Sanborn
... be obtained, it is improved to the utmost, as at Queretaro, where a small river is made to turn the largest overshot wheel which has ever been constructed, furnishing power in the famous Hercules Cotton Factory of that city, which gives regular employment to many ...
— Aztec Land • Maturin M. Ballou
... the middle of the boulevard signalled with his little white wand; the stream of east-bound vehicles checked and began to close up to the right of the crossing, upon which they encroached jealously; and a taxi on the outside, next the island, overshot the mark, pulled up sharply, and began to back into place. Before Lanyard could stir, its window was opposite him, and he was looking ...
— The Lone Wolf - A Melodrama • Louis Joseph Vance
... main bulkhead. The women had its doorkey. Now the door stood ajar. Coffin pushed himself through so hard that he overshot and caromed off the ...
— The Burning Bridge • Poul William Anderson
... overshot our mark, so, turning about, we made for the whale, which kept for a considerable time near the top of the water, spouting now and then, and going slowly to windward. We at last got within a few feet of the monster, and the captain suddenly ...
— Fighting the Whales • R. M. Ballantyne
... The Sketching of Machinery. Drilling Machines; Motive Machines; Water-wheels. Construction and Setting up of water wheels, Delineation of water wheels, Design of a water wheel, Sketch of a water wheel; Overshot Water wheels, Water Pumps; Steam Motors; High-pressure expansive steam engine. Details of Construction; Movements of the Distribution and Expansion ...
— Scientific American, Vol.22, No. 1, January 1, 1870 • Various
... though the appearance of Terra del Fuego be well known, without knowing also the appearance of Staten Land; and that some navigators have been deceived by three hills on Staten Land, which have been mistaken for the Three Brothers on Terra del Fuego, and so overshot the streight. But no ship can possibly miss the streight that coasts Terra del Fuego within sight of land, for it will then, of itself, be sufficiently conspicuous; and Staten Land, which forms the east side, will be still more manifestly distinguished, ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 12 • Robert Kerr
... into pocket pistols," interrupted Mr. C., "and not have overshot the mark, my dear—ha, ...
— The Disowned, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... majestic current to bear up the young man's enterprises, and sweep him on to fame and fortune. Opportune are all the days when health spills over at the eye and ear and laughs through the lips. Men worn out are like overshot wheels—the life trickles and the buckets are filled slowly by long rests and frequent vacations. Young men are like undershot wheels—always, by day and night, the water ...
— The Investment of Influence - A Study of Social Sympathy and Service • Newell Dwight Hillis
... and the land. You've overshot everything. Why, man, are ye all mazed aboard? Never a vessel comes hereabouts, and 'tis the Lord's mercy you han't ...
— True Tilda • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... it came, hard and fast. We huddled together on the cold field and prepared ourselves to expect anything that might come along now. Shells and rain were both falling in the field. I think a few shells, meant for Ypres, had rather overshot the mark and had come into our ...
— Bullets & Billets • Bruce Bairnsfather
... for seein' bloodshed, but I must find out the nature o' these fellows and see their customs with my own eyes, so that I may be able to speak of it again, if need be, authoritatively. It's only six miles off, and we don't run much more risk than that of getting a rap with a stray stone or an overshot arrow. Will ...
— The Coral Island - A Tale Of The Pacific Ocean • R. M. Ballantyne
... contrast, the Aryan folk of India, whether in their pure type as found in the Punjab and Rajputana Desert, or mingled with the earlier Dravidian races belong to the hot belt but scarcely reach the Tropic of Cancer,[198] though their language has far overshot this line both in the Deccan and the Ganges Delta. One spore of Aryan stock, in about 450 B.C., moved by sea from the Bay of Cambay to Ceylon; mingling there with the Tamil natives, they became the progenitors of the Singhalese, ...
— Influences of Geographic Environment - On the Basis of Ratzel's System of Anthropo-Geography • Ellen Churchill Semple
... garret empty, and not furniture or other appurtenance than the hole in the floor up which he had come, and the door into the place of wailing beyond, which was fastened by a long iron spike dropping into a staple that overshot a heavy wooden bar. As he slipped up the spike and took the bar off, Phoebus heard some person in the room below mutter, and lock the great padlock upon the other door, effectually barring his escape by ...
— The Entailed Hat - Or, Patty Cannon's Times • George Alfred Townsend
... moment Backus fired. It was an instantly fatal shot. Backus had influential friends among business men and politicians. The Coroner held an inquest. A jury to hold Backus blameless had been secured, but they overshot their mark—the thing was too transparent, too bare-faced. The murdered man was a German much respected by his countrymen. They determined to press the matter to justice. Backus was indicted, tried, convicted of murder ...
— The Vigilance Committee of '56 • James O'Meara
... stage, she had but one end in view; to show the young man the essential absurdity of any sentimental acquaintance between himself and the mother of this blooming maid. With a vague uneasiness she realized the possibility that she had overshot the mark. ...
— Other People's Business - The Romantic Career of the Practical Miss Dale • Harriet L. Smith
... any appearance of it on the road before him, a level stretch of two miles. However, he ran on another five miles, and there was no sign of it, nor had anyone he passed or met, seen it. Plainly he had overshot it. ...
— The Admirable Tinker - Child of the World • Edgar Jepson
... little sister Edie. For Ernest had fully made up his mind by this time what it was he had come for, and he took the earliest possible opportunity of taking a walk with Edie alone, through the tiny glen behind the town, where the wee stream tumbles lazily upon the big slow-turning vanes of the overshot mill-wheel. ...
— Philistia • Grant Allen
... him. But I had so grossly overshot the mark that I suppose it took me two good miles of road and half an hour of elocution to persuade him I had been in earnest. In the course of which I became so interested in demonstrating my present danger ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 20 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... about twenty new hymns by himself and various German authors, but not a single hymn by Kingo. The omission no doubt reflects the envy that the poet's quick rise to fame had stirred up against him in certain influential circles. His enemies, however, had overshot their mark. Even the king realized that it would be impossible at this time to publish a hymnal that ignored the work of the country's greatest hymnwriter. And so Jonasson's work promptly shared the fate ...
— Hymns and Hymnwriters of Denmark • Jens Christian Aaberg
... projects deeper and more devious than ours, the Dutchman made haste to cover up what seemed to have been an overshot. Frankly, he turned ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1921 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various
... no more a great musician than Offenbach, for he also wrote badly. The essential difference between the two was the care, not only in his prosody but also in his declamation, which Gretry tried to reproduce musically with all possible exactness. He overshot the mark in this for he did not see that in singing the expression of a note is modified by the harmonic scheme which accompanies it. It must be recognized, in addition, that many times Gretry was carried away by his melodic inventiveness and forgot ...
— Musical Memories • Camille Saint-Saens
... Space was too cramped and he overshot his planned landing. The spacer set down hard beyond the cleared strip, raising spurting clouds of volcanic ash which showered ...
— Master of the Moondog • Stanley Mullen
... Kenneth strove hard during the days that followed to right himself in her eyes. But so headlong was he in the attempt, and so misguided, that presently he overshot his mark by dropping an unflattering word concerning Crispin, whereby he attributed to the Tavern Knight's influence and example the degenerate change that had of late ...
— The Tavern Knight • Rafael Sabatini
... a model September afternoon—and what can one say more of weather?—when at half-past three precisely Mr. Pellew's hansom overshot the door of 102, Cavendish Square, and firmly but amiably insisted on turning round to deposit its fare according to the exact terms of its contract. Its proprietor said what he could in extenuation of its maladroitness. They ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan
... harm. O'Leary had overshot her, in his desire to make his missiles reach. Not even a canister had lodged in her spars, or torn her sails. The usual luck appeared to attend her, and the people on board fought with renewed confidence and zeal. Not so with the ...
— The Wing-and-Wing - Le Feu-Follet • J. Fenimore Cooper
... above the bank of vapour, he found that he had overshot the mark, so he turned quickly and sped backwards. At the same time he discovered that he had been preceded by Commander Briggs, who was bombarding the shed furiously, and who himself was the object of a concentrated fire. ...
— Aeroplanes and Dirigibles of War • Frederick A. Talbot
... when too late, that she had overshot her mark, while, at the same time, she wondered at the reason of a result so strange from such well-digested and well-conducted plans. She determined, however, never again to interfere between her daughter and the baronet's heir; concluding, with a nearer approach ...
— Precaution • James Fenimore Cooper
... dear Seigneur!" he said, on the Sunday before the playing was to end, "we have overshot ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker
... instant cure. It was impossible to decide which of these presents was the most valuable; so the sultan said he should have her who shot an arrow to the greatest distance. The eldest (Houssian) shot first; Ali overshot the arrow of his eldest brother; but that of the youngest brother (Ahmed) could nowhere be found. So the award was given to Ahmed.—Arabian ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook, Vol. 3 • E. Cobham Brewer
... present his head for a target, and took refuge in a brier thicket. He was left until the last, when we all sallied out to make the final kill. There were two rifles, and had the chance come to my father, I think he would have killed him easily; but the opportunity came to a neighbor, who overshot, merely causing a slight wound. The next instant the stag charged at me from the cover of the thickety fence corner. Not having sense enough to take to the nearest protection, I turned and ran like a scared wolf across the field, the hog following me like a hound. My father risked a running shot, ...
— Reed Anthony, Cowman • Andy Adams
... like water will now be recognized. So long as the water is at rest, it is inert. If we pump it up to a height, we confer on it the equivalent of potential. We can let the water fall into the buckets of an overshot wheel. Its velocity leaving the tail race may be identical with that at which it left the supply trough to descend on the wheel. Its quantity will be the same. It will be in all respects unchanged, just as the current of electricity passing through a lamp ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 303 - October 22, 1881 • Various
... the opposite of what that word means to-day. He was as egalitarian as St. Francis, and as independent as Robin Hood. Like that other yeoman in the ballad, he bore in hand a mighty bow; what some of his enemies would have called a long bow. But though he sometimes overshot the mark of truth, he never shot away from it, like Froude. His account of that sixteenth century in which the mediaeval civilisation ended, is not more and not less picturesque than Froude's: the difference is in the dull detail of truth. That crisis was not the foundling ...
— The Crimes of England • G.K. Chesterton |
