"Wide of the mark" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... course of judicious regulation, so great were the improvements effected that the vendor regretted having sold it for such a trifling sum, and the more so when it was whispered about that the instrument was a veritable Amati—a report, by the way, very far wide of the mark, as it was simply ...
— The Violin - Its Famous Makers and Their Imitators • George Hart
... as "a tadpole of the Lakes," was ridiculously wide of the mark. He was nearly of the second generation of romantics; he was only three years old when "The Ancient Mariner" was published; "Christabel" and Scott's metrical romances had all been issued before he put forth his first volume. But though he ...
— A History of English Romanticism in the Nineteenth Century • Henry A. Beers
... mingle with the rabble rout, who in vain attempted to rid themselves of his company. The knight was not over-nice in the just administration of his discipline. Often, when he thought himself near enough for its accomplishment, he aimed a terrific blow, but shot wide of the mark, bringing down the innocent and unoffending victims, who strewed the floor like swaths behind the mower. Whenever a lucky individual could disentangle himself from his comrades, he darted through the door, and in spite of the storm and pitchy ...
— Traditions of Lancashire, Volume 1 (of 2) • John Roby
... Ethel Blue that she was released from the promise, for her guesses went wide of the mark. Ethel Brown made something that she guessed to be a hen, Roger called it a book, Dicky maintained firmly that it was a portrait of himself. The rest gave it up, and they all needed a long argument by the artist to believe that she had meant to draw ...
— Ethel Morton's Enterprise • Mabell S.C. Smith
... answers; and to say to people, 'Pray!' 'Seek!' 'Knock!' when the one thing to say is 'Take the gifts that God sent you before you asked for them,' is folly, and has often led to a course of painful and profitless struggling, which was all unnecessary and wide of the mark. It is like telling a man to pray for rain when the reservoirs at his side are full, and every flower is bending its chalice, charged with the blessing. It is needless to tell a man to seek for the treasure that is lying there at his side, and to which he has only to turn his eyes ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ezekiel, Daniel, and the Minor Prophets. St Matthew Chapters I to VIII • Alexander Maclaren
... for that this was not their first meeting was evident. If they had been strangers, the major would not have greeted him in so cordial and friendly a manner. This was what Elam told himself, but he had shot wide of the mark. ...
— Elam Storm, The Wolfer - The Lost Nugget • Harry Castlemon
... rather weak refinement—a stranger would probably have summed up his first impressions of Lord William, drawn from his bodily presence, in some such words. But the stranger who did so would have been singularly wide of the mark. His wife beside him looked even frailer and slighter than he. A small and mouse-like woman, dressed in gray clothes of the simplest and plainest make, and wearing a shady garden hat; her keen black eyes in her shriveled face gave that ...
— The Coryston Family • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... point lace, about a thousand people who have not got such a thing will write to say that they will sell you wax flowers, old books, ostrich feathers, odd numbers of Myra's Journal, or any rubbish they may have by them; I dare say that most of the writers of these letters are just as wide of the mark. Sit here at my feet, Fan; and you shall open the letters for me and read the addresses. No, not that way with your fingers. If you stop to tear them to pieces, like a hungry cat tearing its meat, it will take too long. Use the paper-knife, and ...
— Fan • Henry Harford
... had striven to bear in mind a piece of advice which Mr. Lincoln had given him. "Speak so that the lowest may understand, and the rest will have no trouble." And it had worked. At the halting lameness of the beginning an egg was thrown,—fortunately wide of the mark. After this incident Stephen fairly astonished his audience, —especially an elderly gentleman who sat on a cracker-box in the rear, out of sight of the stand. This may have been Judge Whipple, although we have no ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill
... Pigeonswing, you're wide of the mark this time. But, that we may understand each other, we'll begin at the beginning like, which will let you into the whole history of the pale-face religion. As we've had a smart walk, however, and here is the bear's meat safe and sound, just as you left it, let us sit down a bit on this ...
— Oak Openings • James Fenimore Cooper
... want to if they come as wide of the mark as that," said Frank; "they are shooting at ...
— The Boy Aviators' Polar Dash - Or - Facing Death in the Antarctic • Captain Wilbur Lawton
... his comrades were so taken by surprise that for a moment they did not realise his intentions; but De Narvaez, with an oath, exclaimed: "It is De Pontbriand; shoot the dog down!" Their petronels rang out, but the clumsy weapons shot wide of the mark, and in a trice Claude was with his friends, who, alarmed by the firing, and the wild rush of the approaching rider, had come to a sudden standstill. Before they had time to question De Pontbriand the Spaniards were upon them, and with fierce ...
— Marguerite De Roberval - A Romance of the Days of Jacques Cartier • T. G. Marquis
... millions of tiny blows dealt every minute in our body-battle, what wonder if some go wide of the mark! ...
— Preventable Diseases • Woods Hutchinson
... view of a royal party coming along one of the walks at Frogmore. We were, in fact, theorizing and practically commenting on the art of throwing stones. Boys have a peculiar contempt for female attempts in that way. For, besides that girls fling wide of the mark, with a certainty that might have won the applause of Galerius, [2] there is a peculiar sling and rotary motion of the arm in launching a stone, which no girl ever can attain. From ancient practice, I was somewhat of a proficient in this art, and was discussing ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey
... the turbulent stream of humanity sweeping in opposite directions through Washington Street and its busy estuaries. He was in the crowd, but not of it. I had so little real knowledge of him that I was obliged to imagine his more intimate environments. However wide of the mark my conjectures may have fallen, they were as satisfying to me as facts would have been. His secluded room I could picture to myself with a sense of certainty—the couch (a sofa by day), the cupboard, the writing-table with ...
— Ponkapog Papers • Thomas Bailey Aldrich
... encouraging him with well known words of cheer, he rushed over the scene of his late struggle with a velocity that set all restraint at defiance—his late opponent scarcely being able to put himself in safety. A couple of shots, that whistled wide of the mark, announced his extrication from the difficulty—but, to his surprise, his enemies had been at work behind him, and the edge of the copse through which he was about to pass, was blockaded with bars in like manner with the path in front. He heard the shouts of the ruffians in the rear—he ...
— Guy Rivers: A Tale of Georgia • William Gilmore Simms
... now. Forty-nine operations were successfully performed. Owing to the great hurry necessitated by the far-gone state of some of the flock, Gabriel missed his aim in one case, and in one only—striking wide of the mark, and inflicting a mortal blow at once upon the suffering ewe. Four had died; three recovered without an operation. The total number of sheep which had thus strayed and injured ...
— Far from the Madding Crowd • Thomas Hardy
... was vigorously played; but had Marjorie's arm lost its cunning? Her bowling went wide of the mark, Eric proposed that he should bowl, and she should bat. This made matters no better. Finally he ...
— The Children of Wilton Chase • Mrs. L. T. Meade
... it, Mr. Careless; ah! that's not it; no, no, you shoot wide of the mark a mile; indeed you do, that's not it, Mr. Careless; ...
— The Comedies of William Congreve - Volume 1 [of 2] • William Congreve
... told no more than the rest of you," the other replied; "and my guess may be wide of the mark; so just now I'm not going to say anything more. But you can see from the way he keeps looking at Mazie she's got something to do with it all. When he talks about having to make a terrible sacrifice ...
— Phil Bradley's Mountain Boys - The Birch Bark Lodge • Silas K. Boone
... the earth, no communication has been established between him and the lower animals, and he affirmed that we know quite as little of the thoughts and motives of our own children. Both conclusions are wide of the mark. There is much more communication between man and the domestic animals than between animals of the same species. The understanding between an Arab and his horse is almost perfect, and so is that between a sportsman and his setters. Even the sluggish ox knows the word of command. Then what ...
— The Life and Genius of Nathaniel Hawthorne • Frank Preston Stearns
... the publicity of the interview, he contrived to make Mr. Van Riper understand how matters stood. To tell the truth, Van Riper grew quite sober and manageable when he realized that his extravagant imputation of insanity was not so wide of the mark as it might have seemed, and that there was a possibility that his old friend's mind might be growing weak. He even ventured a little way down the path and permitted Jacob to come to the gate while they discussed ...
— The Story of a New York House • Henry Cuyler Bunner
... to. Mind you keep your notions to yourself, for some of 'em are wide of the mark. Now you may read if you like'; and there the talk ended; but Ted took great comfort in it, and looked as ...
— Jo's Boys • Louisa May Alcott
... biped of the Greek Philosopher, nor the tool-using animal of the Sage of Chelsea. For animals, too, have their tools, and man, in his visible flounces, has feathers enough to make even a peacock gape. Both my Philosophers have hit wide of the mark this time. And Man, to my way of thinking, is a flounce-wearing Spirit. Indeed, flounces alone, the invisible ones in particular, distinguish us from the beasts. For like ourselves they have their fashions in clothes; their peculiar speech; ...
— The Book of Khalid • Ameen Rihani
... this, however, as in many other cases, size does not necessarily connote quality. My experiences may (like the weather) have been exceptional, and the attempt to judge of this Hercules by the foot I saw may be wide of the mark; but here are three instances which are at any ...
— The Land of Contrasts - A Briton's View of His American Kin • James Fullarton Muirhead
... Tranta cunningly made straight for it. The two natives who were in charge of it promptly went over one side as Tranta climbed up the other, and, although a few shots were fired after him as he clambered on board, they went wide of the mark, and Tranta lay down on the small deck and licked his wounded leg.[Footnote: A fact.—Author.] He stayed there all that day, and neither the beaters nor the hunters dare go near him. But at night he crept over the side of the ship and swam to shore, and, as he ...
— Rataplan • Ellen Velvin
... fresh, almost high, and as the boat got out from under the lee of the shore timber, she heeled over upon one side, and sped rapidly through the water. The Lieutenant made his men fire again, but the distance was now so great that their bullets flew wide of the mark. ...
— Captain Sam - The Boy Scouts of 1814 • George Cary Eggleston
... have come here to attack the heart of an innocent girl." I watched him narrowly, and I have often wondered how I had the courage to insult him. It was a bold shot at the truth, and his look satisfied me that I was not very wide of the mark. To accuse a gray-haired old man of attempting to win the affections of a young girl would seem absurd enough. But if you had ever seen Benoni, you would understand that he was anything but old, save for his snowy locks. Many ...
— A Roman Singer • F. Marion Crawford
... error of supposing that our impulses towards good action are entirely the products of education, training, public opinion, and so forth. Let the reader refer, for instance, to such a celebrated work as John Stuart Mill's "Utilitarianism," and it will be seen how wide of the mark it was possible for even a great thinker to go, when his ideas of mind were unguided by the light of evolution. Even in the greatest writer of that time not a syllable do we find as to the parental instinct. "As is my own belief," says Mill, ...
— Woman and Womanhood - A Search for Principles • C. W. Saleeby
... the dark. All that Peter knew of the jewel-case was Rose Winter's description of it, when she told of Mary's arrival in her absence, to take it away; but Lady Dauntrey's face said that the shot had not gone wide of the mark. ...
— The Guests Of Hercules • C. N. Williamson and A. M. Williamson
... by a tyro, it was no wonder that it flew far wide of the mark, striking a bough away to the left and then dropping from twig to twig till it ...
— Rob Harlow's Adventures - A Story of the Grand Chaco • George Manville Fenn
... ears, gazed for a second intently at his enemies, and then appreciating his danger, snorted like a warhorse and plunged in a seeming desperation of terror towards the shore. He had ran a few rods when Spalding let drive at him, as he confessed, at random. The ball went wide of the mark, and the game dashed, with more desperate energy, and whistling and snorting like a locomotive, into the brush that lined the banks. It was Spalding's third shot in all his life at a deer, and he insisted, gravely enough, that he did not fire while the game was standing broadside ...
— Wild Northern Scenes - Sporting Adventures with the Rifle and the Rod • S. H. Hammond
... hardly comprehending this ebullition. It was not what he had expected to elicit. No one laughed. His fleer was wide of the mark. ...
— 'way Down In Lonesome Cove - 1895 • Charles Egbert Craddock (AKA Mary Noailles Murfree)
... It was hard to find catchwords under which to look. "Amusement"? there is no such word among all the many spoken by God to men. "Recreation"?—nor that either; and "game" is not in all the book, and "rest" is something so wide of the mark (in the Bible sense, I mean) that you must leave it out altogether. And "pastime"? ah, the very thought is ...
— Tired Church Members • Anne Warner
... sea, was cast with the current on the coast of Paria, and peopled about S. Miguel de Neveri. It was then attempted by Don Pedro de Silva, a Portuguese of the family of Ruy Gomez de Silva, and by the favour which Ruy Gomez had with the king he was set out. But he also shot wide of the mark; for being departed from Spain with his fleet, he entered by Maranon or Amazons, where by the nations of the river and by the Amazons, he was utterly overthrown, and himself and all his army defeated; only seven escaped, and ...
— The Discovery of Guiana • Sir Walter Raleigh
... a fierce affection that to men who do not know California is always a surprise. Hence he is impatient of outside criticism. Those who do not love California cannot understand her, and, to his mind, their shafts, however aimed, fly wide of the mark. Thus, to say that California is commercially asleep, that her industries are gambling ventures, that her local politics is in the hands of professional pickpockets, that her small towns are the shabbiest ...
— California and the Californians • David Starr Jordan
... went wide of the mark in their reasoning that industry would inevitably crush the worker. Modern industry is gradually lifting the worker and the world. We only need to know more about planning and methods. The best results can and will be brought about by individual ...
— My Life and Work • Henry Ford
... well as T. Haviland Hicks, Jr., shot far wide of the mark in believing that the big Hercules had no power to feel; he possessed that power, but, with it the ability to conceal his feelings. They thought nothing appealed to him, had stirred his soul, at college, but they were wrong; true, Thor was unable to understand this ...
— T. Haviland Hicks Senior • J. Raymond Elderdice
... the hawk rose with its prey in its talons they shot their arrows almost simultaneously. Amuba's arrow struck the hawk between the wings, and the creature fell dead still clutching its prey. Chebron's arrow was equally well aimed, but it struck a twig which deflected its course and it flew wide of the mark. ...
— The Cat of Bubastes - A Tale of Ancient Egypt • G. A. Henty
... may thus be obtained of Rashi's early education; and in assuming that he soon distinguished himself for precocity and for maturity of thought, we shall not be shooting wide of the mark. But legend will not let its heroes off so cheaply; legend will have it that Rashi, in order to complete his education, travelled [traveled sic] to the most distant lands. Not satisfied with having him go to the south of France, to ...
— Rashi • Maurice Liber
... in passing to set free the Blackfoot who had been bound to a tree. That red man, having expected death, went off with a lively feeling of surprise, and at top speed, his pace being slightly accelerated by a shot—wide of the mark and at long ...
— The Prairie Chief • R.M. Ballantyne
... wide of the mark in suspecting that Clifford had begun to pay unscrupulous compliments to his brilliant cousin; for the young man had really more scruples than he received credit for in his family. He had a certain ...
— The Europeans • Henry James
... rubbish!" When I say in what parts Charles Kean was "best," I don't mean to be assertive. How should a mere child be able to decide? I "think back" and remember in what parts I liked him best, but I may be quite wide of the mark. ...
— The Story of My Life - Recollections and Reflections • Ellen Terry
... made by Hussey the man was begging to be killed and the policeman shot at him, but his aim was defective and the bullet went wide of the mark. The officer then handed Hussey a knife with instructions to cut the veins in the suffering man's wrists, and Hussey ...
— Complete Story of the San Francisco Horror • Richard Linthicum
... Royal Seals. To that quarter he first led his companion, and thence directed her towards objects more likely to supply her with amusement; he talked freely, and was himself surprised at the show of information his memory allowed him to make—desperately vague and often ludicrously wide of the mark, but still a something of knowledge, retained from all sorts of chance encounters by his capable mind. Had the British Museum been open to visitors in the hours of the evening, or on Sundays, Bob Hewitt would possibly have ...
— The Nether World • George Gissing
... British Republic held on its way under one President. It is wide of the mark to object that other Republics, which change their President more frequently, support the semblance of over- lordship at considerably less cost to the people. Britons are minded for the present that the Head of their State shall ...
— The Private Papers of Henry Ryecroft • George Gissing
... more easily said than done. I am talking perfectly plainly. You would not get such a Bill. I want to talk even more plainly. I want to say that reference to the Hindu community or the Mahomedan community, in respect to the position of the Viceroy's Executive, is entirely wide of the mark in the view, I know, both of the Viceroy and of myself. If, as I have already said I expect, it may be my duty by-and-by to recommend to the Crown the name of an Indian member, it will not be solely for the sake of placing on the Viceroy's Executive Council an Indian ...
— Indian speeches (1907-1909) • John Morley (AKA Viscount Morley)
... over to the crack shots. They fire half a dozen shots at a target, then look at the target through a telescope. Those men know that they can hit the bull's eye every time, so that if the shots are wide of the mark, either there is a defect in the gun or the sights are not true. In nine cases out of ten it is the fault of the sights, and ...
— The Boy With the U.S. Census • Francis Rolt-Wheeler
... not over yet. But Dr. Doyle is not a prophet, and cannot be reproached for a miscalculation of this character, for if I, and many with me, had been asked at the time what we thought of the future, we might have been as wide of the mark as ...
— My Reminiscences of the Anglo-Boer War • Ben Viljoen
... it distinct. She said nothing more, she only looked in front of her; but her very quietness prompted me to something suggestive of sympathy and service. It was difficult indeed to strike the right note—some things seemed too wide of the mark and others too importunate. At last, unexpectedly, she appeared to give me my chance. Irrelevantly, abruptly she broke out: "Didn't you tell me ...
— The Patagonia • Henry James
... Pluton and Furor bringing up the rear. The Infanta Maria Teresa, leading the procession, was the flagship of Admiral Cervera. He sent a shell toward the American vessels, but, in accordance with the rule, it went wide of the mark. The Texas opened with her big guns and her companions quickly ...
— Dewey and Other Naval Commanders • Edward S. Ellis
... me a perfect one, such as you would be measured by. And then, what do you think is the best thing in your work? is it this part or that? is it grace or the matter, the invention, the judgment, or the learning? For I find that men are, commonly, as wide of the mark in judging of their own works, as of those of others; not only by reason of the kindness they have for them, but for want of capacity to know and distinguish them: the work, by its own force and fortune, may second the workman, and sometimes ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne
... fervently careful aim, but went far wide of the mark, to his intense chagrin. Paul then bent his bow, but without success, though his arrows stuck in a branch close under the bird, which, being very tame, only glanced down inquiringly. Oliver's arrow went over it, and ...
— The Crew of the Water Wagtail • R.M. Ballantyne
... were "What boat will it be and when does she sail?" Needless to say, these interrogatories were answered at least thrice a day, and were always wide of the mark. Still, we were booked for home, and could afford to wait cheerfully. Our hut (No. 1), inhabited by the thirty best men in the camp (any man of that hut will tell you this assertion is correct), thereupon ...
— A Yeoman's Letters - Third Edition • P. T. Ross
... be made to agree, for they passed from one extreme to the other, endowing each other in turn with faults and charms which they did not possess—charms when they were parted, faults when they were together. In either case they were wide of the mark. ...
— Jean-Christophe, Vol. I • Romain Rolland
... guns, and being joined by the other escort, proceeded to a trial of skill. The Arabs planted a bone about 200 paces from us,—a long distance for a people who seldom fire beyond fifty yards;—moreover, the wind blew the flash strongly in their faces. Some shot two or three dozen times wide of the mark and were derided accordingly: one man hit the bone; he at once stopped practice, as the wise in such matters will do, and shook hands with all the party. He afterwards showed that his success on this ...
— First footsteps in East Africa • Richard F. Burton
... them a solitary boat pursued. There appeared to be only five men, four rowing and one steering. Other boats there were, but wide of the mark. ...
— Alfgar the Dane or the Second Chronicle of Aescendune • A. D. Crake
... concerted charge upon them. Some of them rode ahead of them and got above them on the cliff tops, from which they rolled down "great stones and whole rocks to destroy us." None of these stones did any harm to the pirates, for the cliffs were so rough and broken that the skipping boulders always flew wide of the mark. But though the pirates "escaped their malice for that time," they were yet to run a terrible danger before getting clear away to sea. The Spaniards had been examining, or torturing, the wounded pirates, and the two drunken surgeons, left behind in the town. "These gave them our signs that we ...
— On the Spanish Main - Or, Some English forays on the Isthmus of Darien. • John Masefield
... easy—perhaps expecting the time when they would be loosed. His conjectures for a reason why were grounded on the confidential propensities of women, and the probability that Mrs. Stokes, during their long tete-a-tete that day, had divulged the plots for her wooing and wedding. How far wide of the mark these conjectures were he would learn by and by. Meanwhile, as the effect of the unknown magic was to make her gayer, more confident, and more interested in passing events, he was well pleased. His preference ...
— The Vicissitudes of Bessie Fairfax • Harriet Parr
... thought the carriage in which they were seated had cost. M. de Choiseul replied that he should consider himself fortunate to get one like it for 5,000 or 6,000 francs; but, "His Majesty paying for it as a king, and not always paying cash, might have paid 8,000 francs for it."—"You are wide of the mark," rejoined the king, "for this vehicle, as you see it, cost me 30,000 francs. . . . The robberies in my household are enormous, but it is impossible to put a stop to them."—So the great help themselves ...
— The Origins of Contemporary France, Volume 1 (of 6) - The Ancient Regime • Hippolyte A. Taine
... the surface of the water and the aircraft hovering over them. Bombs dropped from the latter failed to find their targets, and by swift maneuvering the torpedoes shot at them were also caused to go far wide of the mark. ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume II (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various
... over. We should now be obliged to go through the same bungling process of dressing ourselves as when we first learned it as children. Our writing would proceed as awkwardly in the high school as the primary, our eating as adults would be as messy and wide of the mark as when we were infants, and we should miss in a thousand ways the motor skill that now seems so easy and natural. All highly skilled occupations, and those demanding great manual dexterity, likewise depend on our habit-forming power for the ...
— The Mind and Its Education • George Herbert Betts
... that reputation which the French have long enjoyed of being a pre-eminently sociable nation. The common report of the character of a people is, however, an indefinable product, and is apt to strike the traveller who observes for himself as very wide of the mark. The English, who have for ages been described (mainly by the French) as the dumb stiff, unapproachable race, present to-day a remarkable appearance of good-humour and garrulity and are distinguished by their facility of intercourse. On the other hand, any one who has seen half-a-dozen Frenchmen ...
— A Little Tour in France • Henry James
... is generally conceded that "three make a crowd," the rule was certainly wide of the mark in this case. The girls were bound by a tie even stronger than friendship, and that tie was the law of the camp-fire. The latter had taught them many brave lessons in the game of life, lessons in self-denial, in sympathy and loyalty, and they were ...
— Lucile Triumphant • Elizabeth M. Duffield
... a good many things, but most of them are a little wide of the mark. I haven't any leaning at present towards a paid post ...
— Winding Paths • Gertrude Page
... greater respect for the other man's preoccupation because he felt that he understood it better, tried also to hide all evidence of the bitterness which it was re-awakening in him. Yet, at that, Garry's surmise was erroneous; his conclusion wide of the mark. ...
— Then I'll Come Back to You • Larry Evans
... I he needs, and I for whom His greed exceeds, his dreams fly wide of the mark! Is it all self? I wander in the gloom; The ways of God grow dark; I watch the rose that withers in the cheek, The leaden rings that mark us old and wise; And Time that writes what Pity dares not speak Around the ...
— Collected Poems - Volume One (of 2) • Alfred Noyes
... of man to the subordination of the blind forces of Nature, its votaries were first decisively termed magicians—a corruption of the word "Magh," signifying a wise or learned man. Sceptics of a century ago would have been as wide of the mark if they had laughed at the idea of a phonograph or telegraph. The ridiculed and the "infidels" of one generation generally become the wise men and ...
— Five Years Of Theosophy • Various
... made by religious men to bring the Scripture miracles within the scope of the order of nature, but all such attempts are rejected by Mr. Mozley as utterly futile and wide of the mark. Regarding miracles as a necessary accompaniment of a revelation, their evidential value in his eyes depends entirely upon their deviation from the order of nature. Thus deviating, they suggest and illustrate a power higher ...
— Fragments of science, V. 1-2 • John Tyndall
... in at once stimulating and baffling the curiosity of his readers. He stirred the dullest minds to guess the secret of his mystery; but, so far as we have learned, the guesses of his most intelligent readers have been almost as wide of the mark as those of the least apprehensive. It has been all the more provoking to the former class, that each surprise was the result of art, and not of trick; for a rapid review of previous chapters has shown that the materials of a strictly logical development ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 8, No. 47, September, 1861 • Various
... general proposition, all throat spraying is dangerous. A New York singer, suffering while on a concert-tour from a case of sub-acute laryngitis, sought advice from a physician who honestly tried to aid him, but shot wide of the mark through injudicious use of a spray, in which he used menthol and eucalyptus, a combination much affected by a certain well-meaning class, and which for a time gives to the throat a delightful sense of coolness. The singer became afflicted with a violent, ...
— The Voice - Its Production, Care and Preservation • Frank E. Miller
... be remembered that anger, hatred, the spirit of vengeance or any other passion does not excuse one from the guilt of contumely. On the other hand, one's culpability is not lessened by the accidental fact of one's intended insults going wide of the mark and bearing no fruit of dishonor to the person assailed. To the malice of contumely may, and is often, added that of defamation, if apart from the dishonor received one's character is besmirched in the bargain. Contumely ...
— Explanation of Catholic Morals - A Concise, Reasoned, and Popular Exposition of Catholic Morals • John H. Stapleton
... Baptiste, covered with slime, and prepares to cast his projectiles. The first one fell wide of the mark; the schooner swung round into a long reach of water, where the breeze was in her favor; another shout of laughter drowned the maledictions of the muddy man; the sails filled; Colossus of Rhodes, smiling and bowing as hero ...
— Old Creole Days • George Washington Cable
... instant agreement, began to hedge. He did not pretend, he said, to be always right; he could recollect many occasions when he had been considerably wide of the mark. In fact, a bigger blunderhead, excepting in regard to certain matters, of which this was not one, probably did not exist. Trew begged to point out that the middle-aged party walking along behind them was, after all, ...
— Love at Paddington • W. Pett Ridge
... would argue to himself "that if this revolving twig could take the twist out by a reversion of its movements, it could be made to put it in." This would be the first spinning spindle. The explanation is probably not very far wide of the mark. ...
— The Story of the Cotton Plant • Frederick Wilkinson
... truer view of human life, and till we see our neighbours as Omniscience sees them, our kindest and cruellest estimates will be equally wide of the mark. ...
— Without Prejudice • Israel Zangwill
... to a suspicion that one's professional ability is not of the most thorough character. There are so many conditions to govern results in house building, that even an approximate estimate may fall very wide of the mark. Two houses may be built from the same plan, and we may also say, from the same specifications; one by day's work, and the other by contract, and they shall be so exactly alike in all respects when finished, that an unprofessional ...
— Woodward's Country Homes • George E. Woodward
... all press the button, and he is mistaken, because the majority of men who are civilized would do nothing of the kind. This, to my mind, is not to say that men are good; it is merely to say that Rousseau, in his enthusiasm for humanity, as well as in his aversion to it, is wide of the mark. The evil in man is not evil of this active sort, so theatrical, so self-interested; it is a passive, torpid evil which lies latent in the depths of the human animal, it is an evil which can scarcely ...
— Youth and Egolatry • Pio Baroja
... air, when suddenly we see it surrounded by a dozen little white patches of smoke which show that it has come within range of the enemy's anti-aircraft guns and the clouds of shrapnel are bursting about it. Most of them break wide of the mark and it sails on unscathed over the enemy's lines. Just above us is hanging a German taube, obviously watching us and the automobile which we had left below in the road, while the British huge anti-aircraft guns near by are feeling for it, shot ...
— With Our Soldiers in France • Sherwood Eddy
... "Your song no doubt smacks of its teachers!"—"What do you think, masters," inquires Kothner, upon this hopeless revelation, "shall I proceed with the questions? It strikes me his lordship's answers are altogether wide of the mark."—"That is what will presently be seen," Sachs interposes warmly; "If his art is of the right sort, and he duly proves it, of what consequence is it from whom he learned it?" Whereupon Kothner proceeds, addressing Walther: "Are you prepared, now, at ...
— The Wagnerian Romances • Gertrude Hall
... was said of him, among other things, that he "lacked the essential qualities of a leader." Mr. Henry Greenleaf Pearson, the biographer of Governor Andrew of Massachusetts, illuminates this point in a few instructive sentences. "To comprehend this objection, which to us seems so astonishingly wide of the mark," says Mr. Pearson, "we must realize that whenever a New Englander of that generation uttered the word 'leader' his mind's eye was filled with the image of Daniel Webster. Even those who called the fallen ...
— The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln • Francis Fisher Browne
... from Mr. Morley Roberts. His explanation made it clear why every sailor called it either 'hog-eye' or 'hog's-eye,' and why only landsmen editors ever get the word wrong. One collector labels the shanty 'The hog-eyed man,' and another goes still further wide of the mark by calling it 'The ox-eyed man.' The remarks on this shanty in the Preface will show the absurdity of both titles. That is all the explanation I am at liberty to give in print. Whall gives the shanty on page 118, his version differing ...
— The Shanty Book, Part I, Sailor Shanties • Richard Runciman Terry
... was all very familiar, sounded very old, and was ludicrously wide of the mark. She had not been careless, she had not suffered from the dangerous stupidity of ultra-maidenly blindness, she knew quite well how Quisante felt. Accordingly she would not acquiesce in Mrs. Baxter's diplomatic ignoring of the only material point—how she felt herself. ...
— Quisante • Anthony Hope
... good living. But quite other is this extreme vigilance, this incessant observation of one's life and thoughts, this dissecting of one's self, like a piece of mechanism. It is a waste of time, and goes wide of the mark. The man who, to prepare himself the better for walking, should begin by making a rigid anatomical examination of his means of locomotion, would risk dislocating something before he had taken a step. You have what you need to walk with, then forward! Take ...
— The Simple Life • Charles Wagner
... such books, the whole conception of boyhood seems at fault; a boy is generally represented as a generous, heedless, unworldly creature. My experience leads me to think that this is very wide of the mark. Boys are the most inveterate Tories. They love monopoly and privilege, they are deeply subservient, they have little idea of tolerance or justice or fair-play, they are intensely and narrowly ambitious; they have a certain insight into character, but there ...
— The Upton Letters • Arthur Christopher Benson
... when my hunger was over I began again to feel annoyed at their trivial persecutions, and so continued to gather the fallen nuts to throw at them. It amused and piqued me at the same time to see how wide of the mark my missiles went. I could hardly have hit a haystack at a distance of ten yards. After half an hour's vigorous practice my right hand began to recover its lost cunning, and I was at last greatly delighted when of my nuts went hissing like a bullet through the leaves, ...
— A Crystal Age • W. H. Hudson
... were the Potts's—father, mother, and daughters; and how delighted Frank was when he sate down to the dinner-table with them—never were such nice people, thought Frank—and he wasn't far wide of the mark either. And how disconsolate poor Vernon felt in being compelled to rough it all alone, for that day at least, upon water-gruel above stairs! But the ladies, taking compassion upon his forlorn condition, and sympathizing with ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 365, March, 1846 • Various
... with the legislative department, the delegates were on firm ground, because they were dealing with things of which they knew something by experience; but in all this careful separation of the executive power from the legislative they went wide of the mark, because they were following a theory which did not truly describe things as they really existed. And that was because the English Constitution was, and still is, covered up with a thick husk of legal fictions which long ago ceased to have any vitality. ...
— The Critical Period of American History • John Fiske
... see far forward nor far backward What he laughed at, being alone?—That I do laugh alone! Whilst thou wast silent, thou seemedst to be some great thing Who has once been a very fool, will never after be very wise Wide of the mark in judging of their own works Wise may learn more of fools, than fools can of ...
— Widger's Quotations from The Essays of Montaigne • David Widger
... will be easy for you, in conversation, to find out, with a mass of children, how much about it has already developed itself in them; what requires to be stimulated, what to be directly communicated. The answers to your questions may be as unsatisfactory as they will, they may wander wide of the mark; if you only take care that your counter-question shall draw their thoughts and senses inwards again; if you do not allow yourself to be driven from your own position—the children will at last reflect, comprehend, learn only what the ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. II • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke
... "Wash-out" is a term used by the men when their firing is so wide of the mark that it fails to hit any spot on the card. The men apply it indiscriminately to anything in the nature of ...
— The Amateur Army • Patrick MacGill
... Diurbanu, addressing the group before him, "all this is wide of the mark. We are in the midst of war, and in war-times the soldier must ...
— Manasseh - A Romance of Transylvania • Maurus Jokai
... spotted a weeny weeshy one miles away. And what star is that, Poldy? says she. By God, she had Bloom cornered. That one, is it? says Chris Callinan, sure that's only what you might call a pinprick. By God, he wasn't far wide of the mark. ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... something M. de Mauleon had said in disparagement of the Duke of Wellington, and called him out. Victor de Mauleon accepted the challenge, discharged his pistol, not in the air—that might have been an affront—but so as to be wide of the mark, walked up to the lines to be shot at, and when missed, said, 'Excuse the susceptibility of a Frenchman loath to believe that his countryman can be beaten save by accident, and accept every apology one gentleman can make to another for having forgotten the respect due to one of the ...
— The Parisians, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... qualities that constitute a gentleman, that there is but one exhibition of this description of persons in all the literary and dramatic fictions from Shakespeare downward. Scott has not attempted it. Bulwer, in "Pelham," has shot wide of the mark. It was reserved for the author of two very singular productions, "Sydenham" and its continuation "Alice Paulet"—works of extraordinary merits and extraordinary faults—to portray this character completely, in the ...
— The Laws of Etiquette • A Gentleman
... from any one whom she doesn't take a fancy to. That good-natured, talkative Mr. Distel has been trying all day to get her to come to him, but she always gives him the slip." And Blythe, in her preoccupation, proceeded to throw two rings out of three wide of the mark. ...
— A Bookful of Girls • Anna Fuller
... incentive to that better success, the mention of the failure here will be excused for what it illustrates of Dickens himself. "I am really distressed by the illustration of Mrs. Pipchin and Paul. It is so frightfully and wildly wide of the mark. Good Heaven! in the commonest and most literal construction of the text, it is all wrong. She is described as an old lady, and Paul's 'miniature arm-chair' is mentioned more than once. He ought to ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... competitors in the race. All he felt was that there was something charmingly remembered, something half familiar about them. The boldest came near and he touched noses, whereat she whirled with a little squeal and lashed out at him; but her heels were carefully aimed wide of the mark and Alcatraz merely tossed his nose; plainly she was a flirt. He pressed a little closer to the fence and urged friendliness with a conversational whinny. They were not averse, coming towards him with eyes ...
— Alcatraz • Max Brand
... million dollars—better make it too much than too little—and two millions may not be too much. I do not profess to be an expert, and, as likely as not, my estimate is very wide of the mark." ...
— Mr. Fortescue • William Westall
... unsuspicious, the manner in which it tinges every event, and every reflection, are painted with a vividness and a detail of which we can scarcely conceive any one but a female, and we should almost add, a female writing from recollection, capable.' This conjecture, however probable, was wide of the mark. The picture was drawn from the intuitive perceptions of genius, not from personal experience. In no circumstance of her life was there any similarity between herself and her heroine in 'Mansfield Park.' She did not indeed pass through life without being the object of warm affection. In her youth ...
— Memoir of Jane Austen • James Edward Austen-Leigh
... not believe that her estimate of this young man was in any way wide of the mark. And yet the thought of meeting him again had in it a disturbing element for which she could not account. It worried her a good deal that wild afternoon in January. Perhaps a suspicion that she had ...
— The Tidal Wave and Other Stories • Ethel May Dell
... enough that he should actually be finding himself, when Thursday arrived, none so wide of the mark. Kate hadn't come all the way to this for him, but she had come to a good deal by the end of a quarter of an hour. What she had begun with was her surprise at her appearing to have left him on Tuesday anything more to understand. ...
— The Wings of the Dove, Volume II • Henry James
... quoted, thought 12,000 at the earlier date. A more likely reckoning seems to me to be 8,000, but it probably rose near the higher figure before November, and must much have exceeded it by the 1st of December, unless British {p.116} estimates are more wide of the mark than is probable. The lowest maximum for the forces of the two republics that I have seen was given by one of the Boer envoys now[9] in the United States; viz., 38,000. Allowing 30,000 to Natal by November 1, there is nothing immoderate in the supposition that there ...
— Story of the War in South Africa - 1899-1900 • Alfred T. Mahan
... gesture, then waved his hat defiantly in Rupert's direction, and with a spring disappeared, just as the pistol cracked, drawing a shriek of terror from the girl, and its bullet flattened itself against the upper stone of the wall—considerably wide of the mark. ...
— The Light of Scarthey • Egerton Castle
... no great spirit of prophecy to foretell this revolution; but later events have shown that I was very wide of the mark when I talked of fifty years. The twelve gentlemen of Bretagne deputed to Versailles, mentioned above, were sent with a denunciation of the ministers for their suspension of provincial parliaments. They were at once sent to the Bastille. ...
— The World's Greatest Books, Volume 19 - Travel and Adventure • Various
... stated. By the merest accident I myself saw this letter, which the lady had, for more accurate information about the writer, sent to the banker at Florence, and in an instant I detected the fine Roman hand of R. N. F. It is needless to say that this shot went wide of the mark. ...
— Cornelius O'Dowd Upon Men And Women And Other Things In General - Originally Published In Blackwood's Magazine - 1864 • Charles Lever
... older convictions had their root, and from what fitness for the conduct of life they drew the current of their sap. Yet unless this aspect of things had been well considered, his unanswerable reasons were sure to fall wide of the mark. Opinions, as men began to remember, after social movement had thrown the logical century into discredit, have a history as well as a logic. They are bound up with a hundred transmitted prepossessions, and ...
— Diderot and the Encyclopaedists - Volume II. • John Morley
... large French battle plane, fitted with a 37-millimeter gun, attacked a German steamer in the North Sea, but the ship escaped without damage, as all the shells went wide of the mark. ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume V (of 8) • Francis J. (Francis Joseph) Reynolds, Allen L. (Allen Leon)
... little girl, deliver such an oration, and with such an entire forgetfulness of self. Not knowing then how great her heart was nor how she longed to make glad every single person in the world, even though most of her schemes went so wide of the mark that her own father had dubbed her his ...
— The Brass Bound Box • Evelyn Raymond
... who had the right to do so speak of the foolishness of the cross. Foolishness, without doubt, foolishness. And the American humorist, Oliver Wendell Holmes, was not altogether wide of the mark in making one of the characters in his ingenious conversations say that he thought better of those who were confined in a lunatic asylum on account of religious mania than of those who, while professing the same religious principles, ...
— Tragic Sense Of Life • Miguel de Unamuno
... by the spiral groove of the rifle. Of course, the ordinary smooth musket is unfitted to the conico-cylindrical ball. Discharged from such a barrel, there being nothing to keep the point in the direction of its flight, it soon tumbles over, like an arrow without a feather, and strikes wide of the mark. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science Vol. XV., No. 85. January, 1875. • Various
... successful siege, there was always lots of loot, and the soldiers were glad enough to sell anything in the way of jewels for a tithe of their value in gold. I should say if I put the value of the jewels at 50,000 pounds I am not much wide of the mark. That is all right, there is no bother about them; the trouble came from a diamond bracelet that I got from a soldier. We were in camp near Tanjore. I was officer of the day. I had made my rounds, and was coming back to my quarters, when I saw a soldier coming out of a tent thirty or forty yards ...
— Colonel Thorndyke's Secret • G. A. Henty
... strewed the provisions to the winds with shrieks of laughter. On the 30th of April, the assailants began firing muskets, which they had captured from Korovin's massacred hunters; but the shots fell wide of the mark. Then they brought sulphur from the volcanic caves, and set fire to the long grass on the windward side of the tents. Again, Korovin sallied out, drove them off, and extinguished the fire. May, June, and half July he lay stranded here, waiting for his men to recover, and ...
— Vikings of the Pacific - The Adventures of the Explorers who Came from the West, Eastward • Agnes C. Laut
... thought us abstracted before, I don't know what she thought now. We scarcely spoke unless she addressed us, and then we made answers as wide of the mark as a boy's first shots. Only once Lilly roused to interest: Mrs. Long was speaking of the old French families of New Orleans, and Lilly said, "Oh, Mrs. Long, did you ever hear ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, Vol. 22, September, 1878 • Various
... interesting to see how all this tallies with the official report of my case in the archives at Berlin. Perhaps some of these surmises have shot far wide of the mark. Javert, for instance, may not be a direct descendant of the ancient Inquisitor who had charge of the rack and the thumb screws, as I believed. In his own home town he may be a sort of mild-mannered schoolmaster and probably is highly astounded as well as ...
— In the Claws of the German Eagle • Albert Rhys Williams
... still you're not very wide of the mark. If you'll only wait till we reach Pontalegue, I'll tell you the story; not that it's worth the delay, but talking at this ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 1 (of 2) • Charles Lever
... always ran behind a rock or tree or shrub. Finally in desperation I took a snap shot at him, hitting under him, making him jump. Then in rapid succession I fired four more times. I had the satisfaction of seeing where my bullets struck up the dust, even though they did go wide of the mark. After my last ...
— Tales of lonely trails • Zane Grey
... her on the 13 April, 1916: Lola was staying with me at Hohenheim, where we had arrived on the previous day, and I proceeded to Stuttgart in the morning. When I got home in the evening I asked Lola: "Is it nice here? have you had good food at father's?" to which the answer—quite wide of the mark—was—"wo wald?" ( where is the wood?) For I had been telling her about all she would be able to enjoy and that, among other delights, there would be the woods; as however, her afternoon walk had only lain through the fields, ...
— Lola - The Thought and Speech of Animals • Henny Kindermann
... bee make the mistake of humanizing the bee, thus making them communicate with one another as we communicate. Bees have a language, they say; they tell one another this and that; if one finds honey or good pasturage, she tells her sisters, and so on. This is all wide of the mark. There is nothing analogous to verbal communication among the insects. The unity of the swarm, or the Spirit of the Hive, does it all. Bees communicate and cooeperate with one another as the cells of the body communicate and cooeperate in building ...
— Under the Maples • John Burroughs
... kindred,' said he, 'will afflict men with diseases of their nerves. They shall tremble and shake when there is nothing to be afraid of. And when they draw the bow-strings, their arrows shall go wide of the mark by reason of the unsteadiness of eye and hand. And we will send upon them in their sleep evil dreams. The ghosts of the snakes which they have needlessly killed shall twine about them, with fearful fangs, ready to pierce ...
— The Magic Speech Flower - or Little Luke and His Animal Friends • Melvin Hix
... to confess that "yellow and pink trees" were not so wide of the mark, after all, and that they were very pretty. Little Edith was particularly delighted with them, and wanted to "pick the ...
— Among the Trees at Elmridge • Ella Rodman Church
... morning I'll wait on you with all necessary materials. Now I mention no Mr. Bickerstaff, nor do I say, that a certain star-gazing 'squire has been playing my executor before his time; but I leave the world to judge, and if he puts things and things fairly together, it won't be much wide of the mark. ...
— The Bickerstaff-Partridge Papers • Jonathan Swift
... observer would have thought her a quaint, unobtrusive little body. Mr. Grundy's memory was very defective when he wrote about the Brontes; but, with the exception of the reference to red hair—and all the girls had brown hair—it would seem that he was not very wide of the mark when he wrote of 'the daughters—distant and distrait, large of nose, small of figure, red of hair, prominent of spectacles, showing great intellectual development, but with eyes constantly cast down, very ...
— Charlotte Bronte and Her Circle • Clement K. Shorter
... close to the fire filled with apprehension that gradually decreased as they saw the panther feared to approach. Thrice Charley fired at the dim skulking form, but, in the darkness, his bullets went wide of the mark, and he stopped wasting ...
— The Boy Chums in the Forest - or Hunting for Plume Birds in the Florida Everglades • Wilmer M. Ely
... Positive and Positivism, in the meaning assigned to them, are ill fitted to take, root in English soil; while Metaphysical suggests, and suggested even to M. Comte, much that in no way deserves to be included in his denunciation. The term Theological is less wide of the mark, though the use of it as a term of condemnation implies, as we shall see, a greater reach of negation than need be included in the Positive creed. Instead of the Theological we should prefer to speak of the Personal, or Volitional explanation of nature; instead of Metaphysical, the Abstractional ...
— Auguste Comte and Positivism • John-Stuart Mill
... cried as he recognized the principal officer of Glavour. The equerry came forward slowly, blood dripping from a wound in his leg. He swung his ax but it went wide of the mark. Again he struck, but two Terrestrials attacked him from the rear and he whirled. For a moment, Damis had a chance to watch the conflict which was raging about him. Nine of the huge Jovians were engaged in deadly combat with a dozen of the ...
— Giants on the Earth • Sterner St. Paul Meek |
