"Overshot" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... 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 Parliament was dissolved, to travel ...
— Daniel Defoe • William Minto
... us. We were unable to perceive their shadows, yet their muttered conversation, as they lay out upon the yard, served to fix its actual position more clearly in my mind. I believed I knew where I had so grievously overshot ...
— Prisoners of Chance - The Story of What Befell Geoffrey Benteen, Borderman, - through His Love for a Lady of France • Randall Parrish
... barn was full. Four thousand pounds of 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
... teeth in rage when those fierce words were reported to him, and his rage had been increased when he was informed of the cordial reception which everywhere awaited Ankarstrom on his release. He perceived how far he had overshot his mark, and how, in seeking treacherously to hurt Ankarstrom, he had succeeded only in hurting himself. Nor had he appeased the general indignation by his pardon. True, the flame of revolt had been quelled. But he had no lack of evidence that the fire continued to burn steadily in ...
— The Historical Nights' Entertainment • Rafael Sabatini
... particularly mentioned middle-aged; and though she was aware that her brains and fingers and feet couldn't possibly be described as coming under that heading, she said her hair, on the other hand, might well be regarded as having overshot the mark. But its turning white had nothing to do with age. It had done that when Mr. Bilton passed over. No hair could have stood such grief as hers when Mr. Bilton took that final step. She had been considering the ...
— Christopher and Columbus • Countess Elizabeth Von Arnim
... 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, ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 12 • Robert Kerr
... crafty person, Betsey Malcolm had fairly overshot the mark. In seeking to separate Humphreys from Julia, she had given him the clue he desired, and he was not slow to use it, for he was almost the only person that Mrs. Anderson ...
— The End Of The World - A Love Story • Edward Eggleston
... rudimentary, he'd be atrocious: he'd be elaborately 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
... in 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 ...
— The Lone Wolf - A Melodrama • Louis Joseph Vance
... must have been him who cut up the lines." This was rather too glaring a lie, and Ephraim must have forgotten for the moment that Tom Green had been absent from home for several days; and cunning as he was, for once he had, as the saying is, "overshot his mark." "Silas Stinson," said my aunt, "will you allow that boy to sit there and tell such lies in your hearing?" His father saw that there was no help for it, he must at any rate make a show of authority; and looking at his ...
— Walter Harland - Or, Memories of the Past • Harriet S. Caswell
... depression and self-criticism. He had stupidly overshot his mark in insultingly denouncing M. de Lesdiguieres. "It is much better," he says somewhere, "to be wicked than to be stupid. Most of this world's misery is the fruit not as priests tell us of wickedness, but of stupidity." And we know that of all stupidities ...
— Scaramouche - A Romance of the French Revolution • Rafael Sabatini
... of 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 ...
— Thrilling Adventures by Land and Sea • James O. Brayman
... just re-entered it upon my return home), when I saw two persons upon the swangean just over my head. I cried out, "Who's that?" And they immediately called again, "Peter! Peter!"—Ors clam gee, says I; that is, Here am I.—On this they directly took a small sweep round (for they had overshot me before they heard me) and alighted just by me; when I perceived them to be my wife's countrymen, being dressed like her, with vol. only broader chaplets about their heads, as she had told me the ...
— Life And Adventures Of Peter Wilkins, Vol. I. (of II.) • Robert Paltock
... Reason? she that sees them mown Like grass, her young ones! Yea, in the low groan And under the fixed thunder of this hour Which holds the animate world in one foul blot Tranced circumambient while relentless Power Beaks at her heart and claws her limbs down-thrown, She, with the plungeing lightnings overshot, With madness for an armour against pain, With milkless breasts for little ones athirst, And round her all her noblest dying in vain, Mother of Reason is she, trebly cursed, To feel, to see, to justify the blow; Chamber to chamber of her sequent brain ...
— The Shaving of Shagpat • George Meredith
... 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 ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... Herring, 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 being ...
— Life in the Red Brigade - London Fire Brigade • R.M. Ballantyne
... SKETCHING.—Various applications and combinations: 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 Valves; Rules ...
— Scientific American, Vol.22, No. 1, January 1, 1870 • Various
... that you have rendered uninhabitable because they stood in the way of your forts and men. You defended Atlanta on a line so close to town that every cannon-shot and many musket-shots from our line of investment, that overshot their mark, went into the habitations of women and children. General Hardee did the same at Jonesboro, and General Johnston did the same, last summer, at Jackson, Mississippi. I have not accused you of heartless ...
— The Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman, Complete • William T. Sherman
... if the trip turns out to have been wisely planned," remarked Dick, a wistful look coming into his eyes. "Of course, I may have overshot ...
— The High School Boys' Fishing Trip • H. Irving Hancock
... shops—the golden tissues of summer, the delicately-tinted shawls, and gossamer ribbons, and flaunting muslins, woven of nobody knows what—whether of "mist and moonlight mingling fitfully," or of sunset shadows overshot with gold, giving way to gorgeous velvet, and fur, and sumptuous drapery glowing and burning with the tints of autumn, and, like distant fires seen through a fall of snow in mid-winter, full of comfort and warmth; and all the other preparations of double-windows and heavy ...
— Graham's Magazine Vol XXXII. No. 5. May 1848 • Various
... 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
... no reply, and presently we saw a blue light was being burnt on the starboard side—they were looking for us in the wrong quarter. For some minutes our suspense was horrible, for, if the captain thought he had overshot our boat (knowing nothing of the second disaster), he would, we feared, go off on the other tack. Again they hailed, and again we answered, though we were now feeling pretty well done up, and the Portuguese was alternately ...
— Ridan The Devil And Other Stories - 1899 • Louis Becke
... same time, shattered a mariner's arm; two lower shrouds and two backstays were shot away, and our sails and running rigging considerably cut. We must impute our getting off thus well to our keeping so near that they overshot us, and to the annoyance our grape shot gave them; they are, however, but wretched gunners. Gunboat No. 5 had her main yard shot away, and the rigging and sails of the brigs and schooners were considerably cut. Lieutenant Decatur was the only officer killed, but in him the service has ...
— The Medallic History of the United States of America 1776-1876 • J. F. Loubat
... giddy little Lady Jane fired a simple Greek phrase at Tom. The Princess Elizabeth's quick eye saw by the serene blankness of the target's front that the shaft was overshot; so she tranquilly delivered a return volley of sounding Greek on Tom's behalf, and then straightway changed the ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... war, those men got here in a single rush. They thus formed a point too far advanced in the wave of attack, and were caught on the flanks between the machine-guns posted to right and to left on the lines they had overshot. It is some months now since death hollowed their eyes and consumed their cheeks, but even in those storm-scattered and dissolving remains one can identify the havoc of the machine-guns that destroyed ...
— Under Fire - The Story of a Squad • Henri Barbusse
... islands, but a gale coming on, the "Esperanza" was separated from the consorts. Ward-huus—a little harbour to the east of the North Cape-had been appointed as the place of rendezvous in case of such an event, but unfortunately, Sir Hugh overshot the mark, and wasted all the precious autumn time in blundering amid the ice to the eastward. At last, winter set in, and they were obliged to run for a port in Lapland. Here, removed from all human aid, they were frozen to death. A year afterwards, the ill-fated ships were discovered by ...
— Letters From High Latitudes • The Marquess of Dufferin (Lord Dufferin)
... were trembling violently. She thought that she had misjudged the man, and that he was really very deeply moved by the story of his daughter's death. Doubtless, his emotion had made him wish to control himself, and he had overshot the mark and spoken cruelly only in order to seem calm. No one had ever spoken to him of his wife, and even now he could hardly bear to hear her name. It was long before he looked up. Then he ...
— Casa Braccio, Volumes 1 and 2 (of 2) • F. Marion Crawford
... not exactly 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 not but unknown in the ...
— Barchester Towers • Anthony Trollope
... 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' all this quarrel ...
— Becket and other plays • Alfred Lord Tennyson
... it, occurs one of those efforts of which we have spoken, to obliterate the traces of this early attachment. "Him" was originally written "her," but the r has been lengthened to an m, and the e dotted, both with a care which overshot their mark by an almost imperceptible hair's-breadth. If the nature of this attachment were not so evident from other sources, we should have left such passages unquoted; fearing lest they might be misunderstood. As it is, the light they cast seems to ...
— Life of Father Hecker • Walter Elliott
... second, receiving only nine votes less than Young. A protracted contest 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
... 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 ...
— Musical Memories • Camille Saint-Saens
... according to Miss Stisted, deliberately behind her husband's back ran counter to his wishes, fanned the flame of fanaticism, and brought about the crash which ruined his career! Was there ever a more improbable charge? But the accusation has overshot the mark, and, like the boomerang, it returns and injures ...
— The Romance of Isabel Lady Burton Volume II • Isabel Lady Burton & W. H. Wilkins
... 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 investigations ...
— World's War Events, Vol. I • Various
... 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
... explored it thoroughly, looking especially in the forks of the branches, as the authorities say these birds build in a fork. But no nest could I find. Indeed, how can one by searching find a bird's nest? I overshot the mark; the nest was much nearer me, almost under my very nose, and I discovered it, not by searching but by a casual glance of the eye, while thinking of other matters. The bird was just settling upon it as I looked up from my book and caught her in the act. The nest was built ...
— Birds and Bees, Sharp Eyes and, Other Papers • John Burroughs
... about two miles from the Fort, which was much overshot by the small garrison quartered there, and during the day little could be seen on its surface besides a few whistling teal, a duck that gives poor sport, and ...
— Wild Ducks - How to Rear and Shoot Them • W. Coape Oates
... an overshot waterwheel driving through Stangenkunsten pumps in three separate shafts, each covered by the typical conical shaft house. It is possible that these shaft houses also cover horse whims used to operate bucket hoists such as that shown ...
— Mine Pumping in Agricola's Time and Later • Robert P. Multhauf
... he had overshot the mark, and that his best policy now was absence; wherefore, after a few moments' silence, he remounted his horse, looking penitent, handsome, full of admiration ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - February, 1876, Vol. XVII, No. 98. • Various
... so set and square before, that there was little chance of great alteration. We have heard of you from time to time, and that you distinguished yourself greatly in the war against the Welsh, and stood high in the favour and affection of Harold. Guy has overshot you, you see, in point of height, though he is scarce half your breadth," and the baron looked with a suppressed sigh at the fragile young fellow, who stood with his hand on ...
— Wulf the Saxon - A Story of the Norman Conquest • G. A. Henty
... were contained in curious old cases of beaten silver and brass: these things at least, which looked as if they had been transmitted from the early church, were venerable. There was, however, a kind of wholesale sanctity about the place which overshot the mark; it pretends to be one of the holiest spots in the world. The effect is spoiled by ...
— A Little Tour in France • Henry James
... 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 burst after they struck were ...
— Paths of Glory - Impressions of War Written At and Near the Front • Irvin S. Cobb
... command peace—yes, the peace of force, of fact! If it could be won in any other way I should not be here on this veranda in command of an army of invasion. That was my idea—for that I planned." He was making up for having overshot himself in his confession that he had brought on the war as a final step for ...
— The Last Shot • Frederick Palmer
... of the plain, just our side of the camp near "Wesse's Plantation," a great cloud of smoke and dust arose, and slowly drifted away. Beyond doubt, it was the bursting of a British shell. Aimed at the camp it overshot the mark, and landed on the empty plain. As a messenger of hope to us all it was not lost. The distance was only fourteen miles from where I stood—a morning's walk—less than an hour and a half's ride. Yet our relief may take many days yet, and it will cost ...
— Ladysmith - The Diary of a Siege • H. W. Nevinson
... were my only tidings of the outer world. By the sound of his paces Laputa was riding the Schimmel, and if any one thinks it easy to go blindfold by a horse's side I hope he will soon have the experience. In the darkness I could not tell the speed of the beast. When I ran I overshot it and was tugged back; when I walked my wrist was dislocated with ...
— Prester John • John Buchan
... 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 ...
— With the Naval Brigade in Natal (1899-1900) - Journal of Active Service • Charles Richard Newdigate Burne
... 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
... he relapsed 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 long, ...
— The Watchers of the Plains - A Tale of the Western Prairies • Ridgewell Cullum
... 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 ...
— Silas Marner - The Weaver of Raveloe • George Eliot
... may be seen running alike through machinery and through life. The history of man is traced in water-wheels. The overshot wheel belonged to a period when everything else—religion, literature, and art—was overshot. When, as time passed on, common men began to think, began to think under a little, the Reformation came in—and the undershot wheel, as a matter of course. There is no denying that the overshot wheel is ...
— The Voice of the Machines - An Introduction to the Twentieth Century • Gerald Stanley Lee
... need of a friend then, and I thought now was the time to secure one. So I began and told him the moving tale I have told you. But I soon perceived that I had kept by the naked truth too unvarnishedly, and thereby quite overshot my mark. When he learned that he was sitting in a wretched corner of an irregular house, with a felon, who had so lately been scourged and banished as a swindler and impostor, his modest nature took the alarm, and he was shocked, ...
— The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner • James Hogg
... 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 ...
— This World Is Taboo • Murray Leinster
... a new conspiracy. The friends of king James had, upon the death of queen Mary, renewed their practices for effecting a restoration of that monarch, on the supposition that the interest of William was considerably weakened by the decease of his consort. Certain individuals, whose zeal for James overshot their discretion, formed a design to seize the person of king William, and convey him to France, or put him to death in case of resistance. They had sent emissaries to the court of St. Germain's to demand a commission for ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... She wondered what it could possibly be, and, in order the better to see it, ran nimbly out upon the end of a long plank which projected considerably beyond the rest. So eager was she to watch the movements of the strange object that she overshot her mark and with a splash and a cry of alarm fell ...
— The Pirate Island - A Story of the South Pacific • Harry Collingwood
... 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 ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. III • Charles C. F. Greville
... teeth, canine teeth, fangs. Associated Words: odontology, dentist, dentistry, dental, odontography, dentiloquy, denture, cement, tartar, pyorrhea, gnash, alveoli, corona, dentifrice, dentilave, pulp, dentiform, dentilation, cusp, overshot. ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming
... to educate harmonic perception than is commonly supposed. All the devices of counterpoint, as we have them to-day, were invented by the various schools of this period, and brought to a high degree of perfection. But the learning had somewhat overshot its mark. The multiplicity of parts in the compositions of Willaert, and the other masters of the polyphonic schools, served for the cultivation of chord perception just as surely as if they had intentionally ...
— A Popular History of the Art of Music - From the Earliest Times Until the Present • W. S. B. Mathews
... glare of the old man's eye on her in the darkness. "'Deed, we were; but people forget things. We had to borrow to buy our big overshot wheel; we had, though. And when ould Parson Harrison sent us the first boll of oats, we couldn't grind it for ...
— The Manxman - A Novel - 1895 • Hall Caine
... 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 proprietor. A log mill, the oldest in Allegheny ...
— Half a Century • Jane Grey Cannon Swisshelm
... had not observed in the dark. This fall saved him, for the horsemen passed over him. Creeping along quickly on his hands and knees, he found the entrance to a covered drain, into which he crept. He was scarcely concealed when he heard the horsemen, who perceived they had overshot their ...
— Jack Sheppard - A Romance • William Harrison Ainsworth
... This has happened to many ships; particularly, as mentioned by Frezier, to the Incarnation and Concord, which, intending to pass through the Straits of Le Maire, were deceived by three hills on Staten Land, and some creeks, resembling the Three Brothers and coves of Terra del Fuego, so that they overshot the straits. ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 11 • Robert Kerr
... 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 completely ...
— Normandy, Complete - The Scenery & Romance Of Its Ancient Towns • Gordon Home
... 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 and ...
— In Eastern Seas - The Commission of H.M.S. 'Iron Duke,' flag-ship in China, 1878-83 • J. J. Smith
... began by offering 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 Arian Controversy • H. M. Gwatkin
... a black spot rising on a wave, and he makes for it. Not too fast at the last, though, but cautiously, so as to grasp the man with the life-belt and hold him firm till help shall come to get him on board. He might easily have overshot him; but he has him now, and the four-oar sights him as she swings round between the last-moored boat and the pier; and comes apace, the ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... self-defence, to fire. With this object in view he ordered a fresh advance of the police upon the people, and in this third affair matters assumed a more serious aspect; sticks and stones were used with more effect, and the two parties being nearer to each other, the missiles meant only for the police overshot their mark and struck the soldiers, who bore their painful situation with ...
— Handy Andy, Volume One - A Tale of Irish Life, in Two Volumes • Samuel Lover
... and on horseback was the recreation of the day. Fleming's Ravine, about five miles from Mansfield, was the general gathering place for young and old. A small stream had cut a deep ravine with rocky banks on either side. An old mill with its overshot wheel spanned the ravine and filled it with noisy rattle. The adjacent woods, where the fire was lit and the coffee made, and the farm lands stretching beyond, made a picturesque scene often described and always admired. Here we had dances, frolics, speeches and fun, with healthy ...
— Recollections of Forty Years in the House, Senate and Cabinet - An Autobiography. • John Sherman
... As a result of their complexity the speed of these intricate machines was less, and in consequence the price of making the goods was increased. Nevertheless there was a vast improvement over past conditions, when all overshot and embroidered effects had to be worked out on hand-looms. It enabled Americans to turn now to home manufacture for their ribbons. It was nevertheless true, Mr. Gautier explained, that much of the home market was created by the high tariff on ...
— The Story of Silk • Sara Ware Bassett
... the notion of putting them beside the fireplace," said Jack. "When they are both running, it would be like hitching a pair of horses before an ox-team or a steam engine attachment to an overshot water-wheel. It means business. Uncle Harry ...
— The House that Jill Built - after Jack's had proved a failure • E. C. Gardner
... the form of an egg. Behind the furnace are placed two high 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 whilst ...
— The Forest of Dean - An Historical and Descriptive Account • H. G. Nicholls
... yourself, Wheeler; overshot yourself, by all that's awkward. And yet, till now, I always took you for "a ...
— The Parent's Assistant • Maria Edgeworth
... 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 ...
— Hymns and Hymnwriters of Denmark • Jens Christian Aaberg
... decisively answered in the affirmative; but with a Teufelsdroeckh 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 ...
— Sartor Resartus, and On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History • Thomas Carlyle
... 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 with my pistol ...
— The Journals of Lewis and Clark • Meriwether Lewis et al
... now, however, that we had almost overshot the mark in this matter of sanctity. We had made ourselves quite too holy. The monks, who were eager at first to cut our throats, thought so much of us now that we grew a little anxious as to whether they would not wish ...
— Hilda Wade - A Woman With Tenacity Of Purpose • Grant Allen
... developed with an overshot water wheel erected as in Fig. 1. This wheel is made with blocks of wood cut out in sections as indicated by the lines, so as to form the circle ...
— The Boy Mechanic: Volume 1 - 700 Things For Boys To Do • Popular Mechanics
... window, revealed this outer half of the 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 ...
— The Entailed Hat - Or, Patty Cannon's Times • George Alfred Townsend
... channel, choked with the broken stones of its walls and tangled shrubbery. "You don't suppose a joke that size was the great Gilbert's plant. Here's the drop for the water power; yes, and the iron pinions of the overshot wheel." He climbed down a precarious wall, and stood perhaps twelve feet below them. Securing a rough bolt, he brought it up for their inspection. "Look at that forging," he cried; "after it has lain around for a century and a half. Like silk. Charcoal ...
— The Three Black Pennys - A Novel • Joseph Hergesheimer
... 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 that his scent was so rank and heavy that it settled in the hollows ...
— The Writings of John Burroughs • John Burroughs
... seen that things couldn't be so 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
... been 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, ...
— The Maids of Paradise • Robert W. (Robert William) Chambers
... 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 steel work, and are fully as important ...
— Some Mooted Questions in Reinforced Concrete Design • Edward Godfrey
... go quite as fast as I could. I was unable to gain an inch, and away we went, with just about three feet between our separate extremities. We were at the other side now, and a glance served to show me that I had miscalculated and overshot the opening. To reach it now was hopeless; I should have blundered straight into the elephant. So I did the only thing I could do: I swerved like a course hare, and started off round the edge of the glade, seeking for some opening into which ...
— Maiwa's Revenge - The War of the Little Hand • H. Rider Haggard
... 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 of the gloom, the thrushes were swinging in the boughs ...
— A Friend of Caesar - A Tale of the Fall of the Roman Republic. Time, 50-47 B.C. • William Stearns Davis
... had not been mistaken. As his ships came abreast of Santa Clara battery the big guns opened, and fired thirteen shells at a distance of about five miles. The range was badly judged, as more than half the missiles overshot the mark, and others fell short, some as much ...
— The Boys of '98 • James Otis
... pent-up wrath had accumulated like the waters above the dam of an overshot mill. The pond-head of his passion being now filled to the utmost limit of its capacity, and beginning to overflow in the quivering of his lips and the flashing of his eyes, he pulled up all the flash-boards ...
— Maid Marian • Thomas Love Peacock
... power, he leased the old manor and manor-house of the Knights-Hospitallers of Jerusalem, to whom it then belonged, for the purpose of building a palace suitable to his rank and splendor. He erected a structure so magnificent, and so far surpassing any of the royal residences, that he quite overshot his mark, and roused the jealousy of the king, who bluntly asked him what he, a priest, and a butcher's son, meant by building for himself a palace handsomer than any of his king's. Then the cunning Cardinal, putting the best face he could on the matter, said that ...
— Stories and Legends of Travel and History, for Children • Grace Greenwood
... 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 Getting of Wisdom • Henry Handel Richardson
... robbery staring him in the face; and how was he to manage that? This, indeed, was the point on which the accomplished villain felt by the sinking of his heart that he had overshot his mark. When he looked closely into it, his whole frame became cold and feeble from despair, the hard paleness of mental suffering settled upon his face, and his brain was stunned by a stupor which almost destroyed ...
— Fardorougha, The Miser - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... gave her an apple to smell of which effected an 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
... the two men observed at a distance. When he came closer, they were forgotten in the look upon his small face. The odd trick the boy had of throwing his lower jaw forward was now emphasized until the lower teeth fairly overshot the upper. In sympathy, the eyes had tightened, not morosely or cruelly, but with a fixed determination which was all but uncanny. Scotty ...
— Ben Blair - The Story of a Plainsman • Will Lillibridge
... 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 that I forgot all about my future safety, and not only told him the ...
— St Ives • Robert Louis Stevenson
... utilized in water wheels and turbines. These supply power to run a pump; the water to be raised may come from any source, and the pump may be placed at some distance from the water wheel. Where sufficient fall is available—at least three feet—the overshot wheel is used. In California and some other Western States an impulse water wheel is much used, which is especially adapted to ...
— The Home Medical Library, Volume V (of VI) • Various
... does not go precisely where it intends. We have explained that a gust of wind carries it away. They overshot Saint-Merry and found themselves, without precisely knowing ...
— Les Miserables - Complete in Five Volumes • Victor Hugo
... right!" he muttered. "Looks to me like—why, sure I've got it! That madman has overshot himself, for once! He's buried their precious meteor, in blowing up our ridge, ...
— Astounding Stories, July, 1931 • Various
... forget, I say, the deep abstractions and black moods into which he fell? At such times, when the fun rippled and soared from height to height, suddenly, without rhyme or reason, his eyes would turn lacklustre, his brows knit, as with clenched hands and face overshot with spasms of mental pain he wrestled on the edge of the abyss with some ...
— Moon-Face and Other Stories • Jack London
... 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 feet ...
— Happy Days • Alan Alexander Milne
... Repentance claimed him; repentance and a fine ambition to be worthier, to resemble as nearly as his nature would allow him this Anthony Wilding whom he took for pattern. He changed his ways, abandoned drink and gaming, and gained thereby a healthier countenance. Then in his zeal he overshot his mark. He developed a taste for Scripture-reading, bethought him of prayers, and even took to saying grace to his meat. Indeed—for conversion, when it comes, is a furious thing—the swing of his soul's pendulum threatened now to carry him to extremes of virtue ...
— Mistress Wilding • Rafael Sabatini
... be done in any way at the duke's instance. Mr. Fothergill declared indignantly that this insinuation made him very angry; but he was too prudent a man to be very angry at anything, and he knew how to make capital on his own side of charges such as these which overshot their own mark. Mr. Sowerby came down very quietly to Chaldicotes, and there he remained for a couple of days, quite alone. The place bore a very different aspect now to that which we noticed when Mark Robarts drove up to it, in the early pages ...
— Framley Parsonage • 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
... afternoons when they are free of social obligations, a gown to walk in or to lounge in. The skirt, which barely reached to the top of her low shoes, was of some blue stuff (stuff, because to a man's mind the word covers feminine dress- goods generally, liberally, and handily), overshot with gray. Above this she had put on a white golfing-sweater, a garment which at that time was just beginning to find vogue among women who loved the fields and the road. Only men who own to stylish sisters appreciate ...
— The Man on the Box • Harold MacGrath
... of his art. He strove to attain a more intimate connection between instrumental music and poetry in the portrayal of intense passions, and the suggestion of well-defined dramatic situations. In spite of the fact that he frequently overshot his mark, it does not make his works one whit less astonishing. An uncompromising champion of what has been dubbed "programme" music, he thought it legitimate to force the imagination of the hearer to dwell on exterior scenes during ...
— Great Italian and French Composers • George T. Ferris
... I was just in time to see eight or ten men bob up on the crest and take quick snap shots at the three of us in the lead, and then duck to cover. We were so nearly straight under them, however, that they overshot us, although they were barely one hundred yards from us. Dropping behind boulders we peppered back at the flashes of their rifles, which was all we three in the lead thereafter saw of them; for after the first volley most of them lay close and directed their fire at the men ...
— The Red-Blooded Heroes of the Frontier • Edgar Beecher Bronson
... 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 ...
— Aeroplanes and Dirigibles of War • Frederick A. Talbot
... served their purpose, and, in their turn, their heroic mission came to an end. They had forced Wagner on Paris; and Paris, as always, had overshot the mark, and could swear by no one but Wagner. French musicians were translating Gounod's or Massenet's ideas into Wagner's style; Parisian critics repeated Wagner's theories at random, whether they understood them or not—generally ...
— Musicians of To-Day • Romain Rolland
... instructor in hand and rifle grenades he was first class. Routine he hated like poison. Mac is perhaps the only officer who was witty once—and only once—in his trench report. I don't know if H.Q. see the point of his remarks to this day. He it was, who, having overshot the mark, and lost his way in Palestine, was shown back to our ...
— The Fife and Forfar Yeomanry - and 14th (F. & F. Yeo.) Battn. R.H. 1914-1919 • D. D. Ogilvie
... a moment, I did hear the Great Beast; for it bayed but a little way up the stream, as that it had overshot the place where the scent did end. And immediately, I sank swiftly into the water, which was there so deep as my knee, and turned upon my belly. And the water surged over my shoulders; for I kept my head above. And so I did look eager and fearful ...
— The Night Land • William Hope Hodgson
... 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
... absolute famine, and being informed by one of the ship's company who had been at the island of Trinidada, in a voyage with Mr Chudlei, and that we might be sure of having provisions there, our captain directed the course for that island; but not knowing the currents, we overshot it in the night, getting into the gulf of Paria, in which we were for eight days, unable to get out again, as the current constantly set in, and our ship was often in three fathoms water. At length the ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. VIII. • Robert Kerr
... becomes but a companionable tie. And for the rest, Valerie, now that sentiment and fancy were sobered down, could take pleasure in a thousand things which her pining affections once, as it were, overlooked and overshot. She could feel grateful for all the advantages her station and wealth procured her; she could cull the roses in her reach, without sighing ...
— Alice, or The Mysteries, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... great rivers unite in one 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 Investment of Influence - A Study of Social Sympathy and Service • Newell Dwight Hillis
... Knox, encouraged by 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 between the English Protestant ...
— History of the Catholic Church from the Renaissance • Rev. James MacCaffrey
... all this that, as it were, overshot the mark. Ravenswood could not disguise from himself that his noble kinsman had more reasons for taking offence at the reception of his suit than regarded his interest and honour, yet he could neither ...
— Bride of Lammermoor • Sir Walter Scott
... great object of the universe, wherein God, as it were in a glass, shows Himself to mankind. But some (I mean, the philosophers) were bewildered in their own thoughts. Everything with them turned into vanity. By their subtle reasonings some of them overshot and lost a truth which a man finds naturally and simply in himself without the help ...
— The Existence of God • Francois de Salignac de La Mothe- Fenelon
... 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 ended by seeing in him one of those terrible Normans who, all ...
— Une Vie, A Piece of String and Other Stories • Guy de Maupassant
... will make them rue 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 the trees, and one shell I saw burst on the road ...
— Diary of the Besieged Resident in Paris • Henry Labouchere
... looking with awe and 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
... proved that Friar Georgio was too ambitious, and had overshot the mark. In his desire to turn out a finished product, a scholar that should be a credit to his school and an ornament to his family, he not only inculcated the essentials for a commercial education, but, as has already been mentioned, ...
— Amerigo Vespucci • Frederick A. Ober
... especially in the line of the great Caledonian Valley, had, by a strange vorticose motion, twisted round the spire, so that, at the transverse line of displacement, the panes and corners of the octagonal broach which its top formed overshot their proper positions fully seven inches. The corners were carried into nearly the middle of the panes, as if some gigantic hand, in attempting to twirl round the building by the spire, as one twirls round a spinning ...
— My Schools and Schoolmasters - or The Story of my Education. • Hugh Miller
... 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, ...
— The Pennyles Pilgrimage - Or The Money-lesse Perambulation of John Taylor • John Taylor
... girl coming?" asks the old man, presently, in a peevish tone, vexed that, as far as he can tell, his arrow has overshot the mark. "I might have known she would have ...
— Molly Bawn • Margaret Wolfe Hamilton
... Cropley Castle, Cornwall. A little, peaking, puling creature, desperately hen-pecked by a second wife; but madam overshot the mark, and the knight was roused to ...
— Character Sketches of Romance, Fiction and the Drama, Vol 1 - A Revised American Edition of the Reader's Handbook • The Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D.
... The old-fashioned undershot, 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 be eliminated altogether. ...
— Electricity for the farm - Light, heat and power by inexpensive methods from the water - wheel or farm engine • Frederick Irving Anderson
... he was calling 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 ...
— The Jungle Fugitives • Edward S. Ellis
... he had overshot the mark, and he added quickly,—"No one; but in order to have known everything so well, you must have ...
— The Count of Monte Cristo • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... perceived, 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, ...
— Precaution • James Fenimore Cooper
... Vin ordinaire, good, and of a strong body, two or three sous the bottle. Oranges, one sous apiece. They are nearly finishing at Nismes a great mill, worked by a steam-engine, which pumps water from a lower into an upper cistern, from whence two overshot wheels are supplied, each of which turns two pair of stones. The upper cistern being once filled with water, it passes through the wheels into the lower one, from whence it is returned to the upper by the pumps. A stream of water of one quarter ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... or watch the incessant turning—turning of the great water-wheel. Little we thought he should ever own it, or that John would be pointing it out to his own boys, lecturing them on "undershot," and "overshot," as he used ...
— John Halifax, Gentleman • Dinah Maria Mulock Craik
... 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, they expanded the original writings of such ...
— The Makers and Teachers of Judaism • Charles Foster Kent
... sixteen 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
... presence into the Tropics. In 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
... our previous drives. We 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 ...
— A Lady's Life on a Farm in Manitoba • Mrs. Cecil Hall
... 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 his view-ports in ...
— Master of the Moondog • Stanley Mullen
... Skinflints, and a widow; it was a strange match for Sir Murtagh; the people in the country thought he demeaned himself greatly [See GLOSSARY 5], 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, and looking ...
— Castle Rackrent • Maria Edgeworth
... of his investigation was given to the boys as they ate their breakfast under the shade of a cedar, with a sky above them whose morning glories were here and there overshot by ...
— Camp and Trail - A Story of the Maine Woods • Isabel Hornibrook
... formed in two ranks, and started down the right side of the track in a double quick. As we passed out of the cut a body of dismounted cavalry came out of the woods on the ridge to our left and gave us a volley of musketry. But, being on higher ground than we were, they overshot us badly, and did but little harm. We answered their fire, and their line halted. The command quickly went along our column to load and fire as we went, and "keep firing!" and we did so. We kept up a rattling, scattering fire on those ...
— The Story of a Common Soldier of Army Life in the Civil War, 1861-1865 • Leander Stillwell
... said I, "but since you yield the technical point of logic, I will confess that I made the assertion hastily and overshot the mark. I do not remember, however, to have met any one who felt so strongly on the point ...
— Mr. Isaacs • F. Marion Crawford
... 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, ...
— Reed Anthony, Cowman • Andy Adams
... well, as Pete realized later, had it not been for the pup. The pup saw in Rowdy a new playfellow, and charged from the door-step just as that good steed was mentally preparing to come to a stop. The pup was not mentally prepared in any way, and in his excitement he overshot the mark. He caromed into Rowdy's one recalcitrant leg—it usually happens that way—and Rowdy stepped on him. Pete was also not mentally prepared to dismount at the moment, but he did so as Rowdy crashed down in a cloud of dust. The pup, who imagined ...
— The Ridin' Kid from Powder River • Henry Herbert Knibbs
... he had overshot his mark. But the other swept on; and as he talked began to step up and down the little room, in a ...
— By What Authority? • Robert Hugh Benson
... an area nearly eighty miles in diameter, destroying the forests and their wild inhabitants, as well as the people who dwelt within the range of the amazing disaster. So powerfully was this water driven from the crater that the districts immediately at the base of the cone were in a manner overshot by the vast stream, and escaped with relatively ...
— Outlines of the Earth's History - A Popular Study in Physiography • Nathaniel Southgate Shaler
... main bulkhead. The women had its doorkey. Now the door stood ajar. Coffin pushed himself through so hard that he overshot and ...
— The Burning Bridge • Poul William Anderson
... of the charter had begun a general interest in its provisions had been excited, and the determination to secure the liberties it embodied had grown rapidly, so that now the king quickly found, by the opposition it aroused, that in this peculiar demand he had overshot the mark, and he was obliged to recall his orders. Naturally John turned at once to the pope, who was now under obligation to protect him from his enemies, but his envoy was followed by Eustace de Vescy, who argued strongly ...
— The History of England From the Norman Conquest - to the Death of John (1066-1216) • George Burton Adams
... and a tolerably good orator. He seemed accustomed to addressing a jury, for he displayed all the adroitness in handling his subject, and in appealing to the prejudices of his hearers, that we see in successful special pleaders. But he overshot his mark. To nine out of ten of his audience, his words and similes, though correct and sometimes beautiful, were as unintelligible as the dead languages. He advocated immediate, unconditional secession; and I thought from the applause which met his remarks, whenever he seemed to make ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. II. July, 1862. No. 1. • Various
... accomplishing some object which she desired to promote. "Madame," was his courtly reply, "if it is possible, it is done already. If it is impossible, I will take care and manage it." But being very unscrupulous himself, he overshot his mark when he sought to propitiate her further by offering to represent as hers acts of charity which she had not performed. The winter of 1783 was one of unusual severity. The thermometer at Paris was, ...
— The Life of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France • Charles Duke Yonge
... one of the 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 ...
— What Can She Do? • Edward Payson Roe
... It is amusing to see a black rook perched on a red tile chimney, with the smoke coming up around him, and darkening with soot his dingy plumage. They take every scrap thrown out, like sparrows, and peck bones if they find them. The builders in Brighton appear to have somewhat overshot the mark, to judge from the number of empty houses, and, indeed, it is currently reported that it will be five years before the building speculation recovers itself. Upon these empty houses, the hoardings, and scaffold-poles, the rooks perch ...
— The Life of the Fields • Richard Jefferies
... them into pocket pistols," interrupted Mr. C., "and not have overshot the mark, my dear—ha, ...
— The Disowned, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... were simple enough, but in practicing on the target we found that they were not so easy to carry out. It was hard to judge accurately the moment for diving. Sometimes we overshot the target, but more often we were short of it. Owing to the angle at which the rockets were mounted on the struts, it was very important that the dive should ...
— High Adventure - A Narrative of Air Fighting in France • James Norman Hall
... that overshot My dream-web is with that which happeneth not? Nay, nay, believe it not!—love lies alone In loving hearts like fire within the stone: Then strikes my hand, and lo, the flax ablaze! —Those tales of empty striving, ...
— Poems By The Way & Love Is Enough • William Morris
... which 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 ...
— Recreations of Christopher North, Volume 2 • John Wilson
... MAIN FAULTS to be avoided are a domed skull, high peaked occipital bone, heavy, 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
... Edinburgh, with a packet, which he opened and read with great attention, appearing much interested and agitated by the contents. The packet had been despatched very soon after their leaving Edinburgh, but the messenger had missed the travellers by passing through Mid-Calder in the night, and overshot his errand by getting to Roseneath before them. He was now on his return, after having waited more than four-and-twenty hours. Sir George Staunton instantly wrote back an answer, and rewarding the messenger liberally, desired him not ...
— The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... had suffered, not at all on its own account, but because it happened to be in the line of fire of the Town Hall. It merely received some portion of the blessings which were intended for the Town Hall, but which overshot their mark. The Town Hall (like the Cathedrals here and at Rheims) had no military interest or value, but it was the finest thing in Arras, the most loved thing, an irreplaceable thing; and therefore the Germans made a set at it, as they made a set at the Cathedrals. ...
— Over There • Arnold Bennett
... from the men in the boat, and was re-echoed vehemently from the ship. They had overshot the spot only by a few yards. Instantly they pulled round: two strokes brought them to the spot where Will was swimming, and in another moment our hero and the rescued man were hauled into the boat. The men ...
— Lost in the Forest - Wandering Will's Adventures in South America • R.M. Ballantyne
... courageous heart to fare through the maze of it; and like a curious child I peered about upon this strange habitation. Near by there was a gray, weathered stone in the moss: I reached to possess it—and was amazed to find that my hand neither overshot nor fell short, but accurately performed its service. I cast the stone towards heaven: 'twas a surprise to see it fall earthward in obedience to some law I could not in my daze define—some law I had with impatient labor, long, long ago, made sure I understood and would remember. I looked away ...
— The Cruise of the Shining Light • Norman Duncan |
