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Gunshot   Listen
noun
Gunshot  n.  
1.
Act of firing a gun; a shot.
2.
The distance to which shot can be thrown from a gun, so as to be effective; the reach or range of a gun. "Those who are come over to the royal party are supposed to be out of gunshot."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Gunshot" Quotes from Famous Books



... forest, and this resolution must obviously be broken if I explored the church. I kept my seat, telling myself that, however the others had vanished, they had vanished in silence, and therefore all danger from gunshot might be ruled ...
— Sir John Constantine • Prosper Paleologus Constantine

... pillagers, who had spread such terror amongst the farmers the day before. Perched up on the combe, with sentries always on the look-out, they could see the Duke's raiders long before they came within gunshot. If an armed force had tried to rush the camp, after learning that the beasts were shut up within it (which, by the way, no man could possibly suspect until he saw them from the rampart top), the ...
— Martin Hyde, The Duke's Messenger • John Masefield

... a gunshot," said Bruce. "They may never have heard one before; but instinct tells them quickly of the menace. Years ago at home, when I used to fish for bass, during the closed season I'd see thousands of duck and geese and deer. Yet a single gunshot when the season opened and ...
— The Adventures of Kathlyn • Harold MacGrath

... 2nd of August in the bay of Saldanha; and at the moment when General Craig was marching down the coast to meet the invaders, a British fleet was seen advancing, with a fair wind, to the mouth of the harbour. The English admiral, Elphinstone, anchored within gunshot of the enemy, and sent a summons to the Dutch admiral; and seeing that resistance was useless, he delivered up his squadron without having fired a gun. The prizes were two sail of the line, three smaller ships of war, and three ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan

... the morning northerly, began to return in such immense numbers as I never before had witnessed. Coming to an opening by the side of a creek, where I had a more uninterrupted view, I was astonished at their appearance: they were flying with great steadiness and rapidity, at a height beyond gunshot, in several strata deep, and so close together that, could shot have reached them, one discharge could not have failed to bring down several individuals. From right to left, as far as the eye could reach, the breadth of this vast procession extended, seeming everywhere equally ...
— Darwinism (1889) • Alfred Russel Wallace

... jabbering in an unknown tongue, through all the swamp, and by the time the garrison had returned the fellows were skulking in the shrubbery again. Richard Dolliver afterward came on eleven of them engaged in incantations and scattered them with a gunshot, but they would not down. They lurked about the cape until terror fell on all the people, remaining for "the best part of a month together," so it was deemed that "Satan had set ambushments against the good people of Gloucester, with ...
— Myths And Legends Of Our Own Land, Complete • Charles M. Skinner

... Edward was resolute, and thought proper to comply with his request: he walked away till he considered himself out of gunshot, and then commenced a torrent of oaths and abusive language, with which we shall not offend our readers. Before he went farther, he swore that he would have Edward's life before many days had passed, and then shaking his fist, he went away. Edward remained where he was standing till the ...
— The Children of the New Forest • Captain Marryat

... was with his run, he sprang to the mound of bodies, and the first that met his eyes was that of his uncle. But he had hardly recognized the rubicund face now furrowed with blue lines, and seen the stiffened arms and the gunshot wound before he gave a stifled cry, exclaiming, "Let us ...
— The Chouans • Honore de Balzac

... not know," said Abel. "It looks like a gunshot wound but I have not searched for a gun yet. It is a fine boat, and did not belong to a schooner. I never saw a boat like it and I never saw so fine a boat before. The man was ...
— Bobby of the Labrador • Dillon Wallace

... ineffectual battling with the gale, the ships were forced to come about and run out to sea; and Jones suffered the mortification of witnessing the failure of his enterprise, after having been within gunshot of the town that he had hoped to capture. As for the good people of Kirkaldy, they were convinced that their escape from the daring seamen was wholly due to the personal influence of their pastor with the Deity; and the worthy parson lived long afterward, ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 1 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot

... it was no longer an army. As soon as the men had run beyond gunshot they began to march, very deliberately, each one for himself, away from the field. Companies, regiments, and brigades were intermingled. If the rebels had been in condition to pursue us, many thousands of our men would have fallen ...
— Who Goes There? • Blackwood Ketcham Benson

... sweeping round toward us, until it rested fully upon us. It swept on for a yard or two, switched back, paused for a few seconds, and then began to wave wildly to and fro, seemingly by way of a signal, while a solitary gunshot pealed out upon the air. Then the light came back to us, fully revealing the four steamers making their headlong rush for the ...
— Under the Ensign of the Rising Sun - A Story of the Russo-Japanese War • Harry Collingwood

... lounged about on the heights watching the Royalists, who had encamped just without gunshot, wondering what our leaders would ...
— At the Point of the Sword • Herbert Hayens

... with all the sail they could make, hoisting up French colours, and standing away to the southward. They continued the chase three days and nights, and though they did not gain much upon her, the Frenchman sailing very well, yet they kept her in sight all the while and for the most part within gunshot. But the third night, the weather proving a little hazy, the Frenchman changed her course in the night, and so got clear of them, and good reason they had to bless themselves in the escape they had made, if they had but known what a ...
— Lives Of The Most Remarkable Criminals Who have been Condemned and Executed for Murder, the Highway, Housebreaking, Street Robberies, Coining or other offences • Arthur L. Hayward

... breaking a mosque window; that the Duke's pass counted for nothing with these Turks; that he knew the galley we were brought in as well as he knew Paul's Church, having chased it a dozen times, yet never got within gunshot for her swift sailing, etc., which did much content us ...
— A Set of Rogues • Frank Barrett

... slightest noise, and always on the lookout for snakes and thorns, I crept slowly on, making frequent halts to rest myself. Twice the Indian turned his head and looked in my direction, but apparently he did not perceive me. In this manner I came within easy gunshot distance. Now I took my last rest, and with my knife dug a hole in the ground and replanted my cactus shield firmly. Then I placed my rifle in position to fire and drew a fine bead on the nape of ...
— Tales of Aztlan • George Hartmann

... and wings him. The hole in the mountain. "The hound! He hit her! I'll kill him for that!" Grace, unconscious, is carried into camp. "This is not a gunshot wound!" Bullets are fired into the camp of ...
— Grace Harlowe's Overland Riders on the Great American Desert • Jessie Graham Flower

... summer would ever come. Winter held Brookport in its grip. For the first time in her life she was tasting real loneliness. She wandered over the snow-patched fields down to the frozen bay, and found the intense stillness, punctuated only by the occasional distant gunshot of some optimist trying for duck, oppressive rather than restful. She looked on the weird beauty of the ice-bound marshes which glittered red and green and blue in the sun with unseeing eyes; for her isolation was giving her time to think, ...
— The Little Warrior - (U.K. Title: Jill the Reckless) • P. G. Wodehouse

... hurried tremulous cry repeated five or six times. The noise made by this megapodius while scratching among the dead leaves for food may sometimes be imitated with such success as to bring the bird running up within gunshot. When suddenly forced to rise from the ground it flies up into a tree, and remains there motionless, but exceedingly vigilant, ready to start on the approach of anyone, but on other occasions it trusts to its legs to escape. ...
— Voyage Of H.M.S. Rattlesnake, Vol. 2 (of 2) • John MacGillivray

... philosopher seemed the greatest good—the sound mind in the sound body. His physical frame was after death found so perfect that a long life might have been in store for him, notwithstanding all which he had endured. The desperate illness of 1574, the frightful gunshot wound inflicted by Jaureguy in 1582, had left no traces. The physicians pronounced that his body presented an aspect of perfect health. His temperament was cheerful. At table, the pleasures of which, in moderation, were his only relaxation, he was always ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... to cheer her up. With an effort he whipped up enough energy to take her out with his dogs and his gun, until her look of horror made him suspect that the sound of a gunshot was a nightmare to her, as indeed it was, reminding her of many dreams and one unforgettable reality. She did her best to hide this from him, for she saw that he was ...
— The Tragic Bride • Francis Brett Young

... notice the feller yearnin' for someone else to get it an' talk that way, mostly has least use for the thing he's preachin'. Maybe Nancy feels the way you reckon. But that don't seem to me to worry a deal. Still, maybe things have changed around since the days when I hadn't sense to keep out of gunshot of a pair of dandy eyes. And anyway I don't seem to remember the boys bein' worried with the sort of argument you're handing out. If my memory's as good as I reckon, the boys most gener'ly married the gal first, an' got busy wonderin' about things after. All of which seems like so ...
— The Man in the Twilight • Ridgwell Cullum

... Indians call 'Hell,' are all within the space of a gunshot across, and each makes a different noise. One imitates the sound of a fuller's mill; another that of a forge, and a third a man snoring. The water in some is turbid; in some clear; in others red, yellow, ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 3, September 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... sing, and she sang. One might hear, in a favorable wind, a gunshot, or the barking of a dog from one place to the other, so that singing, as to effect, was nothing more than the voicing of her looking and ...
— Balcony Stories • Grace E. King

... how far they were down the lake, but they were able to guide their course by the sun, and, keeping the low bank of forest far beyond gunshot on their right, they moved before a favoring wind. The schoolmaster regained his strength fast. He was old, but a temperate life in the open air reenforced by plenty of exercise, had kept him wiry and strong. Now he sat up and listened to the ...
— The Border Watch - A Story of the Great Chief's Last Stand • Joseph A. Altsheler

... release, the 29th, he was held up by Psalm xxx., which came with great power. As he was led forth to execution he sang hymns nearly all the way. When his captors hesitated to launch their spears at him, he spake gently to them and pointed to his gun. So, either by gunshot or spear wounds, died another of that glorious band of martyrs who have, century after century, fearlessly laid down their lives to advance the ...
— Beneath the Banner • F. J. Cross

... surgeon to resect the knee joint for chronic cases, also the first to treat fractures of the lower jaw and other bones by wiring the fragments, and was also the first in any country to perform a laparotomy for gunshot wounds in the abdomen without protrusion of the viscera. Dr. George Troup Maxwell (1827-1879), was inventor of the laryngoscope. James Ridley Taylor (1821-1895), who entered the medical profession after middle life, ...
— Scotland's Mark on America • George Fraser Black

... innumerable company they were; how many we could not tell, but ten thousand, we thought, at the least. A party of them came on first, and viewed our posture, traversing the ground in the front of our line; and, as we found them within gunshot, our leader ordered the two wings to advance swiftly, and give them a salvo on each wing with their shot, which was done. They then went off, I suppose to give an account of the reception they were like to meet with; indeed, that salute cloyed their stomachs, for they immediately halted, ...
— The Further Adventures of Robinson Crusoe • Daniel Defoe

... hideously ruthless miscreants that ever disgraced the earth and the sea. But their courage and endurance were no less notable than their greed and cruelty, so that a moral can be squeezed even out of these abandoned miscreants. The soldiers and sailors who made their way within gunshot of Khartoum, overcoming thirst, hunger, heat, the desert, and the gallant children of the desert, did not fight, march, and suffer more bravely than the scoundrels who sacked Mairaibo and burned Panama. ...
— Essays in Little • Andrew Lang

... no noise, and the elk, for such it really was, did not notice them until they were within easy gunshot of where he was feeding. Then up went his head, to scent the air, and with a snort of sudden fear he started away, straight ahead ...
— On the Trail of Pontiac • Edward Stratemeyer

... at the low bed where young Harry McAlister lay, very much whiter than the sheets about him, and quite as unconscious of surroundings, the blood oozing slowly through such bandages as Scott Peck's rude surgery had twisted about a gunshot-wound in his thigh, and brought to close tension by a stick thrust through the folds, turned as tight as could be borne, and strapped into place by a bit ...
— The Wit of Women - Fourth Edition • Kate Sanborn

... Arapahoe camp had drawn such multitudes of them together that several hundred were howling in concert in our immediate neighborhood. There was an island in the river, or rather an oasis in the midst of the sands at about the distance of a gunshot, and here they seemed gathered in the greatest numbers. A horrible discord of low mournful wailings, mingled with ferocious howls, arose from it incessantly for several hours after sunset. We could distinctly see the wolves running about the prairie within a few rods of our fire, ...
— The Oregon Trail • Francis Parkman, Jr.

... when I clumb up and got him down of'n the windmill. Way the wind was whistlin' up there, the chances are he's done ketched cold in 'is tail, and if he has, yuh better see to it that thar dog ain't within gunshot uh me, now I'm ...
— The Phantom Herd • B. M. Bower

... elevation of the soil, other false moujiks. The wood of Sestroriesk was watched in the same way. The group of revolutionaries who strolled behind Natacha stopped to confer. In three—maybe two—minutes, they would be surrounded—cut off, taken in the trap. Suddenly a gunshot sounded in the night, and the group, with startled speed, turned in their tracks and made silently for the sea, while from all directions poured the concealed agents and threw themselves into the pursuit, ...
— The Secret of the Night • Gaston Leroux

... horses had escaped, with the exception of two or three, which they had succeeded in carrying off with them. Several, indeed, lay dead on the battle-field, almost torn to pieces by the wolves. My father, who had had some experience in gunshot wounds, did his best to attend to the poor men; but the last discovered died in the course of a few minutes, and we had now only one, the sole survivor of the massacre, to carry with us. A rough litter was at once formed, ...
— In the Wilds of Florida - A Tale of Warfare and Hunting • W.H.G. Kingston

... squinting shrewdly at the three armed herders. "I'll tell ye, let's send them wild horses through 'em! Holy smoke! jest think of a hundred head of them outlaws comin' down the canyon at sundown and hammerin' through that bunch of sheep! And we don't need to git within gunshot!" ...
— Hidden Water • Dane Coolidge

... three destroyers came foaming after me, all converging from different directions. They had about as good a chance of catching me as three spaniels would have of overtaking a porpoise. Out of pure bravado—I know it was very wrong—I waited until they were actually within gunshot. Then I sank and we ...
— Danger! and Other Stories • Arthur Conan Doyle

... proposed to mount a couple of 9.2 guns on the old fort on the west side of the river mouth, with half a dozen twelve-pound quick-firers at the Coast-Guard station on the east side to repel torpedo attack, but the War Office had laughed at the idea of an enemy getting within gunshot of the inviolate English shore, and so one of the most vulnerable points on the south ...
— The World Peril of 1910 • George Griffith

... everyone may know his own fleet by that token. If he see a hard match with the enemy and be to leeward, then to gather his fleet together and seem to flee, and flee indeed for this purpose till the enemy draw within gunshot. And when the enemy doth shoot then [he shall] shoot again, and make all the smoke he can to the intent the enemy shall not see the ships, and [then] suddenly hale up his tackle aboard,[6] and have the ...
— Fighting Instructions, 1530-1816 - Publications Of The Navy Records Society Vol. XXIX. • Julian S. Corbett

... suspicious sails were sighted, as they ran down the coast; but none of these approached within gunshot, the three craft being, evidently, too strong to be meddled with. Rounding Cape St. Vincent at a short distance, they steered for the mouth of the Straits. After the bold cliffs of Portugal, Bob was disappointed with the aspect of the ...
— Held Fast For England - A Tale of the Siege of Gibraltar (1779-83) • G. A. Henty

... I sha'n't be able to be with you until late to-night," he said, as he paused at his office door. "I'm in the medical corps of the Guard and I promised to lecture to-night on gunshot wounds. Some of my material got smashed up, but I have my lantern slides, anyhow. I'll try to see you all ...
— The Treasure-Train • Arthur B. Reeve

... explore that cold, still, and rigid body for a stab, a gunshot wound, for the trace of some killing blow. He felt all over the skull anxiously. It was whole. He slipped his hand under the neck. It was unbroken. With terrified eyes he peered close under the chin and saw no marks ...
— Within the Tides • Joseph Conrad

... slung in the trees above the reach of marauding beasts, and the party would disperse at daybreak, each to search in a different direction, blazing trees as he went ahead so that he could find the way back at night to the camp. Distress or a find was to be signalled by a gunshot or by heliograph of sunlight on a pocket mirror; but many a man strayed beyond rescue of signal and never returned to his waiting 'pardners.' Some were caught in snowslides, only to ...
— The Cariboo Trail - A Chronicle of the Gold-fields of British Columbia • Agnes C. Laut

... British boats, carrying a thousand men, all accustomed to desperate fighting, approached and anchored just out of gunshot. Captain Lockyer wished his men to go into action in the best condition possible, and therefore he came to anchor in order to rest the oarsmen, and to give ...
— Strange Stories from History for Young People • George Cary Eggleston

... shye and watchfull insomuch that we had been unable to get a shot at them; when at rest they generally seelect the most elivated point in the neighbourhood, and as they are watchfull and extreemly quick of sight and their sense of smelling very accute it is almost impossible to approach them within gunshot; in short they will frequently discover and flee from you at the distance of three miles. I had this day an opportunity of witnessing the agility and superior fleetness of this anamal which was to me really astonishing. I had pursued and twice surprised a small herd of seven, in ...
— The Journals of Lewis and Clark • Meriwether Lewis et al

... caught. In proof of which he was still alive, but McClure confessed to himself that it was only a matter of time. He must make a grand stroke for fortune—quick fortune, and then bolt for it. For his heart was sick with thinking on the gunshot from behind the hedge or the knife between his shoulders. He never now went to his own parish of Stonykirk where his father had been a well-doing packman—which is to say, a travelling merchant of silks and laces. McClure knew that he was in danger ...
— Patsy • S. R. Crockett

... to see at Yonville. The street—the only one—a gunshot in length, and flanked by a few shops on each side, stops short at the turn of the highroad. If it is left to the right hand and the foot of the St. Jean hills followed, ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. VIII (of X) - Continental Europe II. • Various

... fleet in the pattern that he set by his own "Fighting Instructions," which governed the tactics of all navies thereafter for a hundred years, namely, the entire force drawn up in single line. This line bore down abreast toward the enemy until it reached gunshot, then swung into line ahead and sailed on a course parallel to that of the enemy. De Ruyter arranged his fleet accordingly, and the two long lines passed each other on opposite tacks three times, cannonading furiously at close range. ...
— A History of Sea Power • William Oliver Stevens and Allan Westcott

... neither rivers nor mountains to delay her course. Like a clever jockey who leads a race, the Arab wishes to ride as slowly and not as quickly as possible. Constantly looking back at his pursuers, he keeps out of gunshot. When they approach he pushes on; when they fall behind, he slows the pace of his horse; when they stop, he walks his mare. Thus the chase continues till the fiery orb of the sun verges toward the horizon. Then for the first time the Arab demands of his horse ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. X. • Kuno Francke

... to what she said, being but secondarily interested in the children at the best. "Here are some things right in this neighborhood, within gunshot of the office, and if you want you can go and look at them to-night; the agents gave me houses where ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... satisfied. They do not know the relation of what appears to what is. If they chance to skirt along the coasts of your Purple Island, it will be only chance, and they will not know it. You may close your port-holes, lower your drawbridge, and make merry, for they will never come within gunshot of the "round tower of ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume IV. (of X.) • Various

... nervous. At Plymouth a boom blocked the entrance, but other places had not even this defense. Sir Walter Scott has described how, on September 17, 1779, a squadron, under John Paul Jones, came within gunshot of Leith, the port of Edinburgh. The whole surrounding country was alarmed, since for two days the squadron had been in sight beating up the Firth of Forth. A sudden squall, which drove Jones back, probably saved Edinburgh ...
— Washington and his Comrades in Arms - A Chronicle of the War of Independence • George Wrong

... drowsy that the sentries were found asleep on their posts at noonday. This unfortunate regiment was therefore taken from the front and set to guard the general ammunition depot, near headquarters. Without being once engaged in battle, so that it had not a single gunshot wound to report, the 16th New Hampshire suffered a loss by disease during its seven months' service in Louisiana of 5 officers and 216 men—in all, 221; and nearly the whole of this occurred in the last two months. This regiment was replaced in Paine's division by the 28th Connecticut, ...
— History of the Nineteenth Army Corps • Richard Biddle Irwin

... their left. These operations were watched by hundreds of diggers. Further on they saw the massed red coats of swaddies, and heard the faint rattle of kettle-drums. The British flag floated over the camp. A mounted officer in crimson and gold passed them, riding at a gallop, and the sound of a gunshot struck upon their ears, a ...
— In the Roaring Fifties • Edward Dyson

... send a man along the road to that crest," Lieutenant Myers suggested, "he will see them coming, and if we all keep close to the boat, we may get out of gunshot in time." ...
— Jack Archer • G. A. Henty

... youth a serious accident threatened to destroy his health and ruin his prospects. A charge of gunshot struck him at the bottom of the spine. The shot still remain in his body, and every autumn he is visited with an attack of quasiperitonitis which reduces him to a sad state of weakness. For long weeks together—once it was for a whole year—his diet is restricted entirely ...
— Painted Windows - Studies in Religious Personality • Harold Begbie

... with old ramparts, which only serve to increase its gloom and render it more confined. These ridiculous fortifications, preyed upon by ivy and crowned with wild gillyflowers, are about as high and as thick as the walls of a convent, and could be demolished by gunshot. They have several openings, the principal of which, the Porte de Rome and the Grand'-Porte, afford access to the Nice road and the Lyons road, at the other end of town. Until 1853 these openings were furnished with huge wooden two-leaved gates, arched ...
— The Fortune of the Rougons • Emile Zola

... her side, laughs at the dreaded "oso." She enjoys the antics of the horsemen. They sport with their enemy. After the fun ends, Bruin receives a gunshot. Choice cuts are added to ...
— The Little Lady of Lagunitas • Richard Henry Savage

... plan was to make a dash for the mole, and then to fight our way forward along it, we fully believing that the enemy would run as soon as we appeared. When the leading boats, under the command of Captains Freemantle and Bowen, had got within half gunshot of the mole head, the enemy took the alarm, and immediately opened fire on us from forty heavy guns. A hot fire it was, I assure you. The 'Fox' cutter, crowded with men, was sunk by the heavy shot which struck her, and nearly a hundred of those on board perished. I was in the 'Terpsichore's' ...
— Dick Cheveley - His Adventures and Misadventures • W. H. G. Kingston

... through the windows of the private office of the division superintendent at Sleepy Cat, a railroad town lying almost within gunshot of the great continental divide, would easily have accounted for the cordial perspiration that illumined Lefever's forehead. Not that a perspiration is easily achieved in the high country; it isn't. None, indeed, but a physical giant, which Lefever was, could ...
— Nan of Music Mountain • Frank H. Spearman

... plumage as he sails slowly by, with that easy, confiding flight that makes him the cheap victim of the tyro sportsman. The grey duck, less easy to approach, rises noisily before boat or canoe comes within gunshot. The olive and brown, hoarse-voiced ka-ka, a large, wild parrot, and green, crimson-headed parakeets, may swell the list. Such is a "papa" river! and there are ...
— The Long White Cloud • William Pember Reeves

... for dinner, and reported three wounded men instead of one. Two had pistol wounds that had evidently been attended to from the first, the other had a gunshot in the back, and must have dragged himself a long way after it, for he was almost gone with loss of blood. "That'll be the chiel' puir Nash fired at ...
— Two Knapsacks - A Novel of Canadian Summer Life • John Campbell

... although possible for the natives with their bare feet, are impracticable to European troops. Many of these rock fortresses were at various times the head-quarters of famous Dacoit leaders, and unless the summits happened to be commanded from some higher ground within gunshot range they were all but impregnable except by starvation. When driven to bay, these fellows would ...
— Tales of Daring and Danger • George Alfred Henty

... daily food. Only upon rare occasions were the guns afterwards used to procure a little fresh provision—such as a brace of wild duets from the lake, or one of the smaller game animals which could be found almost any morning within gunshot distance of the hut. For these reasons many parts of the valley had been left unvisited; and it was deemed possible enough for even a great elephant to have been all the time dwelling within its boundaries, unseen by ...
— The Cliff Climbers - A Sequel to "The Plant Hunters" • Captain Mayne Reid

... opposed the seizure of two pirogues by the English, as hostages until the stolen arms were restored, was wounded severely by a gunshot. During this second visit Cook bestowed the name of Friendly Islands upon this group, no doubt with a sarcastic meaning. Now-a-days they are better known by the native name ...
— Celebrated Travels and Travellers - Part 2. The Great Navigators of the Eighteenth Century • Jules Verne

... largest bird in Guiana, feeds in the marshy savanna through which you have just passed. He is wary and shy, and will not allow you to get within gunshot of him. ...
— Wanderings In South America • Charles Waterton

... last news we had of the three pirates. Only once we heard a gunshot a great way off, and supposed them to be hunting. A council was held, and it was decided that we must desert them on the island—to the huge glee, I must say, of Ben Gunn, and with the strong approval of Gray. We left a ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 6 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... soft voice the mare had heard all her days did not entirely soothe her. As Virginia mounted the wind flung shut the stable door with a bang. Juno leaped as from a gunshot, and dashed away up the river to the northwest. Her rider tried in vain to change her course and quiet her spirit. The mare only surged madly forward, as if bent on outrunning the tantalizing, grinding wind. With the sense of freedom, and with ...
— Winning the Wilderness • Margaret Hill McCarter

... born at Laval; was from the improved methods he introduced in the treatment of surgical cases entitled to be called, as he has been, the father of modern surgery, for his success as an operator, in particular the tying of divided arteries and the treatment of gunshot wounds; he was in the habit of saying of any patient he had successfully operated upon, "I cared for him; God healed him"; his writings exercised a beneficent influence on the treatment of surgical cases in ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood

... in the Pension Bureau alleging that he received a saber wound in the head March 7, 1862, and a gunshot wound in the left leg in the ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 3 (of 3) of Volume 8: Grover Cleveland, First Term. • Grover Cleveland

... lived days of torture, ever watchful of the approaching enemy. They spent sleepless nights of anguish, knowing too well the sound of gunshot, the cry of terror that meant another outbreak of the clans. And when the cross grew too heavy even for their stoic shoulders to bear they ventured unbeknownst to their menfolks to the Good Shepherd of the Hills to beg his ...
— Blue Ridge Country • Jean Thomas

... Mary Ann," she explained carelessly. "They have a spat every time they come within gunshot of each other." ...
— Cow-Country • B. M. Bower

... close of the afternoon the ships were within gunshot of each other, and the Dutchman ran up his colours. As they drew closer, the foreign skipper's glass showed him the nationality of the Policy and he at once opened fire upon her with one of ...
— Foster's Letter Of Marque - A Tale Of Old Sydney - 1901 • Louis Becke

... and floundered away in the opposite direction. He must get out of hearing. He toiled on, listening for the expected gunshot—hearing it, too, and the yawp of a wounded dog, in spite of a mitten ...
— The Magnetic North • Elizabeth Robins (C. E. Raimond)

... afternoon, almost within gunshot of the Cuban shore, while the United States fleet was standing toward Havana, with the Mayflower a mile or more in advance of the flag-ship New York, the merchant steamship Pedro hove in sight. The Mayflower suddenly swung sharply to the westward, and a moment ...
— The Boys of '98 • James Otis

... than a mouse when anything is the matter with them. Yes, if it hadn't been for the old Colonel, who gave me a private hint to say nothing about the affair, but merely to put down in my report, 'Died from the effect of a gunshot wound,' I should have got into a deuce of a scrape over that affair. As it was, it only cost me a hundred rupees to satisfy the man's family and send them back to their native village. That was for years a standing joke ...
— Rujub, the Juggler • G. A. Henty

... and speed of a horse, all supplied judicial observations for Lefever and Sawdy, while Laramie—so nearly the victim—leaving the topic to these Sleepy Cat gun pundits, conferred with Carpy about the care of gunshot wounds; and protested against Flat Nose George and the Museum of Horrors in the ...
— Laramie Holds the Range • Frank H. Spearman

... although they are hard to approach; but Altamont put in practice a device employed by the Indians of his own country; he crept over the ground with his gun and arms outstretched like the horns of one of these shy animals, and having thus come within easy gunshot, he could ...
— The Voyages and Adventures of Captain Hatteras • Jules Verne

... since I have seen any fighting. I am quite out of practice in gunshot wounds. There is the medicine. Good-bye! You will shake hands once, for the sake of ...
— Two Years Ago, Volume II. • Charles Kingsley

... are right. Ah! gentlemen, she was a woman worthy to be had in remembrance: for she invented a capital plaster for gunshot wounds; and a jollier old fellow over a bottle of Tokay there is not at this day in Suabia, or in the Swedish camp. And that reminds me to ask, gentlemen, have any of you heard that Gustavus Horn is expected at Falkenberg? ...
— Memorials and Other Papers • Thomas de Quincey

... the bleeding till better aid could be obtained from Ulm. Thither Moritz Schleiermacher had already sent, and he assured her that he was far from despairing of the elder baron, but she derived little hope from his words, for gunshot wounds were then so ill understood as generally ...
— The Dove in the Eagle's Nest • Charlotte M. Yonge

... pirate boats to withdraw further back, which they did after he had passed his word that he would confer with them again in a quarter of an hour, after he had heard what their envoy had to say. When they had withdrawn out of gunshot, their scarlet suits glowing like two patches of blood on the water, then Lancelot, still bidding our line to be on guard against any surprise, withdrew with me and the clergyman and two or three of our friends a little way up the beach. And there we called upon Mr. Ebrow to tell us all that ...
— Marjorie • Justin Huntly McCarthy

... sent for immediately on our reaching Mr. Bayard's house, united with me in this opinion. General Rey, the French consul, also had the goodness to invite the surgeons of the French frigates in our harbour, as they had had much experience in gunshot wounds, to render their assistance. They immediately came; but, to prevent his being disturbed, I stated to them his situation, described the nature of his wound, and the direction of the ball, with all the symptoms that could enable them to form an opinion as to the event. One of the gentlemen ...
— Memoirs of Aaron Burr, Complete • Matthew L. Davis

... each other. Notwithstanding Commodore Perry's protestations of friendliness, they were afraid of his great ships and their powerful armaments. Should they, as they might easily do, make their way up the bay till they were within gunshot of the capital, what resistance could the government show, or how could it prevent them from battering down the castle ...
— Japan • David Murray

... upon their gallant descendants! Instead of arming themselves and making preparations, the men ran about in the greatest confusion. We were in this enviable state when the dreaded pirate came within gunshot; and the reason of her approach turned out to be that her compass was broken. The whole scene at once changed, as though a beneficent fairy had waved her wand. The captains instantly recovered their dignity, ...
— A Visit to the Holy Land • Ida Pfeiffer

... a camera sounded like a gunshot in the intense stillness, and up the trees went the little band in a flash, all but ...
— The Adventures of Piang the Moro Jungle Boy - A Book for Young and Old • Florence Partello Stuart

... thereafter, came the puny sound of a gunshot. The boats were starting. Would Judas bump Magdalen? Would Judas be head of ...
— Zuleika Dobson - or, An Oxford Love Story • Max Beerbohm

... been carrying sail in order to close, now reduced his canvas to topsails, and put two reefs into them, bringing by the wind for that object (C 1). All other usual preparations were made at the same time; the "Constitution" during them lying side to wind, out of gunshot, practically motionless, like her antagonist. When all was ready, the ship kept away again, heading toward the starboard quarter of the British vessel; that is, she was on her right-hand side, steering toward her stern (C ...
— Sea Power in its Relations to the War of 1812 - Volume 1 • Alfred Thayer Mahan

... was listening to something at a distance; or, rather, having heard something at a distance, was listening for a repetition of it. "I wonder what that can have been?" said she. For fire-arms in July are torpid mostly, and this was a gunshot somewhere. ...
— When Ghost Meets Ghost • William Frend De Morgan

... drew it off from the work before us. But now our leaders proceeded to “tell off” the party, stationing them singly at distances of about seventy or eighty paces along the bottom of the valley, within gunshot of the verge of the wood, which sloped to it. In this open order the line extended more than half a mile. The horses ...
— Rambles in the Islands of Corsica and Sardinia - with Notices of their History, Antiquities, and Present Condition. • Thomas Forester

... but had been thwarted by the precipitancy of the young Indians and Canadians. These now showed no inclination to depart from the cautious maxims of forest warfare. They made a terrific noise, but when they came within gunshot of the fort, it was by darting from stump to stump with a quick, zigzag movement that made them more difficult to hit than birds on the wing. The best moment for a shot was when they reached a stump, ...
— A Half-Century of Conflict, Volume II • Francis Parkman

... February 15, sailed boldly into the harbor of Tripoli. Let us pause for a minute to consider the odds against him. First there was the Philadelphia with her forty guns double-shotted and ready to fire; half a gunshot away was the Bashaw's castle, the mole and crown batteries, while within range were ten other batteries, mounting, all told, a hundred and fifteen guns. Between the Philadelphia and the shore lay a number of Tripolitan cruisers, galleys and gunboats. Into ...
— American Men of Action • Burton E. Stevenson

... appear to see that, despite his boast of his leather skin, the stings of the cruel winged tribes were drawing his blood and causing him alike pain and irritation which, under that sun, and added to the torment of his gunshot wound, were a martyrdom as great as the noblest ...
— Wisdom, Wit, and Pathos of Ouida - Selected from the Works of Ouida • Ouida

... This quotation is taken from a paper secured by the Honorable Richard Rush, our minister to Paris in 1849, and is preserved in the Pennsylvania Historical Society. Henri Christophe received a dangerous gunshot wound in Savannah. Balch says in speaking of Fontages at Savannah: "He commanded there a legion of mulattoes, according to my manuscript, of more than eight hundred men, and saved the army after the useless assault ...
— The Colored Regulars in the United States Army • T. G. Steward

... vote that we do not pursue our investigations into this mystery by going back and, perhaps, getting peppered with gunshot." ...
— The Radio Boys with the Revenue Guards • Gerald Breckenridge

... thought of surrender. "We could not," he answered, "if the Indians should attempt to force the walls. But there is no danger of their venturing within gunshot in any numbers. They won't risk their red skins that way. They'll simply waste their powder and lead in such firing as they did this morning, and pretty soon they'll lose heart and drop off, leaving Pontiac ...
— Four American Indians - King Philip, Pontiac, Tecumseh, Osceola • Edson L. Whitney

... very wary, and did not attempt to come within gunshot distance of the place of concealment for some time, but when they had approached sufficiently near both fired, only one ...
— The Wonder Island Boys: The Tribesmen • Roger Finlay

... within one-half gunshot of the Bashaw's castle and of the principal battery; two of the enemy's cruisers were only a couple of cables' length away on the starboard quarter, and their gunboats were within one-half gunshot on the starboard bow. All the guns of the ...
— Great Men and Famous Women. Vol. 2 of 8 • Various

... up his boots and started in the direction to which she had pointed. Every now and then a sob shook him. By-and-by the chimneys of the house hove in sight among the ridges, and he ran toward it. But within a gunshot of the white garden-wall his breast swelled suddenly and he flung himself on the ground and let the big tears run. They made little pits in the moving sand; and more sand drifted up and ...
— The Ship of Stars • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch

... and the moon had sunk behind the hill that sheltered the harbor on the north, leaving the dark water of the bay in deep shadow. At long gunshot from the shore lay the ship in which Charles Bramble was confined. All was still as death, save the pace of the sentinel in the ship's waist, and a ripple now and then of tide-way against the ship's cable. An observant eye, ...
— The Sea-Witch - or, The African Quadroon A Story of the Slave Coast • Maturin Murray

... nearly within gunshot, the captain's face began to burn, and his pulses to throb ...
— The Adventures of Captain Horn • Frank Richard Stockton

... Neck, I saw a bird skimming over the ice that covered the small pond back of the beach. I put up my glass and said to myself, "A killdeer plover!" There proved to be two birds. They would not suffer me within gunshot,—though I carried no gun,—but flew off into some ploughed ground, with their usual loud vociferations. (The killdeer is aptly named ...
— The Foot-path Way • Bradford Torrey

... to reach such an active animal was not easy. On the ground he could get away too fast, in the branches he could get away too far. A well-aimed gunshot could alone stop him as he ran or climbed, but Torres possessed no firearm. His sword-knife and hoe were useless unless he could get ...
— Eight Hundred Leagues on the Amazon • Jules Verne

... put Satan to it. He went up with a will. From the narrow saddle of the ridge-crest I tried to take my bearings. Below me slanted the green of pinyon, with the bleached treetops standing like spears, and uprising yellow stones. Fancying I heard a gunshot, I leaned a straining ear against the soft breeze. The proof came presently in the unmistakable report of Jones's blunderbuss. It was repeated almost instantly, giving reality to the direction, which was down the slope of what I concluded must be the third ravine. Wondering what was the ...
— The Last of the Plainsmen • Zane Grey

... Writing-Stone country, and a man had no business wandering up and down those somber ridges alone, away from the big freight-trails, unless he was anxious to be among the "reported missing"—which he sure would be if a bunch of non-treaty Indians ever got within gunshot of him. I damned Major Lessard earnestly for what I considered his injustice to MacRae, and wondered if he would send his troopers out to look for that hypothetical gold-dust. I didn't see how he could avoid making a bluff at doing so, even if he secretly classed Rutter's story ...
— Raw Gold - A Novel • Bertrand W. Sinclair

... but no post-mortem had yet been permitted, a circumstance the doctor referred to regretfully, and it was merely his opinion, based on purely superficial examination, that death was instantaneous, the result of the gunshot wound referred to. Dr. Brick further gave it as his professional opinion that post-mortem should be no ...
— Ray's Daughter - A Story of Manila • Charles King

... considered her a good match for the Essex, and Captain Porter replied that he should gratify them with pleasure if his majesty's commander was of their taste. So we stood toward the convoy and when within gunshot hove to, and awaited the Minerva, but she tacked and stood in among the convoy, to the utter amazement of our prisoners, who denounced the commander as a base coward, and expressed their determination to report him to the Admiralty." An incident of reported "flinching" ...
— The Naval War of 1812 • Theodore Roosevelt

... to the firing point. He was not afraid of death—none of the Akor-Neb people were; their language contained no word to express the concept of total and final extinction—and discarnation by gunshot was almost entirely painless. But he was beginning to suspect that he had made a fool of himself by getting into this affair, he had work in his present reincarnation which he wanted to finish, and his political party would suffer loss, both of ...
— Last Enemy • Henry Beam Piper

... style," said the doctor. "Hysterical, frightened women and singed dandies not my class of work! A good respectable gunshot wound, a leg off, or a bayonet probe, if you like; but this sort of thing—bah! Why, if it had not been for our flute-player and Sir Mark Frayne, ...
— The Queen's Scarlet - The Adventures and Misadventures of Sir Richard Frayne • George Manville Fenn

... He could not come within gunshot. If they clap eyes on him, they will hustle him to jail, and his cutthroats shall not avail him a hair's weight. The impertinent swore he'd be ...
— Monsieur Beaucaire • Booth Tarkington

... shoreward of them must hear. But their shouts were merged in the wail of despair, of shrieks and cries that floated away into the mist. The boat, travelling with the last of the tide, had struck the cable with force, and was already drifting a gunshot away. Whether any saved themselves on it, the two clinging to the hawser could ...
— The Wild Geese • Stanley John Weyman

... and inflammation in a gunshot wound is another. Infection set up in Jerry Boyle's hurt on the day after that which the doctor had marked as the critical point in his ...
— Claim Number One • George W. (George Washington) Ogden

... down the river a goodish piece, getting a sleep by the bush, and easing my plug, when I woke up quick. Seemed to me I heard a gunshot. Maybe I was dreaming. Anyway I sat up and took notice, but didn't see a thing. So, after a while, I got dozing again. Then my plug started to neigh, and kept whinnying. I got around then, guessing something was doing. So I started to chase up the river. Then I found ...
— The One-Way Trail - A story of the cattle country • Ridgwell Cullum

... irregular water-courses and stagnant pools—tapering off seaward into a mere spit of sand, on which reeds and bent-grass scarcely deign to grow, towards the extreme point, just where the neck is narrowest, are the "blinds"—ten or twelve in number—a long gunshot apart, in which the "fowlers" lurk, waiting for their prey. On either side stretch the broad estuary of the Gunpowder River, and the broader waters of the Chesapeake, along whose shallows lie the banks of the wild ...
— Border and Bastille • George A. Lawrence

... amputated yesterday, and was very feeble. One had been struck by a ball on the head and a buckshot in the lungs. Two boys were but slightly wounded, and were in good spirits. To one of these—a jovial, pleasant boy—Dr. Seyes said, good-humoredly: "You need have no fears of dying from a gunshot; you are too big a devil, and were born to be hung." Colonel Marrow sought to question this same fellow in regard to the strength of the enemy, when the boy said: "Are you a commissioned officer?" "Yes," replied Marrow. "Then," returned he, "you ought ...
— The Citizen-Soldier - or, Memoirs of a Volunteer • John Beatty

... the young officer's theory was that, if the Nicaraguans meant to fight, they would place an ambush in the dense jungle along the river, and from this place of concealment harass the flotilla before it got within gunshot of the fort. This ambuscade could easily fall back upon the fort if directly attacked and defeated. This, the young man argued was what he himself would have done had he been in command of the Nicaraguan forces, so it naturally occurred to him to discover whether the same idea had suggested itself ...
— The Strong Arm • Robert Barr

... (pl. {[:-]e},) gunshot, range of a musket-ball; {zwanzig Bchsenschu}, twenty times the range ...
— Eingeschneit - Eine Studentengeschichte • Emil Frommel

... coming saucily up the water with a couple of swarthy, black-hair'd men aboard—the strong shades falling on the light gray or yellow outlines of the hills all through the forenoon, as we steam within gunshot of them—while ever the pure and delicate sky spreads over all. And the splendid sunsets, and the sights of evening—the same old stars, (relatively a little different, I see, so far north) Arcturus and Lyra, and the Eagle, and great Jupiter like a silver ...
— Complete Prose Works - Specimen Days and Collect, November Boughs and Goodbye My Fancy • Walt Whitman

... envelope quickly, O this is not our son's writing, yet his name is sign'd, O a strange hand writes for our dear son, O stricken mother's soul! All swims before her eyes, flashes with black, she catches the main words only, Sentences broken, gunshot wound in the breast, cavalry skirmish, taken to hospital, At present low, but ...
— Leaves of Grass • Walt Whitman

... steep mountain- crest which was terminated by the swift mountain-river Mechik, and had to command the plain that stretched before us. Here and there on this picturesque plain, out of the reach of gunshot, now and then, especially at evening, groups of mounted mountaineers showed themselves, attracted by curiosity to ride up and view the ...
— Stories by Foreign Authors: Russian • Various

... answer to the wish a stalwart figure leaped from behind a large tree to the shelter of a smaller one, about half a gunshot from ...
— Standish of Standish - A story of the Pilgrims • Jane G. Austin

... as he did so, how hard it had been for him to keep the story of his wound secret from the doctor, who had already extracted the ball, and who was to visit him on the morrow. The practitioner to whom he had gone, knowing nothing of gunshot wounds, had taken him to a first-class surgeon, and the surgeon had of course asked as to the cause of the wound. Daniel had said that it was an accident as to which he could not explain the cause. "You mean you will not tell," said the surgeon. "Exactly so. I will ...
— Lady Anna • Anthony Trollope

... full view of the passing woodsman, and craned their necks to watch him from the near-by branches. On every shallow mere and tranquil river-reach the flocks of wild ducks had fed boldly, suffering canoe or punt to come within easy gunshot. In the heavy grass of the wild meadows, or among the long, washing sedges of the lakeside, the red deer had pastured openly in the broad daylight, with tramplings and splashings, and had lifted large bright eyes of unterrified curiosity if a boat or canoe happened by. The security ...
— The House in the Water - A Book of Animal Stories • Charles G. D. Roberts

... and she turned back; but then returned and threw a handkerchief over the dead man's face, which while they spoke had assumed that quiet, ecstatic expression of joy which often is observed to overspread the faces of those who die of gunshot wounds, however fierce the passion in which the spirits took their flight. With this strange, grand, awful joy did the dead man gaze upward into the very eyes and hearts, as it were, of the two that now bent over him. They looked ...
— The Ancestral Footstep (fragment) - Outlines of an English Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... the rear of the troops, my son, and take your orders from Major Sheaffe or of the army surgeon. I told them both what we were sending, as they passed. Keep out of gunshot and avoid capture: the time may come only too soon when you'll share the ...
— Neville Trueman the Pioneer Preacher • William Henry Withrow



Words linked to "Gunshot" :   shot, enfilade fire, enfilade, gunfire, shooting, snipe



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