A Dictionary of Cont..

particularly in the arbalest, where the ejecting
string was wound up with a ratchet-to prepare
a quarrel for shooting than it did to adjust the
older type of arrow and draw back the bowstring.
A crossbowman was more to be feared
in battle than a longbowman-until he had shot
his bolt. And then he was less to be feared and,
indeed, until he had reloaded his crossbow,
quite vulnerable. He had, therefore, to hold his
bolt until it could be used most effectively and,
above all, he had to resist excited urges to shoot
the bolt before it would be most effective.
Hence there was a proverb, A fooPs bolt is
soon shot.
Swift listed You have shot your bolt as a
hackneyed phrase in 1738.
shop; store. Etymologically, a shop is a place in
which things are made or shaped, a store is a
place in which they are stored. Both words are
used in England and America, but often with
different applications.
As a noun, shop is preferred to store in
England to describe a place for selling goods.
In America store (in modern times usually the
more accurate word) is preferred to shop,
though exclusive and high-priced stores, especially
those that restrict their sales to some
specialty, tend to call themselves shops, perhaps
to exploit the prestige often associated with
British merchandise. Many of the great department
stores maintain special departments
known as The College Shop or The Misses’
Shop or some such thing.
Shop is retained in America in its older sense
of the place where things are shaped or made
in such phrases as machine shop or rail.road
shops. We speak of a shoe repair shop, a barber
shop, a cabinet shop, and so on. In America a
shopman is a worker in a workshop. In England
a shopman is one who sells things over the
counter. In America a closed shop is a shop in
which union membership is a condition of
hiring as well as of employment, or one in
which the employer must call on the union to
furnish employees. An open shop is a nonu:nion
shop which may or may not employ union
members together with nonmembers, but which
does not recognize or deal with a union as the
representative of the employees; or, an antiunion
shop in which union members are not
knowingly employed; or, a shop in which a
union, because chosen by a majority of the
employees, acts as representative of all the employees
in making agreements with the employer,
but in which union membership is not
a condition of employment. See also store.
shop, as a verb, has a somewhat looser definition
in America than in England. Though in both
countries as an intransitive verb it means to
visit shops for the purpose of purchasing or
examining goods, in America shop (especially
among American women) often means little
more than to go on a tour of inspection with
no thought of buying at present. Hence the
expression window shop. The English are as
great shoppers in this sense as Americans but
451 showdown
they put the matter more obliquely, in expressions
such as go around the shops.
shorn. See shear.
short; shortly. Short may be used as an adjective,
as in a short distance. Either form may be used
as an adverb, as in he stopped short and they
will be here shortly. Either form may mean
“curtly”; otherwise, the form shortly means
“in a short time,” and the form short is used
for all the other senses of the word. See also
brief.
short and sweet, as a term for something brief
but enjoyable, is hackneyed. So is a short life
but a merry one for a gay, adventurous career
that may be cut short. It is far more often
spoken of lives that may be short than of those
that actually are or were.
short shrift, give. Though shrift originally meant
penance, especially a penance prescribed in
writing it came to mean auricular confession
and the sacrament of penance. Criminals, when
execution often followed almost immediately
upon judgment, were usually allowed a brief
interval for confession, so that their souls would
not suffer. Hence short shrift came to mean a
brief respite and to give short shrift to make
short work of, usually, as of a summary dismissal,
in dealing unfavorably with someone
in one’s power. Shrift is now an archaic or
historical word and the phrase to give short
shrift a cliche.
shot. When shot means the ammunition, it has
the plural shot, as in piles of shot and shells.
It may be treated as a mass word and used with
a singular verb, as in much shot was wasted, or
as a true plural, as in two shot have fallen to the
leeward.
In all other senses the word has a regular
plural shots, as in I’ve taken three shots at it
and they were both good shots. See shoot.
should. See shall.
show. The past tense is showed. The participle is
shown or showed. Shown is used more often
than showed as a participle, as in I have shown
you how to do it.
show a clean pair of heels. Why the heels displayed
by those who depart suddenly in fear
or escape should be clean is not clear. Perhaps
it simply means disencumbered. It used to be
a fair pair of heels and a light pair of heels.
Perhaps in the humorous suggestion of not
waiting for shoes or stockings there is a suggestion
that the naked heels would look white and
clean. But whatever it may mean or have meant,
the phrase is now exhausted.
show the white feather. As a figure of speech for
manifesting cowardice, 10 show the white feuther,
a metaphor drawn from gamecocks, a white
feather in whose tails (it is said) is a mark of
inferior breeding, is a cliche.
showdown is drawn from the game of poker. It
describes the laying down of one’s cards, face
up, as a player declares his hand. More generally,
it means any forced disclosure of actual
resources or power. It is now used colloquially
to mean any trial of strength or even a personal