[see SHOT sb.]
1. The shooting or discharge of a cannon.
1606. Hieron, Wks., I. 46. If Hee had done it by cannon shot.
1876. Bancroft, Hist. U.S., III. xiii. 199. Triple line was formed, out of reach of cannon-shot.
2. Ammunition shot from a cannon; balls or other ‘shot’ for a cannon.
1591. Shaks., 1 Hen. VI., III. iii. 79. These haughtie wordes of hers Haue battred me like roaring Cannon-shot.
1653. Urquhart, Rabelais, I. xxxvii. These are cannon-shot.
1687. Lond. Gaz., No. 2282/6. Ply’d with Bombs and Cannon-shot.
1871. Joaquin Miller, Songs Italy (1878), 119. The hail like cannon-shot struck the sea.
3. The distance a cannon will throw a ball; the range of a cannon.
1580. Sir R. Bingham, in Spenser’s Wks. (Grosart), I. 463. I entered the harbour … within canon shotte of the fortress.
1702. Lond. Gaz., No. 3844/4. Out of Cannon-shot of that Town.
1790. Beatson, Nav. & Mil. Mem. (1804), 327. To approach within cannon-shot.
