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March 2

What is a "browning shot"? Submarine warfare in the First World War

Reading Lloyd George's War Memoirs, he mentions a "browning shot" a couple of times, in the context of submarine attacks on shipping. Chapter XL, The Peril of the Submarines. "A submarine could not count on firing more than a single "browning shot" as it was at once attacked by the escort..." and later in the same chapter, quoting a report from the Shipping Department, "... a tanker, the Wabasha in the fourth convoy from Hampton Roads, was hit by a "browning shot"." DuncanHill (talk) 03:41, 2 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

The usual meaning is a shot fired at a convoy from a long distance in hopes of hitting something, rather than a shot aimed at a specific target. Shock Brigade Harvester Boris (talk) 03:54, 2 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

This book by Norman Friedman discusses it in some detail, e.g. results (1 of 10) at this link :

Friedman, Norman (2011). Naval Weapons of World War One. Seaforth Publishing. ISBN 9781848321007.

—2606:A000:4C0C:E200:7CD4:F70E:645:39E2 (talk) 10:08, 2 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Dictionary of Jargon (Routledge Revivals) by Jonathon Green says:

browning shot n [Navy] a term from the shooting use of into the brown: a shot fired with no specific target into the middle of a group of ships with the hope of hitting one of them.
brown, into the, adv [Shooting] to fire into the brown implies an indiscriminate blast into the heart of a covey of passing birds.
brown 2. v [Shooting] to shoot into the centre of a covey of birds, rather than take a specific target; this usually kills nothing but wounds or harms several birds.

I also found The Encyclopaedia of Sport, Volume 1 (1897), Henry Charles Howard Earl of Suffolk and Berkshire, which says (p. 165): 'Occasionally, without any apparent cause, they will, like Golden Plover, fly past within easy reach, and, keeping very close together, offer a good "browning" shot'. Alansplodge (talk) 10:48, 2 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Excellent, thank you all. DuncanHill (talk) 17:08, 2 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Technical problem in ultimate solution?

Kindly look at the cartoon and final solution below [1].As we can see two squares are still vacant, though only these letters are "circled" in the above preliminary solved solutions (and hence only they should appear in the final answer), but then why are more rectangular spaces here where final answer ought to fit ? Is leaving them empty a part of some deeper sense of humor.If so, can someone kindly explain it's meaning ? 124.253.0.50 (talk) 13:30, 2 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

It may be not mainstream enough to make its object obvious. Any way any thing in Art that is not easily identifiable can be difficult to discuss. I would begin with some reflexion starting with Visual rhetoric#Visual rhetoric of text perhaps. --Askedonty (talk) 14:34, 2 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

This comic is the Jumble. From the looks of it, there was some kind of error when writing this one - they originally planned the answer "HIGH-TECH", then changed it to "HI-TECH" (to make the pun more obvious - it's translating greetings, so it's "hi" technology), I assume. Smurrayinchester 16:42, 2 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure what is going on here, as on my screen I see four boxes, then a dash, then four more boxes. The letters in the left-hand boxes read HITE and in the right-hand boxes CH, with the two end boxes empty. I see no circles or "preliminary solved solutions". This is a standard arrangement, and one would not necessarily expect all the boxes to be filled. For example, postcodes are entered on a form in this manner (although there may only be three boxes on the right). The outgoing code (post town followed by postal district) is on the left and the incoming code (single digit indicating sub-district followed by two letters which pinpoint a block of up to fifty houses) is on the right. One box may well be empty, because the outgoing code may be four characters (e.g. SW1A 1AA) or three, e.g. CR9 2TA (which was the very first postcode, discounting the trial system used in Norwich). 92.19.174.150 (talk) 18:05, 2 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

It appears to be a puzzle with rules not stated in the image. I don't know whether HITE-CH followed by two blanks field is the stated solution by the puzzler author or an attempted solution by a solver but I think either HIGH-TECH or "HI"-TECH (with quotation marks counting as characters) would be a better solution. I don't know whether they break any unstated rules. PrimeHunter (talk) 19:05, 2 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

It's a Jumble, as stated, or more precisely, it's part of one. Jumbles are a daily feature in some newspapers. Here's a sample of one. Solving the anagrams at left gives the first-stage answers BLEND, AVOID, CHEESY, and CAMERA. The circled letters are BDAIDHYARA, which is the anagram that must be solved for the final answer. Often this involves a pun, but in this example it's more a reinterpretation of the answer phrase: BAD HAIR DAY.
But in the newspaper where I see them, when the answer is given the next day, they just print the words–as you see at the bottom of the one I linked to. The format shown at the original poster's link does not occur. The answer "HI-TECH" certainly makes sense as Smurray explains, so it appears there was some sort of error. --69.159.62.113 (talk) 08:32, 3 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks for your answer. Can you be please kind enough to let me know from which newspaper this is from ? If possible please give me web address that leads to this paper's Jumble (daily/weekly) : OP — Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.253.3.22 (talk) 16:09, 3 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I found that one using Google Images; it was linked from the web site of the Peninsula Daily News. --69.159.62.113 (talk) 23:31, 3 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

If there was any humor intended I guess the target would be the user trying to get the text moving to the side without any possible result whatsoever. --Askedonty (talk) 21:20, 2 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I never heard of "Jumbles" before yesterday, though I'm familiar with crosswords and anagrams. What we need is for someone to look at the Denver Post for 19 February and tell us which were the jumbled words and which boxes were circled. 92.19.174.150 (talk) 10:21, 3 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I think Smurray is onto it. It's a joke, parodying the Jumble puzzle (which has been around for decades, though maybe not that widely syndicated). There was a question a couple or three months ago about a Jumble puzzle, which as I recall was also from the Denver Post. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 10:33, 3 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

And as suggested by a couple of other users, "HI"-TECH is indeed the answer.[2] ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 10:51, 3 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict)The discussion was Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2017 October 23#Jumble, which in turn leads on to this: [3]. 92.19.174.150 (talk) 11:12, 3 March 2018 (UTC)[reply]