take by surprise
IdiomsExample Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
One day he will suddenly start off to take by surprise the garrisons of Potsdam and of Rinfueld; he gives the order for boots and saddles, which naturally leads to innumerable accidents.
From The Schemes of the Kaiser by Adam, Juliette
The two were superbly mounted, and well calculated, by their style and bearing, to take by surprise the leader of a rabble host marching through a country where all was new to his eyes.
From The Great Mogul by Tracy, Louis
Mr. Elster walked slowly through the village on his way to Hartledon, whose inmates he would presently take by surprise.
From Elster's Folly by Wood, Henry, Mrs.
I expect to take by surprise a newly-married pair in their honeymoon, and I find a state of things here which I should never have supposed possible.
From Success and How He Won It by Werner, E. T. C. (Edward Theodore Chalmers)
He then prepared for a bold and sudden movement, which should take by surprise one flank of our army.
From Three Years in the Sixth Corps A Concise Narrative of Events in the Army of the Potomac, from 1861 to the Close of the Rebellion, April, 1865 by Stevens, George T.
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
