Don't fire until you see the whites of their eyes

¹

1. Don't react to a situation too early. This saying comes from an order allegedly given by American officer William Prescott at the Battle of Bunker Hill in the American Revolutionary War.

Don't fire until you see the whites of their eyes

²

1. A famous command attributed to William Prescott, an American officer, at the Battle of Bunker Hill in the Revolutionary War. Prescott may have said “color” rather than “whites.”

Prescott's command has become a proverb, meaning “Don't act before you have some chance of success.”