step short

English

Verb

step short (third-person singular simple present steps short, present participle stepping short, simple past and past participle stepped short)

1. (military) To diminish the length or rapidity of the step according to the established rules.

Part or all of this entry has been imported from the 1913 edition of Webster’s Dictionary, which is now free of copyright and hence in the public domain. The imported definitions may be significantly out of date, and any more recent senses may be completely missing.
(See the entry for “step short”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.)