"shot across the bows" meaning in English

{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "shots across the bows",
      "tags": [
        "plural"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "shots across the bows"
      },
      "expansion": "shot across the bows (plural shots across the bows)",
      "name": "en-noun"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "senses": [
    {
      "alt_of": [
        {
          "word": "shot across the bow"
        }
      ],
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [
            "Entries with incorrect language header",
            "Entry maintenance"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "1856 March, “Monthly Summary. [United States.]”, in George R[ex] Graham, editor, Graham’s American Monthly Magazine of Literature and Art, volume XLVIII, number 3, Philadelphia, Pa.: George R. Graham, […], →OCLC, page 267, column 1",
          "text": "President [Franklin] Pierce, like a great war ship, fired two shots across the bows of the Congress, to bring matters to.",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1979, P[eter] B[rian] Medawar, “What shall I Do Research on?”, in Advice to a Young Scientist (Alfred P. Sloan Foundation series), New York, N.Y.: Basic Books, pages 13–14",
          "text": "Scientists considered collectively are remarkably single-minded in their views about what is important and what is not. If a graduate student gives a seminar and no one comes or no one asks a question, it is very sad, but not so sad as the question gallantly put by a senior or a colleague that betrays that he hasn't listened to a word. But it is a warning sign, a shot across the bows.",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1992, H[erbert] L[ionel] A[dolphus] Hart, “Postscript”, in The Concept of Law, 3rd edition, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, published 2012, pages 238–239",
          "text": "Though I have fired a few shots across the bows of some of my critics, notably the late Professor Lon Fuller and Professor R[onald] M[yles] Dworkin, I have hitherto made no general comprehensive reply to any of them; I have preferred to watch and learn from a most instructive running debate in which some of the critics have differed from others as much as they have differed from me.",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2013, Lucinda Riley, chapter 28, in The Midnight Rose, London: Macmillan; republished London: Pan Books, 2014, page 379",
          "text": "Perhaps her refusal to marry him would be the shot across the bows Jack needed to help him face his demons. But somehow she doubted it.",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Alternative form of shot across the bow"
      ],
      "id": "en-shot_across_the_bows-en-noun-DEY1XXV7",
      "links": [
        [
          "shot across the bow",
          "shot across the bow#English"
        ]
      ],
      "tags": [
        "alt-of",
        "alternative"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "shot across the bows"
}

{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "shots across the bows",
      "tags": [
        "plural"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "shots across the bows"
      },
      "expansion": "shot across the bows (plural shots across the bows)",
      "name": "en-noun"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
  "senses": [
    {
      "alt_of": [
        {
          "word": "shot across the bow"
        }
      ],
      "categories": [
        "English countable nouns",
        "English entries with incorrect language header",
        "English lemmas",
        "English multiword terms",
        "English nouns",
        "English terms with quotations"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "1856 March, “Monthly Summary. [United States.]”, in George R[ex] Graham, editor, Graham’s American Monthly Magazine of Literature and Art, volume XLVIII, number 3, Philadelphia, Pa.: George R. Graham, […], →OCLC, page 267, column 1",
          "text": "President [Franklin] Pierce, like a great war ship, fired two shots across the bows of the Congress, to bring matters to.",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1979, P[eter] B[rian] Medawar, “What shall I Do Research on?”, in Advice to a Young Scientist (Alfred P. Sloan Foundation series), New York, N.Y.: Basic Books, pages 13–14",
          "text": "Scientists considered collectively are remarkably single-minded in their views about what is important and what is not. If a graduate student gives a seminar and no one comes or no one asks a question, it is very sad, but not so sad as the question gallantly put by a senior or a colleague that betrays that he hasn't listened to a word. But it is a warning sign, a shot across the bows.",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1992, H[erbert] L[ionel] A[dolphus] Hart, “Postscript”, in The Concept of Law, 3rd edition, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, published 2012, pages 238–239",
          "text": "Though I have fired a few shots across the bows of some of my critics, notably the late Professor Lon Fuller and Professor R[onald] M[yles] Dworkin, I have hitherto made no general comprehensive reply to any of them; I have preferred to watch and learn from a most instructive running debate in which some of the critics have differed from others as much as they have differed from me.",
          "type": "quotation"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2013, Lucinda Riley, chapter 28, in The Midnight Rose, London: Macmillan; republished London: Pan Books, 2014, page 379",
          "text": "Perhaps her refusal to marry him would be the shot across the bows Jack needed to help him face his demons. But somehow she doubted it.",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Alternative form of shot across the bow"
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "shot across the bow",
          "shot across the bow#English"
        ]
      ],
      "tags": [
        "alt-of",
        "alternative"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "shot across the bows"
}