Sentence:  At 7 : 25 two hotel doormen came thumping down the steps , carrying a saw-horse to be set up as a barricade in front of the haberdashery store window next to the entranceway , and as I watched them in their gaudy red coats that <WSD>nearly</WSD> scraped the ground , their golden , fringed epaulets and spic , red visored caps , I suddenly saw just over their shoulders Jessica gracefully making her way through the crowd . 
Meaning of the word marked with <WSD> tags:  (of actions or states) slightly short of or not quite accomplished; all but