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Baffle   /bˈæfəl/   Listen
noun
Baffle  n.  
1.
A defeat by artifice, shifts, and turns; discomfiture. (R.) "A baffle to philosophy."
2.
(Engin.)
(a)
A deflector, as a plate or wall, so arranged across a furnace or boiler flue as to mingle the hot gases and deflect them against the substance to be heated.
(b)
A grating or plate across a channel or pipe conveying water, gas, or the like, by which the flow is rendered more uniform in different parts of the cross section of the stream; used in measuring the rate of flow, as by means of a weir.
3.
(Coal Mining) A lever for operating the throttle valve of a winding engine. (Local, U. S.)


verb
Baffle  v. t.  (past & past part. baffled; pres. part. baffling)  
1.
To cause to undergo a disgraceful punishment, as a recreant knight. (Obs.) "He by the heels him hung upon a tree, And baffled so, that all which passed by The picture of his punishment might see."
2.
To check by shifts and turns; to elude; to foil. "The art that baffles time's tyrannic claim."
3.
To check by perplexing; to disconcert, frustrate, or defeat; to thwart. "A baffled purpose." "A suitable scripture ready to repel and baffle them all." "Calculations so difficult as to have baffled, until within a... recent period, the most enlightened nations." "The mere intricacy of a question should not baffle us."
Baffling wind (Naut.), one that frequently shifts from one point to another.
Synonyms: To balk; thwart; foil; frustrate; defeat.


Baffle  v. i.  
1.
To practice deceit. (Obs.)
2.
To struggle against in vain; as, a ship baffles with the winds. (R.)





Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48


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"Baffle" Quotes from Famous Books



... nightmare of that meal was ended, Bull began making his rounds. He had chosen his men. Every man he picked was sharp-eyed like Uncle Bill Campbell. They were the men whose inlooking eyes would baffle the sheriff; they were the men capable of suspicions, and such men Bull needed—not ...
— Bull Hunter • Max Brand
... be a pretty thing, if HE should become commander- in-chief!" cried Blucher. "The confusion and wrangling that would ensue would baffle description; for York and Bulow would be even more disobedient to him than they ...
— NAPOLEON AND BLUCHER • L. Muhlbach
... him, Hyacinth Halvey; you are the most man we have to baffle any wrong thing coming in ...
— New Irish Comedies • Lady Augusta Gregory
... the blue sunrise. The entire sky in the north, halfway up to the zenith, was streaked with extraordinary colours, among which jale and dolm predominated. Just as the principal character of an ordinary dawn is mystery, the outstanding character of this dawn was wildness. It did not baffle the understanding, but the heart. Maskull felt no inarticulate craving to seize and perpetuate the sunrise, and make it his own. Instead of that, it agitated and tormented him, like the opening bars of ...
— A Voyage to Arcturus • David Lindsay
... open war between President Buchanan and Senator Douglas. In a general way the Southern Democracy followed Buchanan, while the Northern Democracy followed Douglas. Yet there was just enough local exception to baffle accurate calculation. Could the Charleston Convention heal the feud of leaders, and bridge the chasm in policy and principle? As the time approached, and delegation after delegation was chosen by the States, ...
— Abraham Lincoln, A History, Volume 2 • John George Nicolay and John Hay


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