"Baffle" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... is sometimes vaguely referred to the verb foil, to baffle, with which it has no connection. The Fr. feuille, leaf, is also invoked, and compared with Fr. fleuret, a foil, the idea being that the name was given to the "button" at the point. Now the earliest foils and fleurets were not buttoned; first, because they were pointless, and secondly, ...
— The Romance of Words (4th ed.) • Ernest Weekley
... that have incensed me, can in soul Acquit me of that guilt. They know I dare To spurn or baffle them; or squirt their eyes With ink or urine: or I could do worse, Arm'd with Archilochus' fury, write iambicks, Would make ...
— Calamities and Quarrels of Authors • Isaac D'Israeli
... large, and the slave-dealers were fully determined to preserve their profitable monopoly, if by any means they could baffle the Government. The Egyptian officials were also inclined to assist their efforts, and while Gessi was recovering his strength, he had the mortification of seeing the fruits of his earlier success lost by the inaction or more culpable proceedings of his lieutenants. ...
— The Life of Gordon, Volume II • Demetrius Charles Boulger
... that were uppermost, "Mamma died this morning." In a moment it flashed upon her that Dan had read the letter, and was waiting now to see the effect of the shock upon her. She immediately, but involuntarily, set herself to baffle his cruel curiosity. With a calm, illegible face she read the letter from beginning to end, folded it, and put it back in its envelope deliberately, then took up another which had ...
— The Beth Book - Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius • Sarah Grand
... when we followed her, in a couple of hours, she was sleeping soundly. But I can't say either of us slept so well. If a trick was being played upon us, it was carried out in so clever a manner as to baffle me completely. I need not say that I made careful search of every cranny about the handsome house and offices; and if there was a secret passage or a door in the wall anywhere, it escaped me. We had peace for a fortnight, ...
— The Argosy - Vol. 51, No. 4, April, 1891 • Various
... is astonishing how clear even the later Latin language becomes when it touches on congenial subjects, such as agriculture or law. The ancient legal phraseology had been seriously complained of as being so technical as to baffle all but experts in deciphering its meaning. Horace ridicules the cunning of the trained legal intellect in more than one place. But this reproach was no longer just. The series of able and thoughtful writers who had carried out a successive and systematic treatment of ...
— A History of Roman Literature - From the Earliest Period to the Death of Marcus Aurelius • Charles Thomas Cruttwell
... "You baffle me," said the doctor at last, thoroughly discouraged. "Apparently you are sound all over, yet, looking at you, I fail to ...
— Biltmore Oswald - The Diary of a Hapless Recruit • J. Thorne Smith, Jr.
... first, we yet can never pass beyond the principle of self-consciousness. Should we attempt it, we must be driven back from ground to ground, each of which would cease to be a ground the moment we pressed on it. We must be whirled down the gulf of an infinite series. But this would make our reason baffle the end and purpose of all reason, namely, unity and system. Or we must break off the series arbitrarily, and affirm an absolute something that is in and of itself at once cause and effect (causa sui), subject and object, or rather the absolute identity of both. But as this is inconceivable, ...
— Biographia Literaria • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... said my friend, calmly. "Perpetual motion, or squaring the circle, would baffle Gregory. He's ...
— The Face And The Mask • Robert Barr
... is the goal. The pupil gives constant attention to the handwriting as well as to the thought. A number of students of about the same grade, under the same teacher, will write much alike. Fifteen or twenty of these students could each write a line on a page and it might baffle a layman, and perhaps puzzle an expert, to tell whether or not more than one person wrote the page. This constant striving after one ideal, and putting thought on the handwriting, had drawn them all toward that ideal ...
— Disputed Handwriting • Jerome B. Lavay
... and unique, that one leaves the study of them impressed only with a deep, abiding sense of his inability to fathom them. We have in our midst one such, the penetration of whose manifestations and phenomena is well calculated to baffle the most zealous investigator. Reared among the rugged hill-sides and verdant vales of Williamstown, his character and oratory bear the evident impress of his nurturing. If to Elihu Burritt belongs the title of "The Learned Blacksmith," not less to William Pratt ...
— A Williams Anthology - A Collection of the Verse and Prose of Williams College, 1798-1910 • Compiled by Edwin Partridge Lehman and Julian Park
... ascend a ladder and creep through an aperture at the bottom of the sphere. This was not worth the labor, but then we could say we had attained the highest point of the cathedral. I hear that ladies sometimes venture into the ball; if so, their timidity is insufficient to baffle their curiosity. This accomplished, we retraced our steps, and visited the portion of St. Paul's in which divine service is performed. About a dozen boys, dressed in white surplices, were chanting sweetly; a dull-looking clergyman read the service indifferently; ...
— Young Americans Abroad - Vacation in Europe: Travels in England, France, Holland, - Belgium, Prussia and Switzerland • Various
... had but two desires. The first was to live until he had saved as many lives as his carelessness had lost in the Nerbuddha. For it was nothing worse, but mere forgetfulness to change the course: one of those dreadful lapses of memory which baffle all Board of Trade inquiry. You may light, and buoy, and beacon every danger along the coast, and still you leave that small kink in the skipper's brain which will cast away a ship for all your care. The second of ...
— Old Fires and Profitable Ghosts • A. T. Quiller-Couch
... long talk between the earl and his page as to the best course to be pursued. It was clear that their old enemy was the leading person in the plot, and that the only plan to baffle it with any fair chances of success was to keep a constant eye upon his movements, and also to have three or four of the sturdiest men of the band told off to watch, without being perceived, each time that the princess ...
— The Boy Knight • G.A. Henty
... meant to feed on. 360 For the earth-not a use to which they don't turn it, The ore that grows in the mountain's womb, Or the sand in the pits like a honeycomb, They sift and soften it, bake it and burn it— Whether they weld you, for instance, a snaffle With side-bars never a brute can baffle; Or a lock that's a puzzle of wards within wards; Or, if your colt's fore-foot inclines to curve inwards, Horseshoes they hammer which turn on a swivel And won't allow the hoof to shrivel. 370 Then they cast bells like the shell of the ...
— Dramatic Romances • Robert Browning
... prevent surprise whilst the others sleep; and often practise the stratagem of lighting a fire at sunset, which they leave burning, and move on after dark to a more distant encampment—yet these precautions do not always baffle the depredators. Such is the description of men whom the traders of this river have constantly to guard against. It must require a long residence among them and much experience of their manners to overcome the apprehensions their hostility and threats are calculated to excite. Through ...
— The Journey to the Polar Sea • John Franklin
... need, he gave her "for Charity L1.17.6." The majority will sympathize rather than disapprove of his opinion when he wrote, "Workmen in most Countries I believe are necessary plagues;—-in this where entreaties as well as money must be used to obtain their work and keep them to their duty they baffle all calculation in the accomplishment of any plan or repairs they are engaged in;—and require more attention to and looking after than ...
— The True George Washington [10th Ed.] • Paul Leicester Ford
... trained inquirers. That is the advantage of Societies such as ours; so that we don't personally have the unpleasantness. Some cases do baffle everybody. It's ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy
... Nur ed-Din formulated a plan to punish the rebellious Shawir. Persecuted by Shirkuh, Nur ed-Din sent him with his army into Egypt. The Franks now joined with Shawir to defend the country, hoping thereby to baffle the schemes of Nur ed-Din. The Christian army was amazed at all the splendour of the caliph's palace at Cairo. Shawir retreated to entice the invaders on, who, advancing beyond their base, were soon reduced to straits. Shirkuh then ...
— History Of Egypt From 330 B.C. To The Present Time, Volume 12 (of 12) • S. Rappoport
... Sometimes, indeed, when the deaths were less numerous, a hope began to be entertained that the distemper was abating, and confidence was for a moment restored; but these anticipations were speedily checked by the reappearance of the scourge, which seemed to baffle and deride all human skill ...
— Old Saint Paul's - A Tale of the Plague and the Fire • William Harrison Ainsworth
... fell heavily to the ground. Pericord undid the girdle. The motor was uninjured. A sudden strange thought flashed upon him as he looked at it. The machine had become hateful to him. He might dispose both of it and the body in a way that would baffle ...
— The Last Galley Impressions and Tales - Impressions and Tales • Arthur Conan Doyle
... not quite of his opinion, for, dangerous as he knew the Bohemian to be, he thought he could use his services, and, at the same time, baffle his treasonable purpose, now that he saw clearly to what it tended. But his anxiety upon this subject was soon at an end, for the little cavalcade was not an hundred yards from the monastery and the village before Maugrabin joined it, riding as usual on his little ...
— Quentin Durward • Sir Walter Scott
... man was the one emotion that seemed to be left in her withered bosom. To baffle him, to evade him, to anticipate his coming and be away from home, constituted the chief object of ...
— A Romance of Billy-Goat Hill • Alice Hegan Rice
... not men that it is easy to baffle, and at last they found a sphinx in a desert at evening watching a ruined temple whose gods she had eaten hundreds of years ago when her hunger was on her. And they cast chains on her, who was still with an ominous stillness, and took her westwards with them and brought ...
— Fifty-One Tales • Lord Dunsany [Edward J. M. D. Plunkett]
... without effect. Sir George Cary, burning to avenge the injury offered to his commander, sent immediately a letter of defiance to lord Fleming, challenging him to meet him in single combat on this quarrel, when, where and how he dares; concluding thus: "Otherwise I will baffle your good name, sound with the trumpet your dishonor, and paint your picture with the heels upward and bear it in despite of yourself." That this was not the only species of affront to which portraits were in these days exposed, we learn from ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin
... failure; on the contrary, he was one of those men whom opposition stimulates. And what before had been but a suggestion of prudence, became an object of desire. Plenty of other lads might no doubt be had on as reasonable terms as Lenny Fairfield; but the moment Lenny presumed to baffle the Italian's designs upon him, the special acquisition of Lenny became of paramount importance in ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 2, No. 8, January, 1851 • Various
... greeted in surprise as Craig shook hands and introduced Norton. "And Jameson, too? Well, I think you've found a case at last that will baffle you." ...
— The Gold of the Gods • Arthur B. Reeve
... out for a quarreller. Of all disgraces he endures not to be nonplussed, and had rather fly for sanctuary to nonsense which few descry, than to nothing, which all. His boldness is beholden to other men's modesty, which rescues him many times from a baffle; yet his face is good armour, and he is dashed out of anything sooner than countenance. Grosser conceits are puzzled in him for a rare man; and wiser men, though they know him, [yet] take him [in] for their pleasure, or as they would do a sculler ...
— Character Writings of the 17th Century • Various
... prison. The abolition of slavery in my native State and throughout the country, and the lapse of time, render the caution hitherto observed no longer necessary. But even since the abolition of slavery, I have sometimes thought it well enough to baffle curiosity by saying that while slavery existed there were good reasons for not telling the manner of my escape, and since slavery had ceased to exist, there was no reason for telling it. I shall now, however, cease to avail myself of this formula, and, as far as I can, endeavor to satisfy this ...
— The Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, 1995, Memorial Issue • Various
... particularly, to be the most loyal and best disposed, and the most cordial haters of the French, that ever existed; but there is an indolence and a want even of the power of exertion in their disposition and habits, either for their own security, that of their country, or of their allies, which baffle all ...
— Maxims And Opinions Of Field-Marshal His Grace The Duke Of Wellington, Selected From His Writings And Speeches During A Public Life Of More Than Half A Century • Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington
... recognized the deficit as the expectation of the ill fortune which should befall the time, and which still failed to materialize. So strong upon him was the persuasion of evil chances rife in the air to-day that he set himself as definitely to thwart and baffle them as if rationally cognizant of their pursuit. He would not return to his wonted vocation at the distillery, but carried his venison home, where his father, a very old man, with still the fervors of an aesthetic pride, pointed out with approbation the evidence of ...
— The Mystery of Witch-Face Mountain and Other Stories • Charles Egbert Craddock
... were, of course, conducted with caution and remoteness. Gylingden, however, was one of those places which, if it knows anything, is sure to find a way of telling it, and the attorney was soon satisfied that Mark's secret visit had been conducted with sufficient caution to baffle the eyes and ears of the good folk ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu
... personal safety. He had made up his mind to communicate the secret of his enterprise to none until the moment of its execution; and this being accomplished, his ultimate plans were laid, as he thought, with sufficient skill to baffle pursuit and defeat either the malice of his enemies or the ...
— Fardorougha, The Miser - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... to translate these sentences into the true statement of his opinions, in order to baffle this angry and impotent attack; the self-righteousness of all who expect to claim salvation on the plea of their own personal merit. "Pay to A. B. at sight—value received by me."—To Messrs. Stone and Co. Bankers, Heaven-Gate. It is a ...
— Coleridge's Literary Remains, Volume 4. • Samuel Taylor Coleridge
... inherited both the truth and the error of Columbus. His career is one of those irritating mysteries which baffle the most patient inquiry. Born at Genoa, and naturalized in 1476 at Venice after fifteen years' residence, he seems to have settled in England eight or nine years before the close of the fifteenth century. Already his life had been an adventurous ...
— The Story of Newfoundland • Frederick Edwin Smith, Earl of Birkenhead
... enthusiasm; and the exile of an eloquent and popular fanatic would diffuse the mischief through the provinces of Arabia. His death was resolved; and they agreed that a sword from each tribe should be buried in his heart, to divide the guilt of his blood, and baffle the vengeance of the Hashemites. An angel or a spy revealed their conspiracy; and flight was the only resource of Mahomet. [117] At the dead of night, accompanied by his friend Abubeker, he silently escaped from his house: the assassins watched at the ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 5 • Edward Gibbon
... spectacle with profound reverence, sure that through it all is working some divine power. Goodness is dear to the gods, wickedness is abhorrent to them. But the good man is often unhappy,—from strange inheritance of curse, or from complication of events which no wisdom can baffle. Yet from the discipline of suffering emerges the noblest character, and over the grave itself play gleams of ...
— The Chief End of Man • George S. Merriam
... winnaw," cried Hal o' Nabs, "yo're neaw taen yet, feyther abbut, an' ey knoa a way to baffle 'em. If y'on let him down into t' river, Ebil, ey'n manage to ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth
... somewhat different. Why, it is a veritable romance—an affair of Daphne and Corydon—although, to be unpardonably candid, the plot of your romance, my young Arcadians, is not the most original conceivable. I think that the denouement need not baffle our imaginations." ...
— The Certain Hour • James Branch Cabell
... as by the English Government, as to the course to be adopted during its deliberations. He was fully persuaded in his own mind that Sir Alfred Milner, being still a new arrival in South Africa, had not been able to grasp its complicated problems, and so had not adopted the best means to baffle the intrigues of President Kruger and the diplomacy of his clever colleague, President Steyn. At every tale which reached Cecil Rhodes concerning the difficulties encountered by Sir Alfred, he declared that he was "glad to be out of this mess." Yet ...
— Cecil Rhodes - Man and Empire-Maker • Princess Catherine Radziwill
... us in Brussels—at the centre," he said, hastily. "Whatever vigorous action originated in Hermione Street seemed doomed to failure. Something always happened to baffle the best planned manifestations in every part of Europe. It was a time of general activity. You must not imagine that all our failures are of a loud sort, with arrests and trials. That is not so. Often ...
— A Set of Six • Joseph Conrad
... any rate, Peteiro had given no signs of possessing much cunning. To all appearances he was a tough, go-ahead fighter, with a right which would drill a hole in a steel plate. Had he sufficient skill to baffle his (Sheen's) strong tactics? If only Joe Bevan would come! With Joe in his corner to direct him, he ...
— The White Feather • P. G. Wodehouse
... express the meaning in the form of logical definitions than in the way of the simple reader of the Bible, who desires to sit at the feet of Jesus, and learn the one thing needful from his lips. In this, as in many other portions of Scripture, a hungry labourer may live upon the bread, while it may baffle a philosopher to analyze its constituents, and expound its nutritive qualities. A devout reader may get the meaning of the parable in power upon his heart, while the logical interpreter expends much profitless labour in the dissection of a ...
— The Parables of Our Lord • William Arnot
... to the exit, and the young man noticing this, became momentarily tongue-tied, but nevertheless persisted, with a certain awkward doggedness which was not going to allow so slight a hint that his further attendance was unnecessary, to baffle him. He did not speak until they had passed down the stone steps to the pavement, and then his utterance began with a half-embarrassed stammer, as if the shadow of displeasure demanded justification ...
— A Rock in the Baltic • Robert Barr
... baffle, deter, dissuade, hinder, confound, disapprove, expose, impede, counteract, disconcert, frustrate, ...
— English Synonyms and Antonyms - With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions • James Champlin Fernald
... genius, his haunting fiend. He had conceived a profound terror of her from the moment he perceived that she was resolutely bent upon making him honest. He had broken from her years ago, fled, resumed his evil courses, hid himself from her,—in vain. Wherever he went, there went she. He might baffle the police, not her. Hunger had often forced him to accept her aid. As soon as he received it, he hid from her again, burying himself deeper and deeper in the mud, like a persecuted tench. He associated her idea with all ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... are starting-points to an azimuth circle, and command them to search and find out the ultimate causes of things in the universe, but the forever narrowing circle in one direction, and the forever widening one in the other, would utterly baffle all their attempted research. Whether they descended into the microscopic world, with its myriad-thronged conditions of life, or passed upward and outward, in Sirius-distances, to the irresolvable nebulA|, where other and perhaps brighter stars might burst upon their view—gleaming ...
— Life: Its True Genesis • R. W. Wright
... to watch the operations of nature, that he may be led to just perceptions of the greatness of the Creator, and the goodness of his immutable laws. Soon he finds his perceptions dim, and is conscious of evil propensities, which baffle all his efforts at sinless perfection. He finds nothing in nature to solve the solemn inquiry how sin is to be pardoned, and evil thoughts and habits to be rooted out. The convinced sinner then feels the necessity ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... to my embrace * Which clips him all about like the tendrils of the vine And shed a flood of softness on the hardness of his heart, * He yielded though at first he was minded to decline; And dreading lest the railer's eye should light upon his form, * Came armoured with caution to baffle his design: His waist makes moan of hinder cheeks that weigh upon his feet * Like heavy load of merchandise upon young camel li'en; Girt with his glances scymitar which seemed athirst for blood, * And clad in ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... silent as her schoolboy brother. Seemingly a prey to the fateful maiden meditations which baffle a father's penetration and even a mother's sagacity, it was impossible to be certain whether it was the lamplight that cast those shadows that flitted over her face like thin clouds over a bright sky, or whether they were passing shades of ...
— A Woman of Thirty • Honore de Balzac
... complicated locks which had helped to guarantee the late Mrs. Allerton against burglars. There was not only a bolt, a chain, and an ordinary lock, but there was an ingenious double lock which turned the wrong way when you thought you were turning it the right, and could otherwise baffle the unskilful. Occupied with this task he could peep over his shoulder, through the unlighted front drawing-room, and see his adored one standing on the hearthrug, his hands clasped behind him, and his head bent, ...
— The Dust Flower • Basil King
... had not been for them, I would have gone to West Point with you, Bob. But, above all else in the world I enjoy pitting my wits against another's—enjoy unravelling mysteries that baffle others. To me there is no excitement equal to a man hunt. I suppose in a way it is an inheritance; my father was a great criminal lawyer, and his father before him. When Pinkerton organized the Secret Service division of the army in '61, ...
— The Lost Despatch • Natalie Sumner Lincoln
... could find out whether they were looking for him or not. They came nearer and then vanished, and he sat down and speculated about his line of retreat. Their disappearance was suspicious, and although he thought he could baffle the rural police, it would be different if he had gamekeepers to ...
— Carmen's Messenger • Harold Bindloss
... watching 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
... retiring to Metapontum, were taken to Tarentum by mistaking the roads; where they were seized by some Roman foragers, who were straggling through the fields, and brought before the proprietor, Caius Claudius. At first they endeavoured to baffle him by evasive answers, but threats of applying torture being held out to them, they were compelled to confess the truth; when they fully admitted that they were the bearers of a letter from Hasdrubal to Hannibal. They were delivered into the ...
— History of Rome, Vol III • Titus Livius
... crime, especially in the great ones, there exists a third element, preeminently vital. This third element the master plotters have either overlooked or else have not had the genius to construct. They plan with rare cunning to baffle the victim. They plan with vast wisdom, almost genius, to baffle the trailer. But they fail utterly to provide any plan for baffling the punisher. Ergo, their plots are fatally defective and often ...
— Stories by Modern American Authors • Julian Hawthorne
... and excitement? Let the wind baffle and drop in a heavy tide- way just as you are sailing your little sloop through a narrow draw-bridge. Behold your sails, upon which you are depending, flap with sudden emptiness, and then see the impish wind, ...
— The Human Drift • Jack London
... these mysteries may surprise and baffle a reason deprived of principle; but they are never contrary to it, because they proceed from reason itself, from that Supreme Reason which created us in its own image; and, by that very fact, is always in accord with individual ...
— Delsarte System of Oratory • Various
... worthily reveal the secret of the sadness in that haunting face, to which sculptors alone have done full justice. There are hints scattered through his poems that startlingly supplement the vague clues which now tantalise and baffle as we trace the story ...
— Romance of Roman Villas - (The Renaissance) • Elizabeth W. (Elizbeth Williams) Champney
... powers, every step of its progress marked by false professions, by broken pledges, by a steady degradation of moral fiber among all those engaged in the scheme. The opposition to it—as usually happens—consisted partly in the natural effort of partisans to baffle their opponents, and partly in an honorable protest of heart and conscience against a great wrong committed in the interest of a national sin. But looking back upon the whole transaction—even over so ...
— Abraham Lincoln: A History V1 • John G. Nicolay and John Hay
... since taking ground, some for Scott and some for McLean. Who will be nominated neither I nor any one else can tell. Now, let me pray to you in turn. My prayer is that you let nothing discourage or baffle you, but that, in spite of every difficulty, you send us a good Taylor delegate from your circuit. Make Baker, who is now with you, I suppose, help about it. He is a good hand to ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln
... Sir, I think from my soul, is nothing but a stipulation for national ignominy; an illusory expedient, to baffle the resentment of the nation; a truce without the suspension of hostilities on the part of Spain; on the part of England a suspension, as to Georgia, of the first law of nature, self-preservation and self-defence—surrender ...
— Selected Speeches on British Foreign Policy 1738-1914 • Edgar Jones
... penetrated my perceptions long since. Of course I remembered young Bretton well; and though ten years (from sixteen to twenty-six) may greatly change the boy as they mature him to the man, yet they could bring no such utter difference as would suffice wholly to blind my eyes, or baffle my memory. Dr. John Graham Bretton retained still an affinity to the youth of sixteen: he had his eyes; he had some of his features; to wit, all the excellently-moulded lower half of the face; I found ...
— Villette • Charlotte Bronte
... stalk, like a pile of dingy chalk; Disappeared the cypress walk, and the flowers; And a donjon-keep arose, that might baffle any foes, With its men-at-arms in rows, ...
— The Bon Gaultier Ballads • William Edmonstoune Aytoun
... patient has been subject to the packs from the beginning of the disease, there will be cases when water-treatment can neither prevent such an event or even save the life of the patient afflicted by scarlet-fever. There will be a case, now and then, to baffle any mode of treatment, and the physician must not be blamed for losing a patient of scarlatina occasionally, but it is not necessary that people should continue to die of this disease in such numbers, as they have been destroyed ...
— Hydriatic treatment of Scarlet Fever in its Different Forms • Charles Munde
... know what to advise"—distractedly. "If we give our suspicions publicity, Arthur Dynecourt may even yet find time and opportunity to baffle and disappoint us. Besides which, we may be wrong. He may have had nothing ...
— The Haunted Chamber - A Novel • "The Duchess"
... scene, during which I could guess that the denouement of the play was near at hand, I went to my charming countess, taking care to change my gondola three times—a necessary precaution to baffle spies. ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt
... though well-travelled road on the south shore which led to St. Valier. Angelique was crafty enough amid her impulsiveness to see that it were better for Fanchon to go down by water and return by land: it lessened observation, and might be important one day to baffle inquiry. La Corriveau would serve her for money, but for money also she might betray her. Angelique resolved to secure her silence by making her the perpetrator of whatever scheme of wickedness she might devise against the unsuspecting lady of Beaumanoir. As for ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby
... sound of the outboard motor could be heard at the mansion, and decided it probably could not. The heavy marsh grass was a good sound baffle and the motor was relatively quiet. He leaned out, trying to see ahead. There were many birds in the swamp, and next to the boat a surprised snapping turtle looked up briefly, then scurried into ...
— The Flying Stingaree • Harold Leland Goodwin
... whether the resolution to sanction the enormous attendant damage would be displayed. It is said that the national spirit does not beat so high as when the youthful William resorted to that measure in 1672 to baffle the French monarch, and then prepared his fleet, in the event of its failure, to convey the relics of Dutch greatness and the fortunes of Orange to a new home and country beyond the seas. On that occasion the waters did their ...
— Dutch Life in Town and Country • P. M. Hough
... place for the pursued deer to take to the water in their endeavor to baffle the hounds following their tracks, and from my station on the long point I could watch and ...
— Golden Days for Boys and Girls, Vol. XIII, Nov. 28, 1891 • Various
... things—to make plans mentally or upon paper, and another thing to carry them out. A general lays down his plan of campaign, but a dozen hazards of the war may tend to baffle and spoil courses which seem as they are laid down sure ways leading ...
— !Tention - A Story of Boy-Life during the Peninsular War • George Manville Fenn
... phenomena received by a series of instruments of delicate construction and capable of exposing the least attempt at fraud. Those who were present at the circles with him declare that he would frequently make his appearance with a new instrument and a face full of grim expectancy that he would now baffle the powers that had baffled him on previous occasions, and that he would retire with a countenance of settled despondency as the unseen something set at nought his deep-laid plans and secret hopes. It will suffice to say here that his experiments ended in his accepting ...
— Lippincott's Magazine, September, 1885 • Various
... breath, as if he had been writing with his heart's blood. Folding up the paper, he hid it inside his shirt and began his dogged walk, calculating the chances of escape. Once out of this shed, he could baffle a blood-hound, he knew the ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 54, April, 1862 • Various
... southern night, with its sense of rich, luscious, breathing intensity, lay over that romantic spot in Southern Rhodesia where the grey walls of the Zimbabwe ruins, with a sublime, imperturbable indifference, continue to baffle the ingenuity and ravish the curiosity of all who would read their story. Scientists, archaeologists, tourists come and go, but the stern old walls, guarded by the sentinel hills, give back no answer to eager questioning, eager ...
— The Rhodesian • Gertrude Page
... the provision adopted by the mercy of the Creator to preserve religion in the world. Outside the Catholic Church all things tend to atheism. The Catholic Church is the one face to face antagonist, able to withstand and baffle the fierce energy of passion and the all-dissolving scepticism of the mind. I am a Catholic by virtue of my belief in God. If I should be asked why I believe in God, I should answer, because I believe in myself. I find it impossible to believe in myself, without believing ...
— Edward Caldwell Moore - Outline of the History of Christian Thought Since Kant • Edward Moore
... far astride, his oilskins dripping, his feet awash to the ankles, spume drenching and whipping him, the wind a lash—brought exultation and a sense of mastery and confidence such as he had never before held suggestion of. To guide the ship, constantly to baffle the sea and wind, the turbulence, buffeting bows and run and counter, smashing at the rudder, leaping always like a pack of yapping hounds—this was a thing that left the days of his water-front detail ...
— A Man to His Mate • J. Allan Dunn
... plan a robbery that was to mulet the Adams Express Company of $100,000, baffle the renowned Pinkertons for weeks and excite universal admiration for its ...
— Jim Cummings • Frank Pinkerton
... have previously mentioned; excessive capitalization, investment write-ups and security manipulations; price rigging and collusive bidding in defiance of the spirit of the antitrust laws by methods which baffle prosecution under the present statutes. They include high-pressure salesmanship which creates cycles of overproduction within given industries and consequent recessions in production until such time as the surplus is consumed; ...
— State of the Union Addresses of Franklin D. Roosevelt • Franklin D. Roosevelt
... escape, and the thought brought him back to the consideration of his own situation. A sudden unreasonable disgust of the conditions which made his salvation so improbable seized upon him. He reflected that he might still baffle fate by taking his own life, and for an instant the idea of thus escaping from all the vexations which surrounded him presented itself to his mind in alluring colors. The idea of self- destruction was one with which ...
— The Philistines • Arlo Bates
... there is nothing even in all these urgencies to justify a single lie or fraud, there is much to sharpen a man's wits to secure the sale of his goods,—much to educate him in all manner of expedients to baffle the inquiries of customers who would be offended, if they could discover that he ever charged them the profit without which he could never meet his expenses. And the jobber's problem is complicated by the folly, universally prevalent among buyers, ...
— Atlantic Monthly Volume 7, No. 40, February, 1861 • Various
... bury the calves, hopelessly deep, indeed, for any of the herd but himself to venture through—he gave a wistful look towards the depths of the cedar swamps in the valley, where he believed he could baffle all pursuers. Then his courage—but without his autumnal fighting rage—came back to him. His herd was his care. He crowded the cows and calves between himself and the snow, and turned to face his pursuers as they came running and ...
— Kings in Exile • Sir Charles George Douglas Roberts
... of which, if we mistake not, man's position is precisely similar—placed, that is, amidst evidence abundantly sufficient to justify his reasonable faith, and yet attended with difficulties abundantly sufficient to baffle ...
— Reason and Faith; Their Claims and Conflicts • Henry Rogers
... her feeling she had thus found the way to show she was not simple. It struck out of Mrs. Wix that this lady still believed her moral sense to be interested and feigned; so what could be such a gage of her sincerity as a peep of the most restless of the passions? Such a revelation would baffle discouragement, and discouragement was in fact so baffled that, helped in some degree by the mere intensity of their need to hope, which also, according to its nature, sprang from the dark portent of ...
— What Maisie Knew • Henry James
... heavily before he shipped; but the captain was evidently too short of hands to be particular. I think I will give the Concanens my tin box to hide in their cabin. Of course I can trust them, and this will baffle theft; the clasp I will wear about me. This is a happy idea; I will go to their cabin now and ask them. It is 9.30 p.m., and the wind ...
— Dead Man's Rock • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... gentleman's head. As to the ball, we do not recollect ever to have seen one in the works of any of the old masters so true to nature. In conclusion, the buttons on the jacket, and the button-holes, companions thereto, would baffle the criticism of the most hyper-fastidious stab-rag; and the shirt collar, with every other detail—never forgetting the chiaro-scuro—are equal to any ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... before his departure, King Afridun had gone in to her and asked her, "How shall I do and what plan shall I pursue?; it is thou hast caused this great distress to us;" and she had answered, "O great King and mighty Cohen![FN389] I will teach thee a trick would baffle Iblis himself, though he summon to his assistance all his grisly hosts."—And Shahrazad perceived the dawn of day and ceased to ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... is almost impossible to compose and print, with perfect accuracy, a work of this size, in which so many little things should be observed, remembered, and made exactly to correspond. There is no human vigilance which multiplicity may not sometimes baffle, and minuteness sometimes elude. To most persons grammar seems a dry and difficult subject; but there is a disposition of mind, to which what is arduous, is for that very reason alluring. "Quo difficilius, ...
— The Grammar of English Grammars • Goold Brown
... cousin as she paused before answering. He felt that the question must baffle her. He did not comprehend what was behind her ...
— The Puritans • Arlo Bates
... than I had intended, and I signified to Lord Bolingbroke my intention of quitting him by sunrise the next morning. He endeavoured in vain to combat my resolution. I was too fearful lest Montreuil, hearing of his danger from the state, might baffle my vengeance by seeking some impenetrable asylum, to wish to subject my meeting with him and with Gerald, whose co-operation I desired, to any unnecessary delay. I took leave of my host therefore that night, and ordered my carriage to be in ...
— Devereux, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton
... and galloped off with his horse's shoes turned backward, so as to baffle pursuit. He came safely, on the fifth day, to his own border castle of Lochmaben, where he found his brother Edward. Keeping watch, they seized a messenger on his way to the English court, bearing ...
— Cameos from English History, from Rollo to Edward II • Charlotte Mary Yonge
... the Diana Gallery, were equally sumptuous. The Emperor, however, especially delighted in the masked balls, when, changing his Imperial robes for a simple domino, he whose police system was so perfect, who knew and saw everything, used to baffle the women, and tease or surprise ...
— The Happy Days of the Empress Marie Louise • Imbert De Saint-Amand
... planet's history, yet among simians it will be apt to come from second-rate motives. Greed, selfishness or fear-thoughts will be the incentives, the bribes. Contrivances, rather than continence, will be the method. How audacious, and how disconcerting to Nature, to baffle her thus I Even into her shrine they must thrust their bold paws to control her. Another race viewing them in the garlanded chambers of love, unpacking their singular devices, might think them grotesque: but the busy little simians will ...
— This Simian World • Clarence Day Jr.
... the Ramesside period; the writing is careful and for the most part very distinct; some lacunae are met with toward the end, and in a few passages the characters baffle the present ...
— Egyptian Literature
... to Brant's abilities as a military leader, there will continue to exist differences of opinion. That he possessed the craftiness of his race in a superlative degree, and that he used this to baffle his opponents on the field of battle, cannot be denied. Some will go further and assert that he had a remarkable genius in the art of stratagem. Whatever powers he had he used, from his boyhood days, in the interests of British rule in America, and the services rendered by this ...
— The War Chief of the Six Nations - A Chronicle of Joseph Brant - Volume 16 (of 32) in the series Chronicles of Canada • Louis Aubrey Wood
... our agent there. I would have given a good deal at that moment for a few words with him. But I knew of no Mulligans in Kildormey, although, of course, there might be. I was born myself only a few miles from the place. Now, thinks I to myself, if these two children can baffle a purser who has been twenty years on the Atlantic when they say they came from his own town almost, by the powers they deserve their passage over the ocean. I had often seen grown people try to cheat their way across, and I may say none of ...
— In a Steamer Chair And Other Stories • Robert Barr
... consisted in leaving her stepmother in doubt. She more than suspected, not without cause, that Fraulein Schult was false to her, and had the wit to baffle all the ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... profit from their annihilation; but since the distemper they have spread seems incurable, since their contagion bids defiance to the medicine of advice or reprehension, and since they are found to baffle all the mental art of physic, save what is prescribed by the slow regimen of Time, and bitter diet of Experience; surely all attempts to contribute to the number of those which may be read, if not with advantage, at least without injury, ought rather to be encouraged ...
— Evelina • Fanny Burney
... upon the matter, I naturally grew obstinate also, and he spent his whole day in trying to catch me up, while I spent mine in trying to baffle him, and we seemed to be playing at hide-and-seek; the consequences were, that when it was getting dark, I had completely lost myself in the most deserted part of the moor. There was no cottage near, and not even a church spire in the distance. The only ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume III (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant
... as he had baffled his own commanders in the past, so now did Devers baffle all. Far from interfering or assuming control, he did so only when in actual command at mounted inspection or drill, and then in the most courteous way of which he was capable. He declined to overhaul or inspect the quarters or stables of the other troops, which, as battalion ...
— Under Fire • Charles King
... or, if thrown at when outside, to dodge the rope by lying as flat as possible on the ground. Thus Lincoln unwittingly taught the Coyote the dangers and limitations of a rope, and so he proved a blessing in disguise—a very perfect disguise. When the Coyote had thoroughly learned how to baffle the lasso, the boy terror devised a new amusement. He got a large trap of the kind known as "Fox-size." This he set in the dust as he had seen Jake set a Wolf-trap, close to the kennel, and over it he scattered scraps of meat, in the most approved style for Wolf-trapping. After a while ...
— Johnny Bear - And Other Stories From Lives of the Hunted • E. T. Seton
... who when they hear Such tidings, hasten. O ye race of men Though born to soar, why suffer ye a wind So slight to baffle ye? He led us on Where the rock parted; here against my front Did beat his wings, then promis'd I should fare In safety on my way. As to ascend That steep, upon whose brow the chapel stands (O'er Rubaconte, looking ...
— The Divine Comedy, Complete - The Vision of Paradise, Purgatory and Hell • Dante Alighieri
... nettle danger. It was then and there that Washington[6] proposed making a flank march to Princeton that very night, boldly throwing themselves upon the enemy's communications, defeating such reenforcements as might be found in the way, and perhaps dealing such a blow as would, if successful, baffle all the enemy's plans. ...
— The Campaign of Trenton 1776-77 • Samuel Adams Drake
... however, every now and then, and many sore evils does the Destroyer suffer at their hands. By faith and fortitude, however, and the occasional assistance of the magic implements he strips them of, he is enabled to baffle and elude their malice, till he is conducted, at last, to the Domdaniel cavern, where he finds them assembled, and pulls down the roof of it upon their heads and his own; perishing, like Samson, in the final ...
— Famous Reviews • Editor: R. Brimley Johnson
... subjected to an examination, in the hope that something might be found to incriminate her in the words of those who might hardly be able to estimate the exact value of their expressions. The princess had been old enough to baffle the utmost malice of her questioners; and the boy had given short and plain replies from which nothing to suit their purpose could be extracted, till they forced him to drink brandy, and, when he ...
— The Life of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France • Charles Duke Yonge
... drive her back: the mystery of the thing; the desire to baffle, or at least to discover, a dark design; the wish to be of service to her mistress; and the hope of finding out something which would keep Iris from going back to her husband. Fanny was unable to comprehend the depth of her mistress's affection ...
— Blind Love • Wilkie Collins
... festival, and in something of the same spirit Pons' thoughts turned to the coming end. In his tender love he tried to protect Schmucke when he should be low in the grave. It was this father's thought that led him to fix his choice upon the leading lady of the ballet. Mlle. Brisetout should help him to baffle surrounding treachery, and those who in all probability would never forgive his ...
— Cousin Pons • Honore de Balzac
... retirement sown In youth, and 'mid the world kept pure As when their earliest flowers of hope were blown, Must perish; how can they this blight endure? And must he, too, his old delights disown, Who scorns a false, utilitarian lure 'Mid his paternal fields at random thrown? Baffle the threat, bright scene, from Orrest-head, Given to the pausing traveller's rapturous glance! Plead for thy peace, thou beautiful romance Of nature; and if human hearts be dead, Speak, passing ...
— Railway Adventures and Anecdotes - extending over more than fifty years • Various
... their own use, it is time to remedy so dangerous an omission; or if the law has been perverted from its original purposes, and criminals deserving to be punished under its provisions have been rescued by legal subtleties, it ought to be made so plain by amendatory provisions as to baffle the arts of perversion and accomplish the ends of its ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... which they could not previously depend. The extraordinary difficulty of penetrating into this country had now been fully experienced; where unexpected delays from deep ravines and other obstacles, frequently force the traveller from his direct course, and baffle every conjecture concerning the time required for passing a certain tract. The utmost extent of this excursion in a direct line had not been more than thirty miles, and it had taken up five days. ...
— The Voyage Of Governor Phillip To Botany Bay • Arthur Phillip
... some of them in the name of Jesus himself, that this world is a vale of tears, and that our lives had better be passed in sorrow and even in torment, as a preparation for a better life to come. Make these sad people comfortable; and they baffle you by putting on hair shirts. None the less, governments must proceed on dogmatic assumptions, whether they call them dogmas or not; and they must clearly be assumptions common enough to stamp those who reject them as eccentrics ...
— Preface to Androcles and the Lion - On the Prospects of Christianity • George Bernard Shaw
... judge. At one moment it exceeded not the common height, at another her forehead seemed to strike the sky; and whenever she raised her head higher, she began to pierce within the very heavens, and to baffle the eyes of them that looked upon her. Her garments were of an imperishable fabric, wrought with the finest threads and of the most delicate workmanship; and these, as her own lips afterwards assured me, ...
— The Consolation of Philosophy • Boethius
... kept the steward waiting while he studied the menu. Dick, who envied his coolness, thought it indicated one of two things: Kenwardine knew he was beaten and was philosophically resigned, or had some plan by which he hoped to baffle his pursuers. Now and then Dick looked at Don Sebastian inquiringly, but the Spaniard answered with an ...
— Brandon of the Engineers • Harold Bindloss
... showed Irving's great ability was the scene in the forest of Montmorency, where, as Robespierre, he reveals at one moment, in his talk with the English envoy, his ambition, his overestimate of himself, his suspicion of everybody and everything, his willingness to be cruel to any extent in order to baffle possible enemies; and then, next moment, on the arrival of his young friends, boys and girls, the sentimental, Rousseau side of his character. This transition was very striking. The changes in the expression of Irving's face were marvelous—as wonderful as those in his Louis XI; but that ...
— Autobiography of Andrew Dickson White Volume II • Andrew Dickson White
... are some natures so essentially base, so incapable of being affected by kindness, so dead to honour and generosity, that they will not scruple to conspire or set themselves individually to escape and baffle the wise precautions undertaken for their benefit. I will not name the dastards at present—they themselves can look into their hearts and see their ...
— Vice Versa - or A Lesson to Fathers • F. Anstey
... to notice, that among Swift's eccentricities, we find a propensity to "out-of-the-way rhymes." In his works are numerous examples of couplets made apparently for no other purpose but to show that no word could baffle him; and the anecdote of his long research for a rhyme for the name of his old enemy Serjent Betsworth, and of the curious accident by which he obtained it, is well known; from which we may conclude that he was on the watch for occasions of exhibiting such rhymes as rakewell ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 185, May 14, 1853 • Various
... speed; but he started too late, and was further delayed by a strong wind which the Fairy raised behind the young couple so as to baffle any pursuit. ...
— The Yellow Fairy Book • Leonora Blanche Alleyne Lang
... sweetly chous'd the States, By Bergen-baffle grown more wise; And made 'em shit as small as rats, By their rich Smyrna fleet's surprise: Had haughty Holmes, but call'd in Spragg, Hans had been put into ...
— The Lives of the Poets of Great Britain and Ireland (1753) - Volume II • Theophilus Cibber
... said, to all men sweet is, Death to all must bitter be; Wherefore thus, oh, mother Thetis! None can baffle Jove's decree? I am ready, I am willing, To resign my stormy life; Weary of this long blood-spilling, Sated ...
— Poems • Adam Lindsay Gordon
... appeared probable enough, and it was with no pleasant feelings that when darkness came I mentally surveyed the situation, and bethought me of some plan by which to baffle those who sought ...
— The Great Lone Land - A Narrative of Travel and Adventure in the North-West of America • W. F. Butler
... scene on our entrance was very striking. There were three thousand people present in full dress; from the roof to the floor, the theatre was decorated magnificently; and the light, glitter, glare, show, noise, and cheering, baffle my descriptive powers. We were walked in through the centre of the centre dress-box, the front whereof was taken out for the occasion; so to the back of the stage, where the mayor and other dignitaries received us; and we ...
— The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete • John Forster
... might be the utterance of the same person, when he has grasped the fact that the loved one is determined to elude him. She may baffle his pursuit, but he will never desist from it, though ...
— A Handbook to the Works of Browning (6th ed.) • Mrs. Sutherland Orr
... consummated: "This is now the time for humbling the whole House of Bourbon: and if this opportunity is let slip, we shall never find another! Their united power, if suffered to gather strength, will baffle our most vigorous efforts, and possibly plunge us in the gulf of ruin. We must not allow them a moment to breathe. Self-preservation bids us crush them before they can combine or recollect themselves."—"No evidence ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XX. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... remember how Herod and Luther died of a diet of Glow-worms," and while the Nightingale (who was by no means a bad bird at stomach) was considering these propositions, escaped, hanging out false lights to baffle his enemy's pursuit. ...
— Humour of the North • Lawrence J. Burpee
... beneath that of your Lordships, the lowest, though once most useful portion of the people, should forget their duty in their distresses, and become only less guilty than one of their representatives? But while the exalted offender can find means to baffle the law, new capital punishments must be devised, new snares of death must be spread for the wretched mechanic, who is famished into guilt. These men were willing to dig, but the spade was in other hands: they were not ashamed to beg, but ...
— The Works of Lord Byron: Letters and Journals, Volume 2. • Lord Byron |
