FUMBLING • DICTIONARY ONE.COM • Definition of Fumbling

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/fˈəmbəlɪŋ/ /fˈəmblɪŋ/ Listen

verb

Fumble v. t. To handle or manage awkwardly; to crowd or tumble together.

Fumble v. i. (past & past part. fumbled; pres. part. fumbling)

To feel or grope about; to make awkward attempts to do or find something. "Adams now began to fumble in his pockets."

To grope about in perplexity; to seek awkwardly; as, to fumble for an excuse. "My understanding flutters and my memory fumbles." "Alas! how he fumbles about the domains."

To handle much; to play childishly; to turn over and over. "I saw him fumble with the sheets, and play with flowers."

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Etymology of 'Fumbling'

Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48

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"Fumbling" Quotes from Famous Books

... furiously, and throws them about the floor. The infernal paper is undiscoverable. His distress is now too great for him to pursue the search with the least method. His wandering reason no longer guides him. He staggers, without calculation, from one thing to another, fumbling a dozen times in the same drawer, while he completely forgets others just by him. Then he thinks that this paper may have been hid in the stuffing of a chair. He seizes a sword, and to be certain, he slashes up the drawing-room chairs and ...

— The Mystery of Orcival • Emile Gaboriau

... lectures. He spoke in a deep and mumbling voice, was confused and tedious in manner, and frequently became hopelessly entangled in blind mazes of obscure words. Sometimes when he had written out his lectures he was unable to read them. Once, after fumbling in his pockets, he exclaimed: "Gentlemen, I've been and left my lecture in the hackney-coach." Still he was interested in this work, and Ruskin says: "The zealous care with which Turner endeavored to do his duty is proved by a large existing series of drawings, exquisitely tinted, and often ...

— A History of Art for Beginners and Students: Painting, Sculpture, Architecture - Painting • Clara Erskine Clement

... Delia! It's done to a turn!" and Isabella smiled sweetly at the returning maid, who retreated a step and stood still, fumbling her tray, an embarrassed, determined ...

— The Fate of Felix Brand • Florence Finch Kelly

... joined her a few seconds later she had already found the keys and was fumbling in the dark for ...

— The Keeper of the Door • Ethel M. Dell

... the cabin. It seemed to pause and diverge to the window. At the window it stood still, head bent, looking in. Then it returned quickly to the door. It was too far to discern, even through the glasses, what the figure was doing. Whether the door was locked, whether he was knocking or fumbling with a key, or whether he spoke through the door to the person within—I cannot tell what it was that came through the glasses straight to my nerves, so that I jumped at a sudden sound; and it was only the distant shrill call of an elk. I was handing the glasses to the Virginian ...

— The Jimmyjohn Boss and Other Stories • Owen Wister

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