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Fluster   Listen
verb
Fluster  v. t.  (past & past part. flustered; pres. part. flustering)  To make hot and rosy, as with drinking; to heat; hence, to throw into agitation and confusion; to confuse; to muddle. "His habit or flustering himself daily with claret."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Fluster" Quotes from Famous Books



... behind him and he had turned to shake his lean old fist at the place where W.M.P. presumably was still sitting, "I'll show you how to treat a reputable member of the bar old enough to be your grandfather! I'll take the starch out of your darned Puritan collar! I'll harry you and fluster you and heckle you and make a fool of you, and I'll roll you up in a ball and blow you out the window, and turn old Hassoun loose for an Egyptian holiday that will make old Rome look like thirty piasters! You pinheaded, pretentious, ...
— By Advice of Counsel • Arthur Train

... towards the drawing-room in her best black silk dress, and in what might have been called a fluster of excitement at the thought of a visitor, if such a word had been applicable to her placid life of self-deception. Juanita made some small jest and laughed rather eagerly at it as she passed the pattern lady ...
— The Velvet Glove • Henry Seton Merriman

... and I can possibly manage it, I will ask her myself to make one of your party. If so, you can go to her afterwards and make your own arrangements. Just write her a note, my dear, and say that I will call to-morrow at twelve. It might fluster her if I were to ...
— Doctor Thorne • Anthony Trollope

... a farce, without a doubt! The cause of all this fuss and fluster Is just a housemaid shaking ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 100, April 4, 1891 • Various

... to-night carous'd Potations pottle-deep; and he's to watch: Three lads of Cyprus,—noble swelling spirits, That hold their honours in a wary distance, The very elements of this warlike isle,— Have I to-night fluster'd with flowing cups, And they watch too. Now, 'mongst this flock of drunkards, Am I to put our Cassio in some action That may offend the isle:—but here they come: If consequence do but approve my dream, My boat sails freely, both with wind ...
— Othello, the Moor of Venice • William Shakespeare

... the giant, fine and satisfied, carried his prize off on his back. But after a while he came to a big stone and sat down to ease his shoulders. And he fell a-dozing. Now, when he woke, he started up in a fluster, and called out: ...
— English Fairy Tales • Flora Annie Steel

... whispered in a fluster, pale with excitement, and buttoning his coat as he prodded his wife with his elbow. ...
— Love and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov

... Simeon not only recognises, but welcomes the approach of death. 'Thou lettest Thy servant depart in peace.' Yes, there speaks a calm voice tranquilly accepting the permission. He feels no agitation, no fluster of any kind, but quietly slips away from his post. And the reason for that peaceful welcome of the end is 'for mine eyes have seen Thy salvation.' That sight is the reason, first of all, for his being sure that the curfew had rung for him, and that the day's work was done. But it is also ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren

... instantly warning them, and, in this, alarming their instinct. My particular rabbit had scarcely run out of hearing when half a dozen others were scurrying hither and thither in the same expectant confusion. Poor little things! What a fluster they made, and their scare communicated itself to a crow in a solitary fir-tree, against which I nearly collided. He croaked, flapped his wings and sailed off heavily, blackly, also anxious ...
— The Black Colonel • James Milne

... such men as Archie Clavering do do it—I cannot say; but they do weigh themselves, and know their own weight, and shove themselves aside as being too light for any real service in the world. This they do, though they may fluster with their voices, and walk about with their noses in the air, and swing their canes, and try to look as large as they may. They do not look large, and they know it; and, consequently, they ring the bells, and look after the horses, and shove themselves on one side, so ...
— The Claverings • Anthony Trollope

... had kept her room since the day before, but remained attentive to all that was happening at the Old Mill, had, through her open door and window, heard and seen the hubbub, the fuss made by the servants, all the mad fluster of a house that feels itself threatened by an ...
— The Frontier • Maurice LeBlanc

... on, Nor Demmercrats nuther, thet hev wut to live on; 190 Ef it aint jest the thing thet's well pleasin' to God, It makes us thought highly on elsewhere abroad; The Rooshian black eagle looks blue in his eerie An' shakes both his heads wen he hears o' Monteery; In the Tower Victory sets, all of a fluster, An' reads, with locked doors, how we won Cherry Buster; An' old Philip Lewis—thet come an' kep' school here Fer the mere sake o' scorin his ryalist ruler On the tenderest part of our kings in futuro— Hides his crown underneath ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell

... She rose, all sobs, fluster, and heroism, and walked away. He strode a step or two and stood in front of her with his hands ...
— The Red Planet • William J. Locke

... lot of geese there. Patch thought he would have a bit of fun with the geese one day, so he set off to chase them. There was a great fluster and spreading of wings, and they waddled off a few yards; then they turned suddenly and faced him, stretching out their long necks and hissing, at which Patch turned tail and troubled them ...
— Laugh and Play - A Collection of Original stories • Various

... you did set me all into a fluster. I thought maybe you'd got into one of your tantrums, and come ...
— After the Storm • T. S. Arthur

... opportunity of studying John Bull, as I may say, stuffed naked—his greed, his usuriousness, his hypocrisy, his perfidy of the back-stairs, all swelled to the superlative—such as was well worth the little disarray and fluster of our passage in ...
— St Ives • Robert Louis Stevenson

... still more of those who had followed Puttock, or were reported to be about to follow Coxon, and among them the members for several divisions in and near Kirton. These last, feeling that all the stir was largely for their benefit and on their account, were in a fluster of self-consciousness and apprehension, and very loud in their condemnation of ...
— Half a Hero - A Novel • Anthony Hope

... daughter. I am called to go to bed by Mrs. Jervis, for it is past eleven; and I am sure she shall hear of it; for all this is owing to her, though she did not mean any harm. But I have been, and am, in a strange fluster; and I suppose too, she'll say, I have ...
— Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded • Samuel Richardson

... rush, and always be in great haste, and may talk about being busy, fuming and sweating as if he were doing ten men's duties; and yet some quiet person alongside, who is moving leisurely and without anxious haste, is probably accomplishing twice as much, and doing it better. Fluster unfits one for ...
— Cheerfulness as a Life Power • Orison Swett Marden

... lies in the thought. Why should we fluster ourselves, why wax so hot, when time thus brings its inevitable revenges? Composed in mind, let us pursue our own unruffled course, with calm assurance that justice will at length prevail. Let us comply with the dictates of sweetness ...
— Essays in Rebellion • Henry W. Nevinson

... that spot—standing statue-like and looking along both roads—until I heard the rumble of the departing train, and then I repaired to the Old Hall, my soul uplifted. I found Jone in an awful fluster about my being out so late; but I do stay pretty late sometimes when I walk by myself, and so he hadn't anything ...
— Pomona's Travels - A Series of Letters to the Mistress of Rudder Grange from her Former - Handmaiden • Frank R. Stockton

... most base and black, That puts me in a fluster— My Rover, would she bring you back? No, no, ...
— Punch, Or The London Charivari, Vol. 101, August 22, 1891 • Various

... the platform by the wealthiest citizen of the county. Judge Briscoe, and his daughter, Minnie, and (what stirred wonder to an itch almost beyond endurance) Mr. Fisbee! and they then drove through town on the way to the Briscoe mansion, all four, apparently, in a fluster of pleasure and exhilaration, the strange lady engaged in earnest conversation with Mr. Fisbee ...
— The Gentleman From Indiana • Booth Tarkington

... climb seemed to fluster him; but the afternoon was a hot one, in spite of a light westerly breeze. The two men moved side by side across the garden-slope, and as they did so John caught sight of a twinkle of sunshine on Captain Tangye's ...
— The Laird's Luck • Arthur Quiller-Couch

... about. It would have been something Madam Schuyler would never have been able to get over if aught had been awry when a single uncle or aunt appeared upon the scene, or if there seemed to be the least evidence of fluster and nervousness. ...
— Marcia Schuyler • Grace Livingston Hill Lutz

... was hovering near in his surplice, and the pew-opener was all in a fluster at the idea of a runaway marriage. Brian came out of the dusky background—the daylight being tempered by small painted windows in heavy stone mullions—as Ida entered the church. Everything was ready. Before she knew how it came to pass, she was standing before the altar, and the fatal ...
— The Golden Calf • M. E. Braddon

... deceived by his own hopes, as even shrewd men will be sometimes—either did not notice the fluster I was in, or thought to set matters all right with me in his own way; for when he found that I remained silent he took up the talk himself again, and went on to show in detail the profits of a single venture with a live ...
— In the Sargasso Sea - A Novel • Thomas A. Janvier

... that every thing in it seemed to shine again. A party at Jacob Rhoneland's! It was a thing unheard of, and produced quite a sensation in the drowsy part of the town where he lived. Never had a household been in such a fluster as his was. What deep consultations were held to prevent the old man—who seemed to have grown quite cheerful and light-hearted, and chirruped about the house like some gay old old cricket—from meddling ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, June 1844 - Volume 23, Number 6 • Various

... Found for himself a bitter treasure-trove; Burst his own wyvern on the seal, and read Writhing a letter from his child, for which Came at the moment Leolin's emissary, A crippled lad, and coming turn'd to fly, But scared with threats of jail and halter gave To him that fluster'd his poor parish wits The letter which he brought, and swore besides To play their go-between as heretofore Nor let them know themselves betray'd, and then, Soul-stricken at their kindness to him, went Hating his own lean ...
— Enoch Arden, &c. • Alfred Tennyson

... few moments the old woman returned in a fluster and said, "I knock on de doah, and ...
— An Original Belle • E. P. Roe

... we had met the Village Settlement homeward bound—the bonnie baby still riding on its mother's knee, and smiling out of the depths of its sunbonnet; but every one else was longing for the bush. Darwin had proved all unsatisfying bustle and fluster, and the trackless sea, a wonder that inspired strange sickness ...
— We of the Never-Never • Jeanie "Mrs. Aeneas" Gunn

... interrupted by the violent opening of the door. His Aunt Mirabelle stood there, dynamic, and behind her, in a great fluster of dismay and apprehension, stood the chairman of the Quarters Committee of the ...
— Rope • Holworthy Hall

... rigged up for me in the gig, so that I was not obliged to dress, but simply got out of one bed into another. The gig was towed by the steam-launch, which also trailed the 'Flash' behind in case we might want to land in any shallow place or get aground on a sand or mud bank. After the first little fluster of moving was over it was a great pleasure to me to be once more in the open air after being shut up for what seems so long a time. It felt deliciously warm too, the temperature being 74 deg.. The scenery was beautiful—sandy shores, green woods with high precipitous ...
— The Last Voyage - to India and Australia, in the 'Sunbeam' • Lady (Annie Allnutt) Brassey

... as quarreled wi' he, you see, miss," David answered, "which makes all the odds. He cum to Harry all in a fluster, and said as how he must drow up the land as he'd a'got, or he's place—one or t'other on 'em. And so you see, Miss, as Harry wur kind o' druv to it. 'Twarn't likely as he wur to drow up the land now as he were just reppin' the benefit ov it, and all for Varmer Tester's place, wich ...
— Tom Brown at Oxford • Thomas Hughes



Words linked to "Fluster" :   bear, confuse, perturbation, put off, ruffle, comport, flurry, disconcert, conduct, carry, behave



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