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A disagreeable mixture or confusion of things; hence, a situation resulting from blundering or from misunderstanding; as, he made a mess of it. [Colloq.]

cially by exciting quarrels. -- To play the mischief, to cause great harm; to throw into confusion. [Colloq.]

Disorder; confusion; tumult from insubordination. Enormous riot and misrule surveyed. Pope. Abbot, or Lord, of Misrule. See under Abbot, and Lord.

Obscurity or confusion, as in treatment of a subject; intellectual dullness.

A state of confusion or disorder; -- prob. variant of mess, but influenced by muss, a scramble. [Colloq. U.S.]

med the child Ichabod. 1 Sam. iv. 21. Thus was the building left Ridiculous, and the work Confusion named. Milton.

In utter confusion; with confused violence. "Men, horses, chariots, crowded pellmell." Milton.

ented as animated, or endowed with personality; prosopopas, the floods clap their hands. "Confusion heards his voice." Milton.

Bustle; confusion; tumult; flutter; bother. [Written also potter, and pudder.] "What a pother and stir!" Oldham. "Coming on with a terrible pother." Wordsworth.

Conjuration attended with great noise and confusion, and often with feasting, dancing, etc., performed by Indians for the cure of diseases, to procure success in hunting or in war, and for other purposes.

Promiscuousness; confusion. H. Spencer.

A state of perplexity or anxiety; confusion; bother; agitation. [Prov. Eng. & Colloq. U. S.]

To collect, and reduce to order, as troops dispersed or thrown into confusion; to gather again; to reunite.

To fall into perplexity and confusion. [Obs.] Till, by their own perplexities involved, They ravel more, still less resolved. Milton.

gh abuse of power by the pontiffs to whose care it was committed, this calendar fell into confusion. It was replaced by the Julian calendar. In designating the days of the month, the Romans reckoned backward from three fixed points, the calends, the nones, and the ides. The calends were always the first day of the mont…

The state of being disorganized and thrown into confusion; -- said especially of an army defeated, broken in pieces, and put to flight in disorder or panic; also, the act of defeating and breaking up an army; as, the rout of the enemy was complete. thy army . . . Dispersed in rout, betook them all to fly. Daniel. To th…

To throw into disorder or confusion. Where best He might the ruffled foe infest. Hudibras.

or its truth; -- in this sense often personified. Rumor next, and Chance, And Tumult, and Confusion, all embroiled. Milton.

A disturbance; noise and confusion; a quarrel. [Colloq.]

A quick succession or confusion of small sounds, like those made by shaking leaves or straw, by rubbing silk, or the like; a rustling. When the noise of a torrent, the rustle of a wood, the song of birds, or the play of lambs, had power to fill the attention, and suspend all perception of the course of time. Idler.…