1680 H. More Apocalypsis Apocalypseos 253 Such a childish trifle or sleight whiffle.

1842 in Gosse Birds Jamaica (1847) 366 At first two or three whiffles make darkened tracks on the glassy waters.

1869 L. M. Alcott Little Women II. xxi. 310 Amy keeps me pointing due west most of the time, with only an occasional whiffle round to the south.

1909 H. Begbie Cage x The whiffle in the air grew more distinct.

1972 F. Ford Atush Inlet i. 9 Their subdued cries could be heard faintly against the gentle whiffle of falling water.

1976 J. Crosby Snake (1977) xxx. 179 She listened to..the soft whiffle of her breathing.

1931 Official Gaz. (U.S. Patent Office) 17 Nov. 573/2 Whiffle. For game apparatus of the type having ball receiving and discharging mechanism.]

1954 Cedar Rapids (Iowa) Gaz. 25 June 12 A new ball game called Whiffle Ball.

1957 Ames (Iowa) Daily Tribune 5 June 19 (advt.) Curve it, Bat it, Indoors or Out. Whiffle Ball.

1965 F. Knebel Night of Camp David xvii. 273 The boys of Saybrook were playing whiffle ball.

1970 New Yorker 11 July 20 Kids playing with whiffleballs and baseballs.

1976 B. Woodward & C. Bernstein Final Days 242 He would get a whiffleball game going on the White House tennis court.

1980 N.Y. Sunday News Mag. 2 Mar. 12/2 I would chase the whiffleball across the street.

1985 T. Boyle Only Dead know Brooklyn xvii. 133 Clusters of Puerto Ricans..swung plastic bats at whiffle balls.

1902 H. F. Day Pine Tree Ballads 47 Hate to act so whiffle-minded, but my father used to say, ‘Men would sometimes change opinions; mules would stick the same old way’.

1905 in Eng. Dial. Dict. VI. 456/1 'e's so w'iffle-minded—'e dunna know 'is own mind two minutes together.

1568 [implied in: T. Howell Arbor of Amitie f. 25^v Vphoyst by wyffling windes. (at whiffling adj.¹ 1a)].

1671 R. Bohun Disc. Wind 56 Near mountainous Islands, or shoares, they [sc. winds] whiffle up and down, and shift from one point of the Compasse to another.

1697 W. Dampier New Voy. around World xv. 413 The Wind had been whiffling about from one part of the Compass to another.

1699 W. Dampier Voy. & Descr. iii. vi. 61 If the Winds also whiffle about to the South.

1737 J. Ozell in tr. F. Rabelais Wks. III. xxxv. 236 (note) A Man who is continually turning and whiffling about to all the Points of the Compass.

a1774 A. Tucker Light of Nature Pursued (1777) III. i. 317 Without some steadiness in our own determinations..we shall be perpetually wavering, whiffle about with every wind.

1801 in Spirit of Public Jrnls. (1806) IX. 370 She yaws and whiffles about like a weathercock.

1812 W. Tennant Anster Fair iv. liv. 92 The whizzing wind..whiffling through the wooden tubes so small.

1840 Lady C. M. C. Bury Hist. Flirt xii They whiffle about like a weathercock.

1854 A. E. Baker Gloss. Northants. Words II. 393 The wind whiffles about so.

1881 Nation (N.Y.) 32 400 Who like a manly man, will not whiffle, or quibble, or evade.

1903 F. Harrison in Westm. Gaz. 24 Nov. 1/3 If he finally whiffle round to tax foreign food.

1662 H. Hibbert Exercitationes Theologicæ 26 in Syntagma Theologicum Any anabaptistical humorist, who hath a company of phanatique toyes whiffling about his understanding.

1668 J. Glanvill Blow at Mod. Sadducism 148 A minde that useth to whiffle up and down in the Levities of Fancy.

1767 W. Harte Amaranth 198 Just as int'rest whiffled on his mind, He Anatolians left, or Thracians join'd.

1817 J. Gilchrist Intell. Patrimony 148 Better chirp with the cricket, or chatter with the sparrow, than whiffle round this eternal monotony of futility.

1818 W. Hazlitt Eng. Comic Writers (1907) viii. 216 He whiffles about the stage with considerable volubility.

1866 Mrs. H. Wood St. Martin's Eve I. xvi. 326 Suddenly the flame inside began to whiffle.

1870 J. P. Smith Widow Goldsmith's Daughter xxxvii She would whiffle and whirl up and down like a withered leaf.

1706 Phillips's New World of Words (new ed.) To Whiffle, to trick one out of a thing, to stand trifling.

1847 J. O. Halliwell Dict. Archaic & Provinc. Words II Whiffle, to talk idly. North.

1832 Fraser's Mag. 6 262 The two strangers whiffled and hissed together, in an unknown very rapid tongue.

1863 C. C. Clarke Shakespeare-characters xvii. 448 Master Silence whiffling his scraps of ballads.

1893 Daily News 13 Feb. 6/1 Where a keen cold blast whiffles and blusters about the black and sullen monsters.

1909 Daily News 14 Sept. 3 When a bear comes ‘whiffling’ about your snow hut.

1915 Glasgow Herald 9 Aug. 8 Shells flew ‘whiffling’ over our heads.

1857 G. Borrow Romany Rye II. App. viii. 328 Nobody can use his fists without being taught the use of them,..no more than any one can ‘whiffle’ without being taught by a master of the art... The last of the whifflers hanged himself about a fortnight ago..there being no demand for whiffling since the discontinuation of Guildhall banquets;..let any one take up the old chap's sword and try to whiffle.