whiff 
whiff Mliwif),f. [Seew/ii/l,?*.] 1. iidrmis.l. 
To puff ; blow ; produce or emit a puff or whiff. 
When through their green boughs whiffiuff winds do whirl. 
With wanton pufs their waning locks to curl. 
Sylvester, tr. of Du Bartas's Weeks, i. 2. 
2. To drink. [Prov. Eug.] 
n. traim. 1. Topuff; puff out; cxliale; blow: 
as, to icliiff out rings of smoke. — 2. To carry as 
by a slight blast or whiff of wind. 
Old Empedocles's way. who, when he leapt into ^y.tna, 
having a (fry sear body, and light, the smoke took him and 
tchift him up into the moon. 
B. Joiison, World in the Moon. 
How was it scornfully whiffed aside ! 
Carhjle, i"rench Rev., I. v. 2. 
3t. To draw in ; imbibe ; inhale : said of air or 
smoke, and frequently of liquids also, 
livery skull 
And skip-iacke now will have his pipe of smoke. 
And whiff it bravely till hee 's like to choke. 
Times' Whistle (E. E. T. 8.), p. 71. 
In this season we might press and make the wine, and 
in winter whiff it up. Urquhart, tr. of Kabelais, i. 27. 
whiffy (hwif), n. [Origin obscure.] An ana- 
canthine or malaeopterygious fish of the i'Ara- 
i\j Pleiirotiectidse, a kind of flatfish or flounder, 
the Cynicoglossus microecplialus, found in Brit- 
ish waters; the smear-tiab, sail-fluke, or mary- 
sole. 
whiff^ (hwif), V. i. [An error for wliip, v. i., 2.] 
To fish, as for mackerel, with a hand-line. See 
whiffing, ii. 
One might as well argue that, because bits of red flannel 
or of tobacco-pipe are highly successful baits in whiffiny 
for Mackerel, therefore these substances form a "favour- 
ite food " of this fish. Salure, XLI. 638. 
whiffer (hwif'er),H. [<w7i(^l + -e)-i.] One who 
whiffs. 
Great tobacco-w/iiircrs; 
They would go near to rob with a pipe in their mouths. 
Beaxi. and FL, Wit at Several Weapons, iv. 1. 
whiffet (hwif'et), n. [< ri'Uff'i' + -ct^.'] 1. A 
little whiff. Imp. Diet. [Rare.] — 2. A whip- 
per-snapper; a whipster; any insignificant or 
worthless person. [U.S.] 
The sneaks, whiffets, and surface rats. 
Philadelphia Times, Aug. 1, 18S3. 
whifHjlg (hwifing), )i. [Verbal n. of wliiff^, v.'] 
1. Surface-fishing with a hand-line. 
Whiffing, the process of slowly towing the bait (sculling 
or pulling in the known haunts of the fish). 
Field, Dec. 26, 1S8B. (,Eneyc. Diet.) 
It [the whiting] is often caught by whiffing, when it 
gives good sport. Stand. Nat. Hist., III. 273. 
2. A kind of hand-line used for taking mack- 
erel, pollack, and the like. 
whiffing-tackle (hwif 'ing-tak"!), n. The tackle 
used in whiffing; surface-tackle. 
whi£B.e (hwif '1), r. ; pret. and pp. u-hiffied, ppr. 
wliifflini/. [Freq. of «'/i((?'l ; perhaps confused 
with D. tfe(/c?eH, waver.] I. intrans. 1. To blow 
in gusts; hence, to veer about, as the wind. 
Two days before this storm began, the Wind whiffled 
about to the South, and back again to the East, and blew 
very faintly. Dampier, Voyages, II. iii. 66. 
Seizing a shovel, he went by the back door to the front 
of the house, at a spot where the whiffUwj winds had left 
the earth nearly bare [of snow], and commenced his sub- 
nivean work. S. Judd, Margaret, i. 17. 
2. To change from one opinion or course to 
another; use evasions; prevaricate; be fickle 
or unsteady ; waver. 
A person of a whiffling and unsteady turn of mind, who 
caimot keep close to a point of a controversy. 
Waits, Improvement of the Mind, I. ix. § 27. 
3. To trifle; talk idly. rhillip.'<, 1706; Ha!li- 
wcU. [Prov. Eng.] 
I am not like those officious and importunate sots who, 
by force, outrage, and violence, constrain an easy, good- 
natured fellow to whiffle, <iua(f , carouse, and what is worse. 
Urquhart, tr. of Rabelais, iii., Prol. 
II. trans. 1. To disperse with a puff; blow 
away; scatter. 
Such as would whiffle away all these truths by resolving 
them into a mere moral allegory. 
IJr. II. Ml/re, Epistles to the Seven Churches, ix. 
[(^Lathatn.) 
2. To cause to cljange, as from one opinion or 
course to another. 
Every man ought to be stedfast and unmovable in them 
[the main things of religion], and not sutler himself to be 
whiffled out of them by an insignificant noise about the 
infallibility (jf a visible cliuich. Tillnlsnn, Sermons, Ixv. 
3. To sliake or wave quickly. Donne. 
whifB.et (hwif'l;, II. [< whiffle, r., in sense of 
orig. verb.] A fife. 
Whiffler, . . . one that plays on a Whiffle or Fife. 
Bailey, 1727. 
whifiler (hwif'ler), n. [< u-hifflc + -er^ .'] If. A 
piper or fifer. 
6898 
His former transition was in the faire about the Jug- 
glers ; now he is at the Pageants among the Whifflers. 
Milton, On Uef. of Hurab. Kemonst. 
2t. A herald or usher; a person who leads the 
way, or prepares the way, for another: prob- 
ably so called because the pipers (see piper'^, 
1) usually led the procession. 
The deep-mouth'd sea. 
Which like a mighty whiffler ioie the king 
Seems to prepare his way. 
Shak., Hen. V., v., cho., 1. 12. 
The term [whitfler] is undoubtedly l>orrowed from whif- 
fle, another name for a fife or small flute ; for whifflers 
were originally those who preceded armies or processions 
as flfers or pipers. F. Douce, Illus. of Shakespeare, p. 311. 
I can go in no corner but I meet with some of my whiff- 
lers in their accoutrements. 
Chapman, Monsieur D'Olive, iii. 1. 
The Whiflers of your inferior and Chiefe companies 
cleere the wayes before him. 
Dekker, Seven Deadly Sins, p. 43. 
Before the dame, and round about, 
Mai'ch'd whifflers ?i\\A staftiers on foot. 
S. Butler, Hudibras, II. ii. 650. 
3. One who whiffles; one who changes frequent- 
ly his opinion or course; one who uses shifts 
and evasions in argument ; a fickle or unsteady 
person. 
Your right whiffler indeed hangs himself in Saint Mar- 
tin's, and not in Cheapside. 
Dekker and Webster, Northward Ho, ii. 1. 
Every whiffler in a laced coat . . . shall talk of the con- 
stitution. Swift. 
4. A puffer of tobacco ; a whiffer. HalliweU. — 
5. The whistlewing, or goldeneye duck. G. 
Trnmbidl, 1888. [Maryland.] 
whifflery (hwif 'ler-i), n. The characteristics or 
habits of a whiffler; trifling; levity. 
Life is no frivolity, or hypothetical coquetry or whifflery. 
Carlyle, in Froude, Life in London, iii. 
whiffletree (hwif'l-tre), «. [< whiffle, turn, + 
tree. Cf. whippletree, siviugletree.^ Same as 
sii'inqletree. 
Whift (hwift), n. [Var. of lohiffT-.'] A whiff or 
waft; a breath; a snatch. [Rare.] 
A sweep of lutestrings, laughs, and whiftsof song. 
Browning, Fra Lippo Lippi. 
whigl (hwig), n. 1. Sour whey. Brochett. 
[Prov. Eng. and Scotch.] 
With green cheese, clouted cream, with flawns and cus- 
tard stor'd. 
Whig, cyder, and with whey, I domineer a lord. 
Drayton, Muses' Elysium, vi. 
Drinke Whig and sowre Milke, whilest I rince my I'hroat 
With Burdeaux and Canarie. 
Ileywood, English Traveller (ed. Pearson), L 2. 
2. Buttermilk. Halliwen. [Prov. Eng.] 
whig^ (hwig), v.; pret. and pp. whiggcd, ppr. 
whigging. [VX. Sc. whiggle, var. of wiggle: see 
wiggle.'] I. intrans. To move at an easy and 
steady pace; jog. [Scotch.] 
The Solemn League and Covenant 
Came whif/ging up the hills, man. 
Battle of KilliecraiJrie (Child's Ballads, VII. 166). 
To Whig awa* wi', to drive briskly on with, Jamieson. 
I remember hearing a Highland farmer in Eskdale, after 
giving minute directions to those who drove the hearse 
of his wife how they were to cross some boggy land, con- 
clude, "Now, lads, whig awa' wt" her." 
Scott. {Jamieson.) 
II. trans. To urge forward, as a horse. 
[Scotch.] 
whig3 (hwig), n. and a. [Formerly also whigg; 
■proh. short tor whiggamore, q.Y.I I. >i. 1. One 
of the adlierents of the Presbyterian cause in 
Scotland about the middle of the seventeenth 
century: a name given in derision. 
When in the teeth they dar'd our Whigs, 
AW covenant true blues, man. 
Burns, Battle of Sheriff-Muir. 
I doubt I'll hae to tak the hills wi' the wild whigs, as 
they ca' them, and ... be shot down like a mawkin at 
some dyke-side. Scott, Old Mortality, vii. 
2. leap.] A member of one of the two great po- 
litical parties of Great Britain, the other being 
tlie Tories (later the Conservatives). The Whigs 
were the successors of the Roundheads of the Civil War 
and the Country party of the Restoration. The name was 
given to them about 1679 as a reproach by their opponents, 
the Court party, through a desire to confound them with 
the rebel Whigs of Scotland (see %ehig-\ 1). The Whigs 
favored the Revolution of 1(>«8 -fl, and governed Great Brit- 
ain for a long period in the eighteenth century. In gen- 
eral, they may be called the party of progress ; one of 
their principal achievements was the passage of the Re- 
form Bill in 183-2. About the same time the name Whig 
began to be replaced by Liberal, though still retained 
to denote the more conservative members of the Liberal 
party. See Liberal, Tory. 
The south-west counties of Scotland have seldom com 
enough to serve them round the year : And . . . those in 
the west come in the summer to buy at Leifh the stores 
that come from the north : And from a word, Whiggam, 
used in driving their horses, all that drove were called the 
Whiggamors, and shorter the Whigs. Now in that year, 
whiggery 
after the news came down of Duke Hamilton's defeat, the 
Ministers animated their people to rise, and march to Ed- 
inburgh. And they came up marching on the head of their 
parishes, witil an unheard-of fury, praying and preaching 
all the way as they came. The Marquis of Argile and hiB 
party came and headed them, they being about 6,000. 'i'his 
was called the Whiggamor's inroad. And ever after that 
all that opposed the Court came in contempt to be called 
Whiggs. And from Scotland the word was brought into 
I)ngland, where it is now one of our unhappy t«rms of dis- 
tinction. Bp. Burnet, Hist. Own Times, I. 68. 
I hate a Whig so much that I'll throw my Husband out 
of his Election, or throw myself out of the World ! a I'ar- 
cel of canting Rogues ; they have always Moderation in 
their Mouths — rank Ilesistance in their Hearts — and 
hate Obedience even to their lawful Wives. 
Mrs. Centlivre, Gotham Election, i. 1, 
The prejudice of the Tory is for establishment; the 
prejudice of the Whig is for innovation. A Tory does not 
wish to give more real power to Government, but that Gov- 
ernment should have more reverence. Then they differ as 
to the Church, 'the Toi-y is not for giving more legal power 
to the Clergy, but wishes they should have a considerable 
influence, founded on the opinion of mankind ; the Whig 
is for limiting and watching them with a narrow jealousy. 
Johnson, in Boswell, an. 1781. 
3. [cap.] In Amer. hist. : (a) A member of the 
patriotic party during the revolutionary period. 
The Hessians and other foreigners, looking upon that 
as the right of war, plunder wherever they go, from Iwth 
Whigs and Tories, without distinction. 
Aobert Morris, Dec. 21, 1776, quoted in Lecky's Eng. in 
[18th Cent., xiv. 
(b) One of a political party in the United States 
which grew up, in opposition to the Democrat- 
ic party, out of the National Republican party. 
It was first called the Whig party in 18:i4. Its original 
principles were extension of nationalizing tendencies, and 
. support of the United States Bank, of a protective tariff, 
and of a system of internal improvements at national ex- 
pense. It won the presidential elections of 1840 and 1848, 
but soon after divided upon the slavery question. It lost 
its last national election in 1862, and soon after many of 
its members became temporarily members of the Ameri- 
can and Constitutional I'uion parties, but eventually most 
of its northern members became Republicans, most of 
its southern members Democrats.— Conscience- WMg, in 
U. S. hist., in the last days of the Whig party, one of those 
northern Whigs who were indisposed to regard the com- 
promise of 1850 as a final settlement of the slavery ques- 
tion : so called from their conscientious objections to such 
compromises with slavery. — Cotton-Whig, in U. S. hist., 
in the last days of the Whig party, one of those northern 
"Whigs who were disposed to regard the compromise of 
1860 as a final settlement of the slavery question : so 
called from their supposed partiality to the cotton in- 
terest. 
II. a. Relating to or composed of Whigs, in 
any use of that word ; wliiggish : as, Whig mea- 
sures; a jr/(ijr ministry. 
The hope that America would supply the main mate- 
rials for the suppression of the revolt [the American Revo- 
lution] proved wholly chimerical. One of the first acts of 
the Whig party in eveiy colony was to disarm Tories. 
Lecky, Eng. in 18th Cent., xiv. 
The Whig party was always opposed to slavery. But 
there was a broad and well-understood distinction be- 
tween Whig opponents of slavery and the fanatical A1k>- 
litionists. T. W. Barnes, Thurlow Weed, p. 306. 
whig* (hwig), «. A variant of icig^. [North. 
Eng. and Scotch.] 
A cook whose recipes were hopelessly old-fashioned, and 
who had an exasperating belief in the sutflciency of but- 
tered whigs and home-made marmalade for all require- 
ments. Mrs. Humphry Ward, Robert Elsmere, ii. 
whiggamore (hwig'a-mor). «. [Also whiggamor, 
whigamore; according to Burnet, derived from 
whiggam, as used by the men orig. called ichig- 
gamores (def. 1) in driving their horses; %chig- 
gam is a dubious word, appar. connected -with 
whig^, jog: see whig^. In the glossary to the 
Waverley novels whigamore is defined " a great 
whig," appar. implying a derivation < whig'^ + 
Gael, mor, great ; whereas the evidence indi- 
cates that M/iiy/f* is an abbr. of uhigganiore. No 
Gael, form that could be the base of whiggamore 
ap|)cars ; but it may be a perverted form from 
an original not now obvious.] 1. A person 
wlio came from the west and southwest of 
Scotland to Leith to buy com. See the quota- 
tion from Bishop Burnet, under Tf'hig^, 2. — 2. 
One of the people of the west of Scotland who 
inarched to Edinbtu'gh in 1648, their expedition 
being called the whiggamores' inroad (see the 
quotation referred to in def. 1). Hence — 3. 
A Scotch Presbyterian ; one of the party op- 
posed to the court; a whig. 
There [at Bothwell Brigg] was he and that sour whiga- 
more they cad Burley. Scott, Old Mortality, ixxviL 
whiggarchy (hwig'ar-ki), n. [< whigS + Gr. 
n^Hfn, rule.] Government by \Vhigs. [Rare.] 
They will not recognise any other goTernment in Great 
Britain but whiggarchy only. 
Swift, App. to Conduct of the Allies, 
whiggery (hwig'er-i), H. l<. whig^ + -erii.] The 
j)rineiples or practices of Whigs: first applied 
to the Scottish Presbyterian doctrine, and gen- 
erally used as a term of contempt. 
