ppl. a. [f. as prec. + -ING2.] That ‘wilders,’ in various senses.

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  1.  Leading or driving one astray; esp. of a place, In which one loses or may lose one’s way.

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1749.  Shenstone, Irreg. Ode, 83. And some had bent the wild’ring maze.

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1793.  Coleridge, Lines Autumnal Even., 27. Toss’d by storms along Life’s wild’ring way.

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1804.  W. L. Bowles, Spir. Discov., IV. 64. Safe in the wildering storm.

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1867.  H. Macmillan, Bible Teach., vi. (1870), 126. Their wildering mazes of exquisite flowers.

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  b.  fig. Producing mental confusion or aberration; perplexing, bewildering.

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1742.  Collins, Ecl., iv. 8. Where wild’ring fear and desperate sorrow led.

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1812.  J. Wilson, Isle of Palms, I. 223. In waking thoughts she still retains The memory of these wildering pains.

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a. 1850.  Rossetti, Dante & Circle, I. (1874), 74. These ’wildering phantasies Then carried me to see my Lady dead.

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1870.  Morris, Earthly Par., III. IV. 370. The clash Of rain-beat boughs and wildering lightning-flash.

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  2.  Going astray, straying, wandering.

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1827.  Keble, Chr. Y., Sexagesima Sunday, ii. Ruin below and wrath above Are all that now the wildering fancy meets. Ibid., 5th Sunday in Lent, iv. Ye too, who tend Christ’s wildering flock.

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1871.  B. Taylor, Faust (1875), II. I. iii. Lamps are gleaming, Through the festal’s wildering train.

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