Now dial. [Imitative: cf. WFris. snaffelje and SNUFFLE v.] a. trans. To utter through the nose. b. intr. To speak through the nose; to make a snuffling noise.

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1616.  Holyday, Persius, I. B 4.

        Where if forsooth one clad in purple cloth’s,
Snaffle some mustie stuffe through’s muffling nose.

2

1647.  Corbet, Poems (1807), 95. To Saint Denis fast we came To see the sights of Nostre Dame, The man that shews them snaffles.

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1826.  in Hone, Every-day Bk., II. 549. A hare-lip … caused him to speak through the nose, or to snaffle, as they term it in Yorkshire.

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1869.  Blackmore, Lorna D. (1889), 286. Snorting, snaffling, whinnying and neighing.

5

  Hence Snaffling vbl. sb.

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a. 1668.  Lassels, Voy. Italy (1698), II. 259. The snafling through the nose made all the edification that I saw in it.

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