\Stum"ble\, v. i. [imp. & p. p. {Stumbled}; p. pr. & vb.
n. {Stumbling}.] [OE. stumblen, stomblen; freq. of a word
akin to E. stammer. See {Stammer}.]
1. To trip in walking or in moving in any way with the legs;
   to strike the foot so as to fall, or to endanger a fall;
   to stagger because of a false step.
         There stumble steeds strong and down go all.
                                               --Chaucer.
         The way of the wicked is as darkness: they know at
         what they stumble.                    --Prov. iv.
                                               19.
2. To walk in an unsteady or clumsy manner.
         He stumbled up the dark avenue.       --Sir W.
                                               Scott.
3. To fall into a crime or an error; to err.
         He that loveth his brother abideth in the light, and
         there is none occasion og stumbling in him. --1 John
                                               ii. 10.
4. To strike or happen (upon a person or thing) without
   design; to fall or light by chance; -- with on, upon, or
   against.
         Ovid stumbled, by some inadvertency, upon Livia in a
         bath.                                 --Dryden.
         Forth as she waddled in the brake, A gray goose
         stumbled on a snake.                  --C. Smart.

\Stum"ble\, v. t.
1. To cause to stumble or trip.
2. Fig.: To mislead; to confound; to perplex; to cause to err
   or to fall.
         False and dazzling fires to stumble men. --Milton.
         One thing more stumbles me in the very foundation of
         this hypothesis.                      --Locke.

\Stum"ble\, n.
1. A trip in walking or running.
2. A blunder; a failure; a fall from rectitude.
         One stumble is enough to deface the character of an
         honorable life.                       --L'Estrange.