bedevil (bedev1)

t. To treat with diabolical violence or ribaldry. "I have been informed, since the present edition and well beloved went to the pre , that my trusty cousins, the Edinburgh Reviewers, are preparing a most vehement critique on my poor, gentle, unresisting Muse, whom they have already so bedevilled with their ungodly ribaldry."-Byron English Bards and Scotch Reviewers, P.S. bě-děv-illed, pa. par. & a. [BEDEVIL.] bě-děv'-il-ling, pr. par. [BEDEVIL.]