Definition of "befuddlement"

It was, of course, an effect of hypnotism, he remembered thinking, vaguely through the befuddlement of his drink—this culminating effect of an evil and remorseless personality acting upon one that was diseased and extra receptive.

1907, Algernon Blackwood, “Max Hensig—Bacteriologist and Murderer” Chapter 4, in The Listener and Other Stories, New York: Knopf, 1917, p. 105

A change came over his wind-beaten face, a slight befuddlement, the shock of some minor fact jarred loose.

1985, Don DeLillo, White Noise‎, Penguin, published 1986, Part I, Chapter 21, p. 162