GRE 2

stringent

binding; rigid / I think these regulations are too stringent.

shackle

chain; fetter / The criminal's ankles were shackled to prevent his escape.

muddle

confuse; mix up / His thoughts were muddled and chaotic.

ordinance

decree / Passing a red light is a violation of a city ordinance.

obese

excessively fat / It is advisable that obese people try to lose weight.

stentorian

extremely loud / The town crier had stentorian voice.

venial

forgivable; trivial / We may regard a hugry man's stealing as a venial crime.

largess

generous gift / Lady Bountiful distributed largess to the poor.

taciturn

habitually silent; talking a little / New Englanders are reputedly taciturn people.

noxious

harmful / We must trace the source of these noxious gases before they asphyxiate us.

secrete

hide away or cache; produce and release a substance into an organism. / The pack rat secretes odds and ends in its nest; the pancreas secretes insulin in the islets of Langerhans.

morose

ill-humored; sullen / When we first meet Hamlet, we find him morose and depressed.

mausoleum

monumental tomb / His body was placed in the family mausolem.

undulate

move with a wavelike motion / The flag undulated in the breeze.

temporal

not lasting forever; limited by time; secular / At one time in our history, temporal rulers assumed that they had been given their thrones by divine right.

pacifist

one opposed to force; antimilitarist / The pacifists urged that we reduce our military budget and recall our troops stationed overseas.

prognosticate

predict / I prognosticate disaster unless we change our wasteful ways.

wastrel

profligate;a lazy person who spends their time and/or money in a careless and stupid way / He was denounced as a wastrel who had dissipated his inheritance.

nuptial

related to marriage / Their nuptial ceremony was performed in Golden Gate Park.

remnant

remainder / I suggest that you wait until the store places the remnants of these goods on sale.

vendor

seller / The fruit vendor sold her wares from a stall on the sidewalk.

sycophant

servile flatterer / The king enjoyed the servile compliments and attentions of the sycophants in his retinue.

microcosm

small world / In the microcosm of our rural village, we find illustrations of all the evils that beset the universe.

velocity

speed / The train went by at considerable velocity.

unassuaged

unsatisfied; not soothed / Her anger is unassuaged by your apology.

sedulous

" diligent " / The young woman was so sedulous that she received a commendation for her hard work.

transcend

" exceed ; surpass" / This accomplishment transcends all our previous efforts.

panache

" flair ; style ; flamboyance" / Many performers imitate Noel Coward, but few have his panache and sense of style.

pliable

" flexible ; yielding; adaptable; impressionable " / In remodeling the bathroom, we replaced all the old, rigid lead pipes with new, pliable copper tubing.

witless

" foolish ; idiotic" / Such witless and fatuous statements will create the impression that you are an ignorant individual.

precursor

" forerunner " / Though Gray and Burns share many traits with the Romantic poets who followed them, most critics consider them precursors of the Romantic Movement, not true Romantics.

privation

" hardship ; want" / In his youth, he knew hunger and privation.

outwit

" outsmart ; trick" / By disguising himself as an old woman, Holmes was able to outwit his pursuers and escape capture.

preeminent

" outstanding ; superior" / The king traveled to Boston because he wanted the preeminent surgeon in the field to perform the operation. Dickens was pre-eminent among English writers of his day.

malaise

" uneasiness ; distress" / She felt a sudden vague malaise when she heard sounds at the door. The latest crime figures are merely symptomatic of a wider malaise in society.

surmount

" overcome " / He had to surmount many obstacles in order to succeed. The organizers of the concerts have first to surmount the hurdle of gaining sponsorship. There are several obstacles to be surmounted.

placate

" pacify ; conciliate" / The teacher tried to placate the angry mother.

pillage

" plunder ;loot" / The enemy pillaged the quiet village and left it in ruins.

prod

" poke ; stir up; urge" / If you prod him hard enough, he'll eventually clean his room.

muse

" ponder ;to think carefully about sth for a time, ignoring what is happening around you" / For a moment he mused about the beauty of the scene, but his thought soon changed as he recalled his own personal problems. I sat quietly, musing on the events of the day.

rote

" repetition " / He recited the passage by rote and gave no indication he understood what he was saying.

solicitous

"worried, concerned; attentive " / The employer was very solicitous about the health of her employees as replacements were difficult to get.

pellucid

" transparent ; limpid; easy to understand" / After reading these stodgy philosophers, I find his pellucid style very enjoyable.

perfidious

" treacherous ; disloyal" / When Caesar realized that Brutus had betrayed him, he reproached his perfidious friend.

tremulous

" trembling ; wavering" / She was tremulous more from excitement than from fear.

ruse

" trick ; stratagem" / You will not be able to fool your friends with such an obvious ruse. She tried to think of a ruse to get him out of the house.

veracity

" truthfulness ;honesty; truth " / Trying to prove Hill a liar, Senator Spector repeatedly questioned her veracity.

vacillate

" waver ; fluctuate" / Uncertain which suitor she ought to marry, the princess vacillated, saying now one, now the other. The country's leaders are still vacillating between confrontation and compromise.

maelstrom

" whirlpool " / The canoe was tossed about in the maelstrom.

tortuous

" winding ; full of curves; convoluted " / Because this road is so tortuous, it is unwise to go faster than twenty miles an hour on it.

provident

"displaying foresight; thrifty; preparing for emergencies; prudent " / In his usual provident manner, he had insured himself against this type of loss.

perturb

"disturb greatly; alarm " / I am afraid this news will perturb him and cause him grief.

patrician

"noble; aristocratic " / "We greatly admired her well-bred, patrician elegance She comes from an old patrician family. "

uncanny

"strange; mysterious; weird " / You have the uncanny knack of reading my innermost thoughts.

nondescript

"undistinctive; ordinary; dull " / The private detective was a short, nondescript fellow with no ourstanding features, the sort of person one would never notice in a crowd.

mirage

"unreal reflection; optical illusion; illusion " / The lost prospector was fooled by a mirage in the desert.

verbose

"wordy; long-winded;tedious;boring " / This article is too verbose; we must edit it.

sallow

"yellowish; sickly in color; having a slightly yellow colour that does not look healthy; pasty " / "We were disturbed by his sallow complexion, which was due to jaundice. He was a small man with a thin sallow face. "

pantomime

acting without dialogue / Because he worked in pantomime, the clown could be understood wherever he appeared. We took the children to a pantomime. He has also appeared in pantomime.

loath

averse; reluctant / They were both loath for him to go.

prattle

babble / The children prattle endlessly about their new toys.

thwart

baffle; frustrate / He felt that everyone was trying to thwart his plans and prevent his success.

palliate

ease pain; make less severe or offensive / If we cannot cure this disease at present, we can, at least try to palliate the symptoms.

vacuous

empty; lacking in ideas; stupid / The candidate's vacuous remarks annoyed the audience, who had hoped to hear more than empty platitudes

savor

enjoy; have a distinctive flavor, smell, or quality / Relishing his triumph, Costner especially savored the chagrin of the critics who had predicted his failure.

mire

entangle; stick in swampy ground; bog / Their rear wheels became mired in mud.

perpetual

everlasting / Ponce de Leon hoped to find perpetual youth.

sinister

evil / We must defeat the sinister forces that seek our downfall. We needn't assume that there was a sinister motive for what she did.

sublime

exalted; noble; uplifting / Mother Teresa has been honored for her sublime deeds.

recluse

hermit;a person who lives alone and likes to avoid other people / The recluse lived in a hut in the forest.

tantrum

fit of petulance; caprice;a sudden short period of angry, unreasonable behaviour, especially in a child / "The child learned that he could have almost anything if he went into tantrums. "

subsequent

following; later / In subsequent lessons, we shall take up more difficult problems.

victuals

food and drink / "I am very happy to be able to provide you with these victuals; I know you are hungry. "

malodorous

foul-smelling / The component heap was most malodorous in summer.

yield

give in; surrender / The wounded knight refused to yield to his foe.

mischance

ill luck / By mischance, he lost his week's salary.

rotunda

circular building or hall covered with a dome / "His body lay in state in the rotunda of the Capitol. "

obsidian

clak volcanic rock / "The deposits of obsidian on the mountain slopes were an indiacation that volcano had erupted in ancient times. "

memorialize

commemorate / Let us memorialize his great contribution by dedicating this library in his honor.

polemic

controversy; argument in support of point of view / Her essays were, for the main part, polemics for the party's policy. Her speech was memorable for its polemic rather than its substance.

replica

copy / Are you going to hang this replica of the Declaration of Independence in the classroom or in the auditorium?

rectify

correct / I want to rectify my error before it is too late.

perdition

damnation; complete ruin;punishment that lasts for ever after death / "Praying for salvation, young Daedalus feared he was damned to eternal perdition. damned to perdition bị sa vào kiếp trầm luân "

swarthy

dark; dusky;having dark skin / "Despite the stereotype, not all Italians are swarthy; many are fair and blond. "

opaque

dark; not transparent / The opaque window kept the sunlight out of the room.

tome

large volume / He spent much time in the libraries poring over ancient tomes.

stratum

layer of earth's surface; layer of society / Unless we alleviate conditions in the lowest stratum of our society, we may expect grumbling and revolt.

laity

laypersons; persons not connected with the clergy / The laity does not always understand the clergy's problems.

unfledged

immature / It is hard for an unfledged writer to find a sympathetic publisher.

privy

secret; hidden; not public / We do not care for privy chamber of government. She was not privy to any information contained in the letters.

usurp

seize power; supplant / The revolution ended when the victorious rebel leader usurped the throne.

parochial

narrow in outlook; provincial; related to parishes / Although Jane Austen writes novels set in small rural communities, her concerns are universal, not parochial.

seine

net for catching fish / When the shad run during the spring, you may see fishermen with seines along the banks of our coastal rivers.

noncommittal

neutral; unpledged; undecided;not giving an opinion; not showing which side of an argument you agree with / We were annoyed by his noncommittal reply for we had been led to expect definite assurances of his approval. The doctor was non-committal about when I could drive again.

subtlety

nicety; cunning; guile; delicacy / The subtlety of his remarks was unnoticed by most of his audience.

marked

noticeable; targeted for vengeance / He walked with a marked limp, a souvenir of an old IRA attack. As British ambassador, he knew he was a marked man.

quorum

number of members necessary to conduct a meeting / The senator asked for a roll call to determine whether a quorum was present.

manifold

numerous; varied / I cannot begin to tell you how much I appreciate your manifold kindnesses.

missile

object to be thrown or projected / Scientists are experimenting with guided missiles.

whittle

pare; cut off bits / "As a present for Aunt Polly, Tom whittled some clothespins out of a chunk of wood. He whittled a simple toy from the piece of wood. He whittled the piece of wood into a simple toy. "

oculist

physician who specialized in treatment of the eyes / "In many states, an oculist is the only one who may apply medicinal drops to the eyes for the purpose of examining them. "

mosaic

picture made of smell, colorful inlaid tiles / "The mayor compared the ciry to a beautiful mosaic made up of people of every race and religion on earth. "

vignette

picture; short literary sketch / The New Yorker published her latest vignette.

perforate

pierce; put a hole through / Before you can open the aspirin bottle, you must first perforate the plastic safety seal that covers the cap.

ruthless

pitiless;hard and cruel; determined to get what you want and not caring if you hurt other people / The escaped convict was a dangerous and ruthless murderer. We'll have to be ruthless if we want to make this company more efficient.

nostrum

questionable medicine / No quack selling nostrums is going to cheat me.

maniacal

raving mad; wild or violent / His maniacal laughter frightened us.

sonorous

resonant, having a pleasant full deep sound / His sonorous voice resounded through the hall.

rejoinder

retort; comeback; reply / When someone has been rude to me, I find it particularly satisfying to come up with a quick rejoinder.

tundra

rolling, treeless plain in Siberia and arctic North America / "Despite the cold, many geologists are trying to discover valuable mineral deposits in the tundra. "

leeway

room to move; margin;latitude the amount of freedom that you have to change sth or to do sth in the way you want to / When you set a deadline, allow a little leeway. How much leeway should parents give their children?

roseate

rosy; optimistic / "I am afraid you will have to alter your roseate views in the light of the distressing news that has just arrived. "

rotundity

roundness; sonorousness of speech / Washington Irving emphasized the rotundity of the governor by describing his height and circumference.

regal

royal / Prince Albert had a regal manner. She dismissed him with a regal gesture.

thrall

slave; bondage / The captured soldier was held in thrall by the conquering army.

soporific

sleep producing / I do not need a sedative when I listen to one of his soporific speeches.

ramp

slope; inclined plane / "The house was built with ramps instead of stairs in order to enable the man in the wheelchair to move easily from room to room and floor to floor. "

slacken

slow up; loosen / As they passed the finish line, the runners slackened their pace.

sloth

slow-moving tree-dwelling mammal / Note how well the somewhat greenish coat of the sloth enables it to blend in with its arboreal surroundings.

stodgy

stuffy; boringly conservative / For a young person, Winston seems remarkably stodgy: you'd expect someone of his age to have a little more life.

oaf

stupid, awkward person / He called the unfortunate waiter a clumsy oaf.

urbane

suave; refined; elegant / The courtier was urbane and sophisticated He was charming and urbane, full of witty conversation.

pomposity

self-important behavior; acting like a stuffed shirt / Although the commencement speaker had some good things to say, we had to laugh at his pomposity and general air of parading his own dignity. The prince's manner was informal, without a trace of pomposity.

tonsure

shaving of the head, especially by person entering religious orders / "His tonsure, even more than his monastic garb, indicated that he was a member of the religious order. "

molt

shed or cast off hair or feathers;moult;to lose feathers or hair before new feathers or hair grow / "The male robin molted in the spring. "

luminous

shining; issuing light / The sun is a luminous body.

parable

short, simple story teaching a moral / Let us apply to our own conduct the lesson that this parable teaches.

unwonted

unaccustomed;not usual or expected / He hesitated to assume the unwonted role of master of ceremonies at the dinner.

unprepossessing

unattractive / During adolescence many attractive young people somehow acquire the false notion that their appearance is unprepossessing.

unseemly

unbecoming; indecent;improper / Your levity is unseemly at this time of mourning.

precarious

uncertain; risky / I think this stock is a precarious investment and advise against its purchase.

static

unchanging; lacking development / Nothing had changed at home; things were static there

untoward

unfortunate; annoying / Untoward circumstances prevent me from being with you on this festive occasion.

lurid

wild; sensational / The lurid stories he told shocked his listeners.

succumb

yield; give in; die;to not be able to fight an attack, an illness, a ‚Üë temptation, etc / "I succumb to temptation whenever it comes my way. "

voluminous

"bulky; large; ample " / Despite her family burdens, she kept up a voluminous correspondence with her friends.

ruffian

"bully; scoundrel; thug " / "The ruffians threw stones at the police. "

onerous

"burdensome; taxing ; demanding " / He asked for an assistant because his work load was too onerous.

rescind

"cancel, revoke " / Because of public resentment, the king had to rescind his order.

venal

"capable of being bribed; corrupt ;prepared to do dishonest or immoral things in return for money" / The venal policeman accepted the bribe offered him by the speeding motorist whom he had stopped.

viable

"capable of maintaining life; practicable ; workable; feasible " / The infant, though prematurely born, is viable and has a good chance to survive.

thrifty

"careful about money; economical; frugal " / A thrifty shopper compares prices before making major purchases.

nauseate

"cause to become sick; fill with disgust; revolt, ‚Üë sicken " / The foul smells began to nauseate him. I was nauseated by the violence in the movie.

prompt

"cause; provoke ; provide a cue for an actor" / Whatever prompted you to ask for such a big piece of cake when you're on a diet?

reprove

"censure; rebuke " / The principal reproved the students when they became unruly in the auditorium.

veer

"change in direction; swerve " / After what seemed an eternity, the wind veered to the east and the storm abated. The bus veered onto the wrong side of the road.

transmute

"change; convert to something different, transform " / He was unable to transmute his dreams into actualities.

pristine

"characteristic of earlier times; primitive, unspoiled;immaculate " / This area has been preserved in all its pristine wildness.

swindler

"cheat; conman ;a person who cheats somebody in order to get something, especially money, from them" / She was gullible and trusting, an easy victim for the first swindler who came along.

quotidian

"daily; commonplace; customary; day to day " / To Philip, each new day of his internship was filled with excitement; he could not dismiss his rounds as merely quotidian routine.

lethal

"deadly; fatal " / It is unwise to leave lethal weapons where children may find them.

limpid

"clear; transparent " / A limpid stream ran through his property.

shrewd

"clever; astute " / A shrewd investor, he took clever advantage of the fluctuations of the stock market.

resolve

"decide; settle ; solve" / Homes resolved to travel to Bohemia to resolve the dispute between Irene Adler and the King.

saccharine

"cloyingly sweet; too emotional in a way that seems exaggerated; sentimental " / "She tried to ingratiate herself, speaking sweetly and smiling a saccharine smile. "

travesty

"comical parody; treatment aimed at making something appear ridiculous, parody " / The ridiculous decision the jury has arrived at is a travesty of justice.

tarry

"delay; dawdle, linger " / We can't tarry if we want to get to the airport on time.

renege

"deny; go back on " / He reneged on paying off his debt.

scrupulous

"conscientious; extremely thorough; meticulous " / I can recommend him for a position of responsibility for I have found him a very scrupulous young man. You must be scrupulous about hygiene when you're preparing a baby's feed. He was scrupulous in all his business dealings.

vie

"contend; compete " / Politicians vie with one another, competing for donations and votes.

zany

"crazy; comic, wacky , trange or unusual in an amusing way" / I can watch the Marx brothers' zany antics for hours.

mercurial

fickle; changing; volatile / He was of a mercurial temperament and therefore unpredictable.

leonine

like a lion / "He was leonine in his rage. "

predatory

plundering / The hawk is a predatory bird.

unison

unity of pitch; complete accord / "The choir sang in unison. the banks have acted in unison with the building societies in lowering interest rates các ngân hàng đã nhất trí với các công ty xây dựng trong việc hạ thấp lãi suất They moved in perfect unison. "

omnipresent

universally present; ubiquitous;present everywhere / On Christmas Eve, Santa Claus is omnipotent.

unwarranted

unjustified; groundless; undeserved;not reasonable or necessary; not appropriate / We could not understand Martin's unwarranted rudeness to his mother's guests.

wanton

unrestrained; willfully malicious; unchaste / Pointing to the stack of bills, Sheldon criticized Sarah for her wanton expenditures. In response, Sara accused Sheldon of making an unfounded, wanton attack.

unconscionable

unscrupulous; excessive / She found the load shark's demands unconscionable and impossible to meet.

studied

unspontaneous; deliberate; thoughtful; deliberate and carefully planned / Given Jill's previous slights, Jack felt that the omission of his name from the guest list was a studied insult.

untenable

unsupportable / I find your theory untenable and must reject it. His position had become untenable and he was forced to resign.

slovenly

untidy; slipshod / Such slovenly work habits will never produce good products.

probity

uprightness; incorruptibility;the quality of being completely honest / Everyone took his probity for granted; his defalcations, therefore, shocked us all.

suavity

urbanity; polish / He is particulary good in roles that require suavity and sophistication.

plasticity

ability to be molded / When clay dries out, it loses its plasticity and becomes less malleable.

prolific

abundantly fruitful / She was a prolific writer who produced as many as three books a year.

mincing

affectedly dainty;(of a way of walking or speaking) very delicate, and not natural / Yum-Yum walked across the stage with mincing steps.

monotheism

belief in one God;the belief that there is only one God / Abraham was the first to proclaim his belief in monotheism.

obtuse

blunt; stupid / Because he was so obtuse, he could not follow the teacher's reasoning and asked foolish questions.

whelp

young wolf, dog, tiger, etc.a young animal of the dog family; a ‚Üë puppy or ‚Üë cub / "This collie whelp won't do for breeding, but he'd make a fine pet. "

vagary

caprice; whim / She followed every vagary of fashion.

whimsical

capricious; fanciful / He dismissed his generous gift to his college as a sentimental fancy, an old man's whimsical gesture. Much of his writing has a whimsical quality.

lax

careless / We dislike restaurants where the service is lax and inattentive.

negligence

carelessness / Negligence can prove costly near complicated machinery. The accident was caused by negligence on the part of the driver. The doctor was sued for medical negligence.

scabbard

case for a sword blade; sheath / "The drill master told the recruit to wipe the blood from his sword before slipping it back into the scabbard. "

quiver

case for arrows / "Robin Hood reached back and plucked one last arrow from his quiver. "

slough

cast off / "Each spring, the snake sloughs off its skin. "

offhand

casual; done without prior thought,not showing much interest in somebody/something / Expecting to be treated with due propriety by her costs, Great-Aunt Maud was offended by their offhand manner.

supersede

cause to be set aside; replace / This regulation will supersede all previous rules. The theory has been superseded by more recent research.

pathetic

causing sadness, compassion, pity; touching / Everyone in the auditorium was weeping by the time he finished his pathetic tale about the orphaned boy.

prudent

cautious; careful / A miser hoards money not because he is prudent but because he is greedy. It might be more prudent to get a second opinion before going ahead.

luminary

celebrity; dignitary; a person who is an expert or a great influence in a special area or activity / A leading light of the American stage, Ethel Barrymore was a theatrical luminary whose name lives on. He has played with all the great jazz luminaries.

mace

ceremonial staff; clublike medieval weapon / "The Grand Marshal of the parade raised his mace to signal that it was time for the procession to begin. "

vicissitude

change of fortune / Humbled by life's vicissitudes, the last emperor of China worked as a lowly gardener in the palace over which he had once ruled.

ossify

change or harden into bone / "When he called his opponent a ""bonehead,"" he implied that his adversary's brain had ossified and that he was not capable of clear thinking."

volatile

changeable; explosive; evaporating rapidly / The political climate today is extremely volatile: no one can predict what the electorate will do next.

mutable

changing in form; fickle / His opinion were mutable and easily influenced by anyone who had any powers of persuasion.

migrant

changing its habitat; wandering / These migrant birds return every spring.

tawdry

cheap and gaudy / He won a few tawdry trinkets in Coney Island.

stanch

check flow of blood / It is imperative that we stanch the gushing wound before we attend to the other injuries.

stem

check the flow / The paramedic used a tourniquet to stem the bleeding from the slashed artery.

talon

claw of bird / The falconer wore a leather gauntlet to avoid being clawed by the hawk's talons.

purge

clean by removing impurities; clear of changes / If you are to be purged of the charge of contempt of Congress, you must be willing to answer the questions previously asked.

precipice

cliff; dangerous position / Suddenly Indiana Jones found himself dangling from the edge of a precipice. The country was now on the edge of a precipice (= very close to disaster).

scale

climb up; ascend / To locate a book on the top shelf of the stacks, Lee had to scale an exceptionally rickety ladder.

malapropism

comic misuse of a word / "When Mrs. Malaprop criticizes Lydia for being ""as headstrong as an allegory on the banks of the Nile,"" she confuses ""allegory"" and ""allegator"" in a typical malapropism."

tumult

commotion; riot; noise / She could not make herself heard over the tumult of the mob.

mentor

counselor; teacher / During this very trying period, she could not have had a better mentor, for the teacher was sympathetic and understanding.

recrimination

countercharges / Loud and angry recriminations were her answer to his accusations. We spent the rest of the evening in mutual recrimination.

yokel

country bumpkin / At school, his classmates regarded him as a yokel and laughed at his rustic mannerisms.

quail

cower; lose heart / He was afraid that he would quail in the face of danger.

rampart

defensive mound on earth / "From the ramparts we watched as the fighting continued. "

peremptory

demanding and leaving no choice / From Jack's peremptory knock on the door, Jill could tell he would not give up until she let him in.

swerve

deviate; turn aside sharply;to change direction suddenly, especially in order to avoid hitting sb/sth / "The car swerved wildly as the driver struggled to regain control of the wheel. "

sleight

dexterity / The magician amazed the audience with his sleight of hand.

quarry

dig into / They quarried blocks of marble out of the hillside.

unearth

dig up / When they unearthed the city, the archeologists found many relics of an ancient civilization. Police have unearthed a human skeleton. I unearthed my old diaries when we moved house.

severance

division; partition; separation / The severance of church and state is a basic principle of our government.

schism

division; split / Let us not widen the schism by further bickering.

quay

dock; landing place / Because of the captain's carelessness, the ship crashed into the quay.

podiatrist

doctor who treats ailments of the feet / "He consulted a podiatrist about his fallen arches. "

tenet

doctrine; dogma / The agnostic did not accept the tenets of their faith.

nocturnal

done at night / Mr. Jones obtained a watchdog to prevent the nocturnal raids on his chicken coops.

latent

dormant; hidden / Her latent talent was discovered by accident.

misgivings

doubts;feelings of doubt or anxiety about what might happen, or about whether or not sth is the right thing to do / Hamlet described his misgivings to Horatio but decided to fence with Laertes despite his foreboding of evil. She decided to go despite her misgivings. I read the letter with a sense of misgiving.

primp

dress or groom oneself with care;to make yourself look attractive by arranging your hair, putting on make-up, etc. / "She primps for hours before a dance. "

tipple

drink (alcoholic beverages) frequently / "He found that his most enjoyable evenings occurred when he tippled with his friends at the local pub. His favourite tipple was rum and lemon. "

propulsive

driving forward / The jet plane has a greater propulsive power than the engine-driven plane.

lucid

easily understood; clear; intelligible / Her explanation was lucid enought for a child to grasp.

rapport

emotional closeness; harmony;a friendly relationship in which people understand each other very well / In team teaching, it is important that all teachers in the group have good rapport with one another. She understood the importance of establishing a close rapport with clients.

regale

entertain / John regaled us with tales of his adventures in Africa.

perjury

false testimony while under oath / When several witnesses appeared to challenge his story, he was indicted for perjury.

modish

fashionable / She always discarded all garments that were no longer modish.

porous

full of pores; like a sieve / Dancers like to wear porous clothing because it allows the ready passage of water and air. He added sand to the soil to make it more porous.

obsequy

funeral ceremony / Hundreads paid their last respects at his obsequies.

purveyor

furnisher of foodstuffs; caterer; a person or company that supplies sth / As purveyor of rare wines and viands, he traveled through France and Italy every year in search of new products to sell. Brown and Son, purveyors of fine wines

odoriferous

giving off an odor / The odoriferous spices stimulated her jaded appetite.

patina

green crust on old bronze works; tone slowly taken by varnished painting / Judging by the patina on this bronze statue, we can conclude that this is the work of a medieval artist. The bronze statue had acquired a hard green patina with age. He looked relaxed and elegant and had the patina of success.

verdant

green; lush in vegetation / Monet's paintings of the verdant meadows were symphonies in green.

lament

grieve; express sorrow / Even advocates of the war lamented the loss of so many lives in combat.

remorse

guilt; self-reproach / The murderer felt no remorse for his crime. She felt no remorse at leaving them without notice. He was filled with remorse for not believing her.

recidivism

habitual return to crime / Prison reformers in the United States are disturbed by the high rate of recidivism; the number of persons serving second and third terms indicates the failure of the prisons to rehabilitate the inmates.

somnolent

half asleep / The heavy meal and the overheated room made us all somnolent and indifferent to the speaker.

satyr

half-human, half-bestial being in the court of Dionysus, portrayed as wanton and cunning / He was like a satyr in his lustful conduct.

tilter

handle used to move the boat's rudder (to steer) / Fearing the wind might shift suddenly and capsize the skiff, Tom kept one hand on the tilter at all times.

pendant

hanging down from something;a piece of jewellery that you wear around your neck on a chain / "Her pendant earrings glistened in the light. "

pendulous

hanging; suspended / The pendulous chandeliers swayed in the breeze as if they were about to fall from the ceiling.

slapdash

haphazard; careless; sloppy;done, or doing sth, too quickly and carelessly / From the number of typos and misspellings I've found on it, it's clear that Mario proofread the report in a remarkably slapdash fashion.

placebo

harmless substance prescribed as a dummy pill / In a controlled experiment, fifty volunteers were given erythromycin tablets; the control group received only placebos. Half of the people taking part in the experiment were given a placebo. The placebo effect means that any treatment will improve patients merely because they want to recover.

raucous

harsh and shrill / His raucous laughter irritated me and grated on my ears. We could hear raucous laughter coming from the room next door.

misogamy

hatred of marriage / He remained a bachelor not because of misogamy but because of ill fate: his fiancee died before the wedding.

monochromatic

having only one color / Most people who are color blind actually can distinguish several colors; some, however, have a truly monochromatic view of a world all in shades of gray.

salubrious

healthful / Many people with hay fever move to more salubrious sections of the country during the months of August and September.

pyre

heap of combustible material, esp. for burning a corpse. / "The mortician put pyre on the corpse before burning a corpse. "

virtuoso

highly skilled artist / The child prodigy Yehudi Menuhin grew into a virtuoso whose virtuosity on the violin thrilled millions.

nominal

in name only; trifling / He offered to drive her to the airport for only a nominal fee.

partiality

inclination; bias / As a judge, not only must I be unbiased, but I must also avoid any evidence of partiality when I award the prize.

purport

intention; meaning / If the purport of your speech was to arouse the rabble, you succeeded admirably. The book does not purport to be a complete history of the period. The purport of his remarks was all too clear.

symbiosis

interdependent relationship (between groups, species), often mutually beneficial / "Both the crocodile bird and the crocodile derive benefit from their symbiosis; pecking away at food particles embedded in the crocodile's teeth, the bird derives nourishment; the crocodile, meanwhile, derives proper dental hygiene. the symbiosis between a plant and the insect that fertilizes it sự cộng sinh giữa cây và côn trùng làm cho cây thụ phấn "

tonic

invigorating medicine / "The tonic water invigorated her, contrary to the enervating effect of the alcohol. the tonic effects of sea air ảnh hưởng tốt lành của khí biển "

shun

keep away from / Cherishing his solitude, the recluse shunned the company of other human beings. She was shunned by her family when she remarried.

strident

loud and harsh / She scolded him in a strident voice

stupefy

make numb; stun; amaze / Disapproving of drugs in general, Laura refused to take sleeping pills or any other medicine that might stupefy her.

virile

manly / I do not accept the premise that a man is virile only when he is belligerent.

rendezvous

meeting place / The two fleets met at the rendezvous at the appointed time. I had a secret rendezvous with John that evening.

tryst

meeting;a secret meeting between lovers / The lovers kept their tryst even though they realized their danger.

molten

melted;heated to a very high temperature so that it becomes liquid / The city of Pompeii was destroyed by volcanic ash rather than by molten lava flowing from Mount Vesuvius.

minatory

menacing; threatening / "Jabbing a minatory forefinger at Dorothy, the Wicked Witch cried, ""I'll get you, and your little dog, too!"""

psychosis

mental disorder;a serious mental illness that affects the whole personality / We must endeavor to find an outlet for the patient's repressed desires if we hope to combat this psychosis.

mirth

merriment; laughter / Sober Malvolio found Sir Toby's mirth improper.

transient

momentary; temporary; staying for a short time / Lexy's joy at finding the perfect Christmas gift for Phil was transient; she still had to find presents for the cousins and Uncle Bob. Located near the airport, this hotel caters to the largely transient trade.

unearthly

not earthly; weird;very strange; not natural and therefore frightening / There is an unearthly atmosphere in her work that amazes the casual observer.

nutrient

nourishing substance / As a budding nutritionist, Kim has learned to design diets that contain foods rich in important basic nutrients. Plants draw minerals and other nutrients from the soil.

unprecedented

novel; unparalleled / Margaret Mitchell's book Gone with the Wind was an unprecedented success.

scurrilous

obscene; indecent;very rude and insulting, and intended to damage sb's reputation / Your scurrilous remarks are especially offensive because they are untrue. He wrote a scurrilous piece about me in the local press.

phenomena

observable facts; subjects of scientific investigation (singular: phenomenon) / We kept careful records of the phenomena we noted in the course of these experiments.

recalcitrant

obstinately stubborn / Donkeys are reputed to be the most recalcitrant of animals.

tender

offer; extend / Although no formal changes had been made against him, in the wake of the recent scandal the mayor felt he should tender his resignation. He has tendered his resignation to the Prime Minister. Local firms were invited to tender for the building contract.

liaison

officer who acts as go-between for two armies; intermediary / As the liason, he had to avoid offending the leaders of the two armies. She is responsible for liaison with researchers at other universities. Our role is to ensure liaison between schools and parents.

unctuous

oily; bland; insincerely suave / "Uriah Heep disguised his nefarious actions by unctuous protestations of his ""'umility."""

terrestrial

on or relating to the earth / We have been able to explore the terrestrial regions much more thoroughly than the aquatic or celestial regions.

marsupial

one of a family of mammals that nurse their offspring in a pouch / The most common marsupial in North America is the opposum.

saboteur

one who commits sabotage; destroyer of property / Members of the Resistance acted as saboteurs, blowing up train lines to prevent supplies from reaching the Nazi army.

prototype

original work used as a model by others / The crude typewriter on display in this museum is the prototype of the elaborate machines in use today.

trappings

outward decorations; ornaments / He loved the trappings of success: the limousines, the stock options, the company jet.

staccato

played in an abrupt manner; marked by abrupt, sharp sound / His staccato speech reminded one of the sound of a machine gun.

piquant

pleasantly tart-tasting; stimulating / The piquant sauce added to our enjoyment of the meal.

toxic

poisonous / We must seek an antidote for whatever toxic substance he has eaten.

tout

publicize; praise excessively / I lost confidence in my broker after he touted some junk bonds that turned out to be a bad investment.

quintessence

purest and highest embodiment / Noel Coward displayed the quintessence of wit.

retort

quick, sharp reply / Even when it was advisable for her to keep her mouth shut, she was always ready with a retort. ‘Don't be ridiculous!’ Pat retorted angrily.

spatial

relating to space / It is difficult to visualize the spatial extent of our universe.

residue

remainder; balance / In his will, he requested that after payment of debts, taxes, and funeral expenses, the residue be given to his wife.

redress

remedy; compensation / Do you mean to tell me that I can get no redress for my injuries?

restive

restlessly impatient; obstinately resisting control / Waiting impatiently in the line to see Santa Claus, even the best-behaved children grow restive and start to fidget.

renovate

restore to good condition; renew / They claim that they can renovate worn shoes so that they look like new ones.

sequester

retire from public life; segregate; seclude / "Although he had hoped for a long time to sequester himself in a small community, he never was able to drop his busy round of activities in the city. to sequester oneself from the world sống cô lập, sống ẩn dật "

superannuated

retired or disqualified because of age; too old for work or to be used for their original purpose / "The superannuated man was indignant because he felt that he could still perform a good day's work. "

title

right or claim to possession; mark of rank; name (of a book, film, etc.) / Though the penniless Duke of Ragwort no longer held title to the family estate, he still retained his title as head of one of England's oldest families.

silt

sediment deposited by running water / The harbor channel must be dredged annually to remove the silt. The water contains fine silt.

portent

sign; omen; forewarning / He regarded the black cloud as a portent of evil.

skiff

small, light sailboat or rowboat / "Tom dreamed of owning an ocean-going yacht but had to settle for a skiff he could sail in the bay. "

spendthrift

someone who wastes money / Easy access to credit encourages people to turn into spendthrifts who shop till they drop.

stalwart

strong, brawny; steadfast / His consistent support of the party has proved that he is a stalwart and loyal member.

venison

the meat of a deer / "The hunters dined on venison. "

motif

theme / This simple motif runs throughout the score.

wispy

thin; slight; barely discernible;consisting of small, thin pieces; not thick / "Worried about preserving his few wispy tufts of hair, Walter carefully massaged his scalp and applied hair restorer every night. "

tertiary

third / He is so thorough that he analyzes tertiary causes where other writers are content with primary and secondary reasons.

palpitate

throb; flutter / As he became excited, his heart began to palpitate more and more erratically. He was aware of his palpitating heart. Her heart was palpitating wildly.

precipitate

throw headlong; hasten / The removal of American political support appeared to have precipitated the downfall of the Marcos regime. The assassination of the president precipitated the country into war.

nullify

to make invalid / Once the contract was nullified, it no longer had any legal force.

unfrock

to strip a priest or minister of church authority / To disbar a lawyer, to unfrock a priest, to suspend a doctor's license to practice--these are extreme steps that the authorities should take only after careful consideration.

meander

to wind or turn in its course / It is difficult to sail up this stream because of the way it meanders through the countryside. The road meanders along the valley floor.

lionize

treat as a celebrity / She enjoyed being lionized and adored by the public.

tremor

trembling; slight quiver / She had a nervous tremor in her right hand.

petty

trivial; unimportant; very small; monor / She had no major complaints to make about his work, only a few petty quibbles that were almost too minor to state.

pest

troublesome or annoying person / He was a pest; always bothering people.

torso

trunk of statue with head and limbs missing; human trunk / This torso, found in the ruins of Pompeii, is now on exhibition in the museum in Naples.

tacit

understood; not put into words / We have a tacit agreement based on only a handshake.

wistful

vaguely longing; sadly pensive / With a last wistful glance at the happy couples dancing in the hall, Sue headed back to her room to study for her exam.

multifarious

varied; greatly diversified;of many different kinds; having great variety / A career woman and mother, she was constantly busy with the multifarious activities of her daily life. This is a vast and multifarious organization.

pied

variegated; multicolored / The pied piper of Hamelin got his name from the multicolored clothing he wore.

sundry

various; several / My suspicions were aroused when I read sundry items in the newspapers about your behavior.

tarantula

venomous spider / We need an antitoxin to counteract the bite of the tarantula.

progenitor

" ancestor " / The Roth family, whose progenitors emigrated from Germany early in the nineteenth century, settled in Peru, Illinois. He was the progenitor of a family of distinguished actors.

nettle

" annoy ; vex" / Do not let him nettle you with his sarcastic remarks. My remarks clearly nettled her.

synthetic

" artificial ; resulting from synthesis; man-made " / During the twentieth century, many synthetic products have replaced the natural products.

rancor

" bitterness ; hatred" / Let us forget out rancor and cooperate in this new endeavor.

outlandish

" bizzare ; peculiar; unconventional; weird " / The eccentric professor who engages in markedly outlandish behavior is a stock figure in novels with an academic setting.

reverie

" daydream ; musing" / He was awakened from his reverie by the teacher's question.

pious

" devout " / The pious parents gave their children a religious upbringing.

quandary

" dilemma " / When the two colleges to which he had applied accepted him, he was in a quandary as to which one he should attend.

rebate

" discount " / We offer a rebate of ten percent to those who pay cash.

prodigious

" enormous ; marvelous; colossal " / He marveled at her prodigious appetite when he saw all the food she ate.

warranty

" guarantee ; assurance by seller" / The purchaser of this automobile is protected by the manufacturer's warranty that he will replace any defective part for five years or 50,000 miles.

loiter

" hang around ; linger" / The policeman told him not to loiter in the alley.

skinflint

" miser " / The old skinflint refused to give her a raise.

scoff

" mock ; ridicule" / He scoffed at dentists until he had his first toothache.

unassuming

" modest " / He is so unassuming that some people fail to realize how great a man he really is.

plaintive

" mournful ;sounding sad, especially in a weak complaining way" / The dove has a plaintive and melancholy call

whinny

" neigh like a horse" / "When he laughed through his nose, it sounded as if he whinnied. "

upshot

" outcome " / The upshot of the rematch was that the former champion proved that he still possessed all the skills of his youth.

verbalize

" put into words " / I know you don't like to talk about these things, but please try to verbalize your feelings.

venerate

" revere ; idolize ; worship " / In China, the people venerate their ancestors.

touchy

" sensitive ; irascible;easily upset or offended; delicated " / Do not discuss this phase of the problem as he is very touchy about it. Racism remains a touchy issue I can't understand why her resignation is still such a touchy subject.

sentinel

" sentry ; lookout" / Though camped in enemy territory, Bledsoe ignored the elementary precaution of posting sentinels around the encampment.

somnambulist

" sleepwalker " / The most famous somnambulist in literature is Lady Macbeth; her monologue in the sleepwalking scene is one of the highlights of Shakespeare's play.

larceny

" theft " / Because of the prisoner's record, the district attorney refused to reduce the charge from grand larceny to petit larceny.

vestige

" trace; remains" / We discovered vestiges of early Indian life in the cave.

rectitude

" uprightness ;the quality of thinking or behaving in a correct and honest way" / He was renowned for his rectitude and integrity.

ungainly

" awkward " / He is an ungainly young man; he trips over everything.

turbid

" muddy ; having the sediment disturbed" / The water was turbid after the children had waded through it.

remiss

" negligent ;not giving sth enough care and attention" / He was accused of being remiss in his duty when the prisoner escaped.

recuperate

" recover " / The doctors were worried because the patient did not recuperate as rapidly as they had expected. After an exhausting few weeks I needed some time to recuperate.

supplant

" replace ; usurp" / Corazon Aquino supplanted Ferdinand Marcos as president of the Philippines. Their work has been largely supplanted by the use of a computer program that fulfils the same function.

reverent

" respectful " / His reverent attitude was appropriate in a house of worship.

reprisal

" retaliation " / I am confident that we are ready for any reprisals the enemy may undertake. They did not want to give evidence for fear of reprisals. They shot ten hostages in reprisal for the assassination of their leader.

orthodox

" traditional ; conservative in belief" / Faced with a problem, he preferred to take an orthodox approach rather than shock anyone.

unscathed

" unharmed ;not hurt" / They prayed he would come back from the war unscathed.

ludicrous

" unreasonable; that you cannot take seriously; laughable; trifling; absurd, ridiculous ; " / Let us be serious; this is not a ludicrous issue.

yen

" urge, longing " / She had a yen to get away and live on her own for a while. I've always had a yen to travel around the world.

muggy

" warm and damp in an unpleasant way; close " / August in New York City is often muggy.

vigilance

" watchfulness " / Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.

prevalent

" widespread ; generally accepted; common " / A radical committed to social change, Reed had no patience with the conservative views prevalent in the America of his day.

serpentine

" winding ; twisting;bending and twisting like a snake" / The car swerved at every curve in the serpentine road.

opus

" work " / Although many critics hailed his Fifth Symphony, he did not regard it as his major opus.

tyro

"beginner; novice " / For a mere tyro, you have produced some marvelous results.

lewd

"lustful; obscene " / They found his lewd stories objectionable.

petrify

"turn to stone orto make sb feel extremely frightened, terrify " / His sudden and unexpected appearance seemed to petrify her. Just the thought of making a speech petrifies me.

nihilism

Denial of traditional values; total skepticism,the belief that nothing has any value, especially that religious and moral principles have no value / nihilism holds that existence has no meaning.

rife

"abundant; current; widespread " / In the face of the many rumors of scandal, which are rife at the moment, it is best to remain silent.

mogul

"powerful person; magnate " / The oil moguls made great profits when the price of gasoline rose.

thrive

"prosper; flourish " / Despite the impact of recession on the restaurant trade, Philip's cafe thrived.

protuberance

"protrusion; bulge;a round part that sticks out from a surface, bulge " / A ganglionic cyst is a fluid-filled tumor (generally benign) that develops near a joint membrane or tendon sheath, and that bulges beneath the skin, forming a protuberance. The diseased trees are marked by protuberances on their trunks.

tentative

"provisional; experimental;not definite or certain because you may want to change it later; hesitant " / Your tentative plans sound plausible; let me know when the final details are worked out. We made a tentative arrangement to meet on Friday.

wrench

"pull; strain; twist ; jerk " / She wrenched free of her attacker and landed a powerful kick to his kneecap. He grabbed Ben, wrenching him away from his mother. Leaving home was a terrible wrench for me.

quell

"put down; quiet; calm " / The police used fire hoses and teat gas to quell the rioters. Extra police were called in to quell the disturbances.

propound

"put forth for analysis;to suggest an idea or explanation of sth for people to consider; propose, put forward " / In you discussion, you have propounded several questions; let us consider each one separately.

receptive

"quick or willing to receive ideas, suggestions, etc.;willing to listen to or to accept new ideas or suggestions; responsive " / Adventure-loving Huck Finn proved a receptive audience for Tom's tales of buried treasure and piracy. She was always receptive to new ideas. He gave an impressive speech to a receptive audience.

voracious

"ravenous; greedy , avid " / The wolf is a voracious animal, its hunger never satisfied.

rampant

"rearing up on hind legs; unrestrained " / The rampant weeds in the garden killed all the flowers that had been planted in the spring.

repercussion

"rebound; reverberation; reaction; consequence " / I am afraid that this event will have serious repercussions.

sublimate

"refine; purify; channel ; to direct your energy, especially sexual energy, to socially acceptable activities such as work, exercise, art, etc." / We must strive to sublimate these desires and emotions into worthwhile activities. sublimating one's sex drive by working hard

spurn

"reject; scorn; shun " / The heroine spurned the villain's advances.

monastic

"related to monks; simple and quiet and possibly ‚Üë celibate; ascetic " / Wanting to live a religious life, he took his monastic vows.

torrent

"rushing stream; flood; deluge " / Day after day of heavy rain saturated the hillside until the water ran downhill in torrents.

surfeit

"satiate; stuff; indulge to excess in anything; excess " / Every Thanksgiving we are surfeited with an overabundance of holiday treats.

relish

"savor; enjoy " / I relish a good joke as much as anyone else. I don't relish the prospect of getting up early tomorrow.

meager

"scanty; inadequate; paltry " / His salary was far too meager for him to afford to buy a new car. This account offers a paltry 1% return on your investment.

toady

"servile flatterer; yes man; sycophant " / Never tell the boss anything he doesn't wish to hear: he doesn't want an independent adviser, he just wants a toady.

mediate

"settle a dispute through the services of an outsider; negotiate " / Let us mediate out differences rather than engage in a costly strike.

liquidate

"settle accounts; clear up; annihilate " / He was able to liquidate all his debts in short period of time. The government tried to liquidate the rebel movement and failed.

mangy

"shabby; wretched; moth-eaten " / We finally thew out the mangy rug that the dog had destroyed.

shoddy

"sham; not genuine; inferior; second-rate;mediocre " / You will never get the public to buy such shoddy material.

luster

"shine; gloss;the shining quality of a surface; sheen " / "The soft luster of the silk in the dim light was pleasing. "

slither

"slip or slide " / During the recent ice storm, many people slithered down this hill as they walked to the station.

revulsion

"sudden violent change of feeling; negative reaction;a strong feeling of disgust or horror; repugnance " / Many people in this country who admired dictatorships underwent a revulsion when they realized what Hitler and Mussolini were trying to do. She felt a deep sense of revulsion at the violence. I started to feel a revulsion against their decadent lifestyle.

ominous

"suggesting that sth bad is going to happen in the future; threatening; foreboding " / Those clouds are ominous; they suggest that a severe storm is on the way. She picked up the phone but there was an ominous silence at the other end.

pertinent

"suitable; to the point, relevant " / The lawyer wanted to know all the pertinent details.

putative

"supposed; reputed; presumed " / Although there are some doubts, the putative author of this work is Massinger.

unsullied

"untarnished; unspoiled ;not spoiled by anything; still pure or in the original state" / I am happy that my reputation is unsullied.

mundane

"worldly as opposed to spiritual; ordinary , dull " / He was concerned only with mundane matters, especially the daily stock market quotations.

psychiatrist

a doctor who treats mental diseases / A psychiatrist often needs long conferences with his patient before a diagnosis can be made.

spoonerism

accidental transposition of sounds in sucessive words / When the radio announcer introduced the President as Hoobert Herver, he was guilty of spoonerism.

succor

aid; assistance; relief; help that you give to sb who is suffering or having problems / We shall be ever grateful for the succor our country gave us when we were in need.

omniscient

all-knowing / I do not pretend to be omniscient, but I am positive about this fact. The novel has an omniscient narrator.

omnipotent

all-powerful;having total power; able to do anything / The monarch regarded himself as omnipotent and responsible to no one for his acts.

waylay

ambush; lie in wait / "They agreed to waylay their victim as he passed through the dark alley going home. the patrol was waylaid by bandits đội tuần tra đã bị bọn cướp mai phục "

rider

amendment or clause added to a legislative bill / Senator Foghorn said he would support Senator Filibuster's tax reform bill only if Filibuster agreed to add an antipollution rider to the bill.

toga

Roman outer robe / Marc Antony pointed to the slashes in Caesar's toga.

vex

annoy; distress / Please try not to vex your mother; she is doing the best she can. The memory of their conversation still vexed him.

sluice

artificial channel for directing or controlling the flow of water / "In times of drought, this sluice enables farmers to obtain water for irrigation. "

posture

assume an affected pose; act artificially / No matter how much Arnold boasted or postured, I could not believe he was as important as he pretended to be. Back pains can be the result of bad posture.

personable

attractive / The man I am seeking to fill this position must be personable since he will be representing us before the public. The sales assistant was a very personable young man.

viscid

"adhesive; gluey;sticky and slimy " / The trunk of the maple tree was viscid with sap.

venturesome

"bold; daring " / A group of venturesome women were the first to scale Mt.Annapurna.

outspoken

"candid; blunt " / The candidate was too outspoken to be a successful politician; he had not yet learned to weigh his words carefully.

vindicate

"clear of charges; justify " / I hope to vindicate my client and return him to society as a free man. I have every confidence that this decision will be fully vindicated.

pugnacious

"combative; disposed to fight; bellicose " / As a child he was pugnacious and fought with everyone.

machiavellian

"crafty; double-dealing; cunning , unscrupulous " / I do not think he will be a good embassador because he is not accustomed to the machiavellian maneuverings of foreign diplomats.

mordant

"critical and unkind, but funny; biting; sarcastic; stinging; caustic " / Actors feared the critic's mordant pen. His mordant wit appealed to students.

tractable

"docile; manageable " / You will find the children in this school very tractable and willing to learn.

tightwad

"excessively frugal person; miser " / Jill called Jack a tightwad because he never picked up the check.

rapacious

"excessively grasping ; plundering" / Hawks and other rapacious birds prey on variety of small animals.

ostracize

"exclude from public favor; ban; shun " / As soon as the newspapers carried the story of his connection with the criminals, his friends began to ostracize him.

ravenous

"extremely hungry; starving " / The revenous dog upset several garbage pails in its search for food.

prosperity

"good fortune; financial success; physical well-being; affluence " / "Promising to stay together ""for richer, for poorer,"" the newlyweds vowed to be true to one another in prosperity and hardship alike. The increase in the country's prosperity was due to the discovery of oil "

maul

"handle roughly, savage " / The rock star was mauled by his overexcited fans.

odious

"hateful; horrible " / I find the task of punishing you most odious.

tendentious

"having an aim; biased; designed to further a cause; controversial " / The editorials in this periodical are tendentious rather than truth-seeking.

titular

"having the title of an office without the obligations; nominal " / Although he was the titular head of the company, the real decisions were made by his general manager.

tenacious

"holding fast; persistent " / I had to struggle to break his tenacious hold on my arm. She's a tenacious woman. She never gives up.

mesmerize

"hypnotize; fascinate " / The incessant drone seemed to mesmerize him and place him in a trance.

paramour

"illicit lover; lover ; a person that sb is having a romantic or sexual relationship with" / She sought a divorce on the grounds that her husband had a paramour in another town.

pert

"impertinent; forward; impudent " / I think your pert and impudent remarks call for an apology.

vehement

"impetuous; with marked vigor; forceful " / He spoke with vehement eloquence in defense of his client.

proclivity

"inclination; natural tendency; propensity " / The cross old lady has a proclivity to grumble.

unerringly

"infallibly; unfailingly ;always right or accurate" / My teacher unerringly pounced on the one typographical error in my essay.

repugnance

"loathing; repulsion " / She looked at the snake with repugnance. She was trying to overcome her physical repugnance for him.

steadfast

"loyal; unswerving; firm " / Penelope was steadfast in her affections, faithfully waiting for Ulysses to return from his wanderings.

mutilate

"maim;to damage somebody’s body very severely, especially by cutting or tearing off part of it; vandalize " / The torturer threatened to mutilate his victim. Intruders slashed and mutilated several paintings.

obviate

"make unnecessary; get rid of; preclude " / I hope this contribution will obviate any need for further collections of funds. This new evidence obviates the need for any further enquiries.

welt

"mark from beating or whipping;a raised mark on the skin where sth has hit or rubbed you weal " / "The evidence of child abuse was very clear; Jennifer's small body was covered with welts and bruises. "

lugubrious

"mournful; doleful " / The lugabrious howling of the dogs added to our sadness.

scurry

"move briskly; to run with quick short steps, scuttle " / The White Rabbit had to scurry to get to his appointment on time.

waft

"moved gently by wind or waves; drift " / Daydreaming, he gazed at the leaves that wafted past his window.

sporadic

"occurring irregularly, intermittent " / Although there are still sporadic outbursts of shooting in the streets, the rebellion is essentially over.

laudable

"praiseworthy; commendable " / His laudable deeds will be remarked by all whom he aided.

presentiment

"premonition; foreboding " / Hamlet felt a presentiment about his meeting with Laertes.

stymie

"present an obstacle; stump; foil " / The detective was stymied by the contradictory evidence in the robbery investigation. He found himself stymied by an old opponent. Financial difficulties have stymied the company's growth.

restitution

"reparation; indemnification; restoration " / He offered to make restitution for the window broken by his son. The company has a legal duty to make restitution to passengers for any inconvenience caused.

penitent

"repentant; remorseful " / When he realized the enormity of his crime, he became remorseful and penitent.

replicate

"reproduce; duplicate " / To the chagrin of the scientists, they were unable to replicate the results of their controversial experiment.

reprimand

"reprove severely; rebuke " / I am afraid that my parents will reprimand me when I show them my report card. The officers were severely reprimanded for their unprofessional behaviour.

sedition

"resistance to authority; insubordination; insurrectio n" / His words, though not treasonous in themselves, were calculated to arouse thoughts of sedition.

reputable

"respectable; respected " / If you want to buy antiques, look for a reputable dealer; far too many dealers today pass off fakes as genuine antiques.

repress

"restrain; crush; oppress; control ; put down ; supress " / Anne's parents tried to curb her impetuosity without repressing her boundless high spirits.

vindictive

"revengeful; spiteful " / She was very vindictive and never forgave an injury.

surreptitious

"secret; furtive;stealthy " / News of their surreptitious meeting gradually leaked out.

mawkish

"sickening; insipid, sentimental " / Your mawkish sighs fill me with disgust.

rakish

"stylish; sporty; dissolute ; jaunty " / He wore his hat at a rakish and jaunty angle. He plays the novel's rakish hero.

meek

"submissive; patient and long-suffering; compliant , self-effacing " / Mr. Barrett never expected his meek daughter would dare to defy him by eloping with her suitor.

subversive

"tending to overthrow; destructive; seditious " / At first glance, the notion that Styrofoam cups may actually be more ecologically sound than paper cups strikes most environmentalists as subversive.

provisional

"tentative; temporary " / The appointment is provisional; only on the approval of the board of directors will it be made permanent.

memento

"token; reminder; souvenir " / Take this book as a memento of your visit.

rile

"vex; irritate; muddy; anger " / Red had a hair-trigger temper: he was an easy man to rile. Nothing ever seemed to rile him.

rusticate

banish to the country; dwell in the country / I like city life so much that I can never understand how people can rusticate in the suburbs.

relegate

banish; consign to inferior position / If we relegate these experts to minor posts because of their political persuasions, we shall lose their valuable services. She was then relegated to the role of assistant. He relegated the incident to the back of his mind.

quizzical

bantering; comical; humorously serious;showing that you are slightly surprised or amused / "Will Rogers' quizzical remarks endeared him to his audiences. "

practical

based on experience; useful / He was a practical man, opposed to theory

nib

beak; pen point / "The nibs of fountain pens often become clotted and corroded. I dipped the nib into the ink and started to write. "

ursine

bearlike; pertaining to a bear / "Because of its ursine appearance, the great panda has been identified with the bears; actually, it is closely related to the raccoon. "

pummel

beat / The severity with which he was pummeled was indicated by the bruises he displayed on his head and face.

lambaste

beat; thrash verbally or physically / It was painful to watch the champion lambaste his opponent, tearing into him mercilessly.

pulchritude

beauty; comeliness / I do not envy the judges who have to select this year's Miss America from this collection of female pulchritude.

mendicant

beggar / From the moment we left the ship, we were surrounded by mendicants and peddlers.

pessimism

belief that life is basically bad or evil; gloominess / The good news we have been receiving lately indicates that there is little reason for your pessimism. There is a mood of pessimism in the company about future job prospects. This widespread pessimism does not seem justified.

refraction

bending of a ray of light / "When you look at a stick inserted in water, it looks bent because of the refraction of the light by the water. "

preternatural

beyond that which is normal in nature;that does not seem natural; that cannot be explained by natural laws / John's mother's total ability to tell when he was lying struck him as almost preternatural.

partial

biased; having a liking for something / I am extremely partial to chocolate eclairs.

necromancy

black magic; dealings with the dead / Because he was able to perform feats of necromancy, the natives thought he was in league with the devil.

regatta

boat or yacht race / "Many boating enthusiasts followed the regatta in their own yachts. "

verge

border; edge / Madame Curie knew she was on the verge of discovering the secrets of radioactive elements.

saga

Scandinavian myth; any legend / This is a saga of the sea and the men who risk their lives on it.

truculence

agressiveness; ferocity / Tynan's reviews were noted for their caustic attacks and general tone of truculence.

reparation

amends; compensation / At the peace conference, the defeated country promised to pay reparations to the victors.

ratify

approve formally; verify / Before the treaty could go into effect, it had to be ratified by the president.

novice

beginner / Even a novice can do good work if he follows these simple directions.

subservient

behaving like a slave; servile; obsequious / "He was proud and dignified; he refused to be subservient to anyone. She did not wish to leave him, but she could not accept her subservient role "

temerity

boldness; rashness / Do you have the temerity to argue with me?

maritime

bordering on the sea; nautical / The maritime Provinces depend on the sea for their wealth.

taper

candle / "He lit the taper on the windowsill. "

leaven

cause to rise or grow lighter; enliven / "As bread dough is leavened, it puffs up, expanding in volume. "

pestilential

causing plague; baneful / "People were afraid to explore the pestilential swap. pestilential doctrines "

perspicuity

clearness of expression; freedom from ambiguity / One of the outstanding features of this book is the perspicuity of its author; her meaning is always clear.

raiment

clothing / "How can I go to the ball? asked Cinderella. ""I have no raiment fit to wear."""

pigment

coloring matter / "Van Gogh mixed various pigments with linseed oil to create his paints. "

synthesis

combining parts into a whole / Now that we have succeeded in isolating this drug, our next problem is to plan its synthesis in the laboratory. A new method that is a synthesis of the best features of the old methods.

lexicographer

compiler of a dictionary / The new dictionary is the work of many lexicographers who spent years compiling and editing the work.

olfactory

concerning the sense of smell / The olfactory organ is the nose.

pithy

concise; meaty;short but expressed well and full of meaning / I enjoy reading his essays because they are always compact and pithy.

peroration

conclusion of an oration / The peroration was largely hortatory and brought the audience to its feet clamoring for action at its close.

parley

conference / The peace parley has not produced the anticipated truce.

validate

confirm; ratify / I will not publish my findings until I validate my results. Check that their courses have been validated by a reputable organization.

nexus

connection;a complicated series of connections between different things / I fail to see the nexus that binds these two widely separated events.

subjugate

conquer; bring under control' to defeat sb/sth; to gain control over sb/sth / "It is not our aim to subjugate our foe; we are interested only in establishing peaceful relations. Her personal ambitions had been subjugated to (= considered less important than) the needs of her family. "

trough

container for feeding farm animals; lowest point (of a wave, business cycle, etc.) / "The hungry pigs struggled to get at the fresh swill in the trough. The surfer rode her board, coasting along in the trough between two waves. The economy is unlikely to reach its trough until the turn of the year. "

tainted

contaminated; corrupt / Health authorities are always trying to prevent the sale and use of tainted food.

transcribe

copy / When you transcribe your notes, please send a copy to Mr.Smith and keep the original for our files. How many official documents have been transcribed into Braille for blind people? The interview was recorded and then transcribed.

reconcile

correct inconsistencies; become friendly after a quarrel / Every time we try to reconcile our checkbook with the bank statement, we quarrel. However, despite these monthly lovers' quarrels, we always manage to reconcile. It was hard to reconcile his career ambitions with the needs of his children.

malefactor

criminal / We must try to bring these malefactors to justice.

stricture

critical comments; severe and adverse criticism / His strictures on the author's style are prejudiced and unwarranted. She merely ignored any strictures on the way she dressed.

throng

crowd / Throngs of shoppers jammed the aisles.

retrench

cut down; economize / If they were to be able to send their children to college, they would have to retrench.

truncate

cut the top off / The top of the cone that has been truncated in a plane parallel to its base is a circle. My article was published in truncated form.

obituary

dealth notice;an article about somebody’s life and achievements, that is printed in a newspaper soon after they have died / I first learned of her death when I read the obituary in the newspaper.

libertine

debauched person, roue / Although she was aware of his reputation as a libertine, she felt she could reform him and help him break his dissolute way of life.

manifesto

declaration; statement of policy / The Communist Manifesto by Marx and Engels proclaimed the principles of modern communism.

panoramic

denoting an unobstructed and comprehensive view / On a clear day, from the top of the World Trade Center you can get a panoramic view of New York City and neighboring stretches of New Jersey and Long Island.

turpitude

depravity;wickedness / A visitor may be denied admittance to this country if she has been guilty of moral turpitude.

posterity

descendants; future generations / "We hope to leave a better world to posterity. Posterity will remember him as a great man. "

sacrilegious

desecrating; profane / His stealing of the altar cloth was a very sacrilegious act. Leading clerics condemned the book as a sacrilegious attack on their faith.

venerable

deserving high respect / We do not mean to be disrespectful when we refuse to follow the advice of our venerable leader.

scurvy

despicable; contemptible / Peter Pan sneered at Captain Hook and his scurvy crew.

obliterate

destroy completely / The tidal wave obliterated several island villages. The building was completely obliterated by the bomb.

virus

disease communicator / The doctors are looking for a specific medicine to control this virus.

unravel

disentangle; solve / "With equal ease Miss Marple unraveled tangled balls of yarn and baffling murder mysteries. I unravelled the string and wound it into a ball. "

skulduggery

dishonest behavior / The investigation into municipal corruption turned up new instances of skulduggery daily.

notoriety

disrepute; ill fame / To the starlet, any publicity was good publicity: if she couldn't have a good reputation, she'd settle for notoriety. She achieved notoriety for her affair with the senator.

unsavory

distasteful; morally offensive / People with unsavory reputations should not be allowed to work with young children.

tribulation

distress; suffering;great trouble or suffering / After all the trials and tribulations we have gone through, we need this rest.

ramify

divide into branches or subdivisions / When the plant begins to ramify, it is advisable to nip off most of the new branches.

skeptic

doubter; person who suspends judgment until he has examined the evidence supporting a point of view. / In this matter, I am a skeptic; I want proof. He was unable to convince the skeptics in the audience.

liability

drawback; debts / Her lack of an extensive vocabulary was a liability that she was able to overcome.

sphinx-like

enigmatic; mysterious / The Mona Lisa's sphinx-like expression has puzzled art lovers for centuries.

paraphernalia

equipment; odds and ends / His desk was cluttered with paper, pen, ink, dictionary and other paraphernalia of the writing craft.

quibble

equivocate; play on words / Do not quibble; I want a straightforward and definite answer. It isn't worth quibbling over such a small amount.

misapprehension

error; misunderstanding / To avoid msapprehension, I am going to ask all of you to repeat the instructions I have given. I was under the misapprehension that the course was for complete beginners.

substantive

essential; pertaining to the substance / Although the delegates were aware of the importance of the problem, they could not agree on the substantive issues. The report concluded that no substantive changes were necessary.

uxorious

excessively devoted to one's wife / "His friends laughed at him because he was so uxorious and submissive to his wife's desires. "

prude

excessively modest or proper person a person that you think is too easily shocked by things connected with sex / The X-rated film was definitely not for prudes.

ornate

excessively or elaborately decorated / Furniture of the Baroque period can be recognized by its ornate carvings.

pretext

excuse;a false reason that you give for doing sth, usually sth bad, in order to hide the real reason; an excuse / "He looked for a good pretext to get out of paying a visit to his aunt. He came to see me on/under the pretext of asking my advice when he really wanted to borrow money Be careful not to give him a pretext to report you. "

minuscule

extremely small / Why should I involve myself with a project with so minuscule a chance for success?

spurious

false; counterfeit; forged; illogical / The hero of Jonathan Gash's mystery novels is an antique dealer who gives the reader advice on how to tell spurious antiques from the real things.

renown

fame;fame and respect because of sth you have done that people admire / "For many years an unheralded researcher, Barbara McClintock gained international renown when she won the Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine. "

visceral

felt in one's inner organs (thuộc nội tạng or bản năng) / She disliked the visceral sensations she had whenever she rode the roller coaster. She had a visceral dislike of all things foreign.

limber

flexible / Hours of ballet classes kept him limber.

quadruped

four-footed animal / Most mammals are quadrupeds.

shard

fragment, generally of pottery / The archaeologist assigned several students the task of reassembling earthenware vessels from the shards he had brought back from the expedition.

rubble

fragments / Ten years after World War II, some of the rubble left by enemy bombings could still be seen. There were piles of rubble everywhere.

redolent

fragrant; odorous; suggestive of an odor / Even though it is February, the air is redolent of spring.

latitude

freedom from narrow limitations / I think you have permitted your son too much latitude in this matter. to understand a problem in its proper latitude

scruple

fret about; hesitate, for ethical reasons; a feeling that prevents you from doing sth that you think may be morally wrong / Fearing that her husband had become involved in an affair, she did not scruple to read his diary. He had no scruples about spying on her.

repine

fret; complain / There is no sense repining over the work you have left undone.

querulous

fretful; whining / His classmates were repelled by his querulous and complaining statements.

serendipity

gift for finding valuable or desirable things by accident; accidental good fortune or luck / Many scientific discoveries are a matter of serendipity: Newton was not sitting there thinking about gravity when the apple dropped on his head. Meeting her like that, and there of all places, was true serendipity!

titanic

gigantic / titanic waves beat aginst the shore during the hurricane. He has set himself a titanic task: to revive the country's economy.

somber

gloomy; depressing / From the doctor's grim expression, I could tell he had somber news.

virtue

goodness; moral excellence; good quality / A virtue carried to extremes can turn into something resembling vice; humility, for example, can degenerate into servility and spinelessness.

theocracy

government of a community by religious leaders / Some Pilgrims favored the establishment of a theocracy in New England.

monarchy

government under a single hereditary ruler with varying degrees of power / England today remains a monarchy.

pall

grow tiresome / The study of word lists can eventually pall and put one to sleep. Even the impressive scenery began to pall on me after a few hundred miles.

surmise

guess;conjecture / I surmise that he will be late for this meeting.

misogynist

hater of women / She accused him of being a misogynist because he had been a bachelor all his life.

prestige

impression produced by achievements or reputation / The wealthy man sought to obtain social prestige by contributing to popular charities.

partial

incomplete / In this issue we have published only a partial list of contributors because we lack space to acknowledge everyone. • It was only a partial solution to the problem.

nonchalance

indifference; lack of interest / Few people could understand how he could listen to the news of the tragedy with such nonchalance; the mahority regarded him as callous and unsympathetic.

opprobrium

infamy; vilification / He refused to defend himself against the slander and opprobrium hurled against him by the newspapers; he preferred to rely on his record.

peregrination

journey / Auntie Mame was a world traveler whose peregrinations took her from Tiajuana to Timbuctoo.

warrant

justify; authorize / Before the judge issues the injunction, you must convince her this action is warranted.

sagacious

keen; shrewd; having insight;wise / He is much too sagacious to be fooled by a trick like that.

trinket

knickknack; bauble / Whenever she traveled abroad, Ethel would pick up costume jewelry and other trinkets as souvenirs.

salacious

lascivious; lustful / Chaucer's monk is not pious but salacious, a teller of lewd tales and ribald jests.

spawn

lay eggs / Fish ladders had to be built in the dams to assist the salmon returning to spawn in their native streams. The band's album spawned a string of hit singles.

sloth

laziness / Such sloth in a young person is deplorable; go to work!

vernacular

living language; natural style / "Cut out those old-fashioned ""thee's"" and ""thou's"" and write in the vernacular. vernacular literature quickly replaced Latin "

sybarite

lover of luxury / Rich people are not always sybarites; some of them have little taste for a life of luxury.

nadir

lowest point / Although few people realized it, the Dow-Jones averages had reached their nadir and would soon begin an upward surge.

osseous

made of bone; bony / "The hollow ""soft spot"" found at the top of the infant's skull gradually closes as new osseus tissue fills in the gap."

uproarious

marked by commotion; extremely funny; very noisy / "The uproarious comedy hit Home Alone featured Macaulay Culkin, whose mugging and comic antics provoked gales of uproarious laughter from audiences coast to coast. "

mete

measure; distribute / He tried to be impartial in his efforts to mete out justice.

skirmish

minor fight / Custer's troops expected they might run into a skirmish or two on maneuvers; they did not expect to face a major battle. Several people were killed in skirmishes during the night.

promiscuous

mixed indiscriminately; haphazard; irregular, particularly sexually / In the opera La Boheme, we get a picture of the promiscuous life led by the young artists of Paris.

unrequited

not reciprocated;(of love) not returned by the person that you love / "Suffering the pangs of unrequited love, Olivia rebukes Cesario for his hard-heartedness. an unrequited love tình yêu không được đáp lại "

procurement

obtaining;the process of obtaining supplies of something, especially for a government or an organization / The personnel department handles the procurement of new employees. She has responsibility for the procurement of equipment in the company.

reaper

one who harvests grain; a person or a machine that cuts and collects crops on a farm / "Death, the Grim Reaper, cuts down men and women, just as a farmer cuts down the ripened grain. "

overt

open to view / According to the United States Constitution, a person must commit an overt act before he may be tried for treason.

manifestation

outward demonstration; indication / Mozart's early attraction to the harsichord was the first manifestation of his pronounced musical bent.

motley

parti-colored; mixed / The captain had gathered a motley crew to sail the vessel.

problematic

perplexing; unsettled: questionable / Given the many areas of conflict still awaiting resolution, the outcome of the peace talks remains problematic.

numismatist

person who collects coins / "The numismatist had a splendid collection of antique coins. "

rustic

pertaining to country people; uncouth / The backwoodsman looked out place in his rustic attire.

tactile

pertaining to the organs or sense of touch / His callused hands had lost their tactile sensitivity.

troth

pledge of good faith especially in betrothal / "He gave her his troth and vowed to cherish her always. in troth có thật, quả thật "

perusal

reading;the act of reading something, especially in a careful way / I am certain that you have missed important details in your rapid perusal of this document. The agreement was signed after careful perusal.

remediable

reparable / Let us be grateful that the damage is remediable.

umbrage

resentment; anger; sense of injury or insult / She took umbrage at his remarks and stormed away in a huff.

slag

residue from smelting metal; dross; waste matter / The blast furnace had a special opening at the bottom to allow the workers to remove the worthless slag.

seedy

run-down; decrepit; disreputable;dirty and unpleasant, possibly connected with immoral or illegal activities / I would rather stay in dormitory lodgings in a decent youth hostel than have a room of my own in a seedy downtown hotel.

pastoral

rural / In these stories of pastoral life, we find an understanding of the daily tasks of country folk.

trigger

set off / John is touchy today; say one word wrong and you'll trigger an explosion.

subside

settle down; descend; grow quiet / The doctor assured us that the fever would eventually subside. She waited nervously for his anger to subside.

pungency

sharpness; stinging quality / The pungency of the cigarette smoke made me cough.

scuttle

sink;to sink a ship deliberately by making holes in the side or bottom of it / "The sailors decided to scuttle their vessel rather than surrender it to the enemy. "

ulterior

situated beyond; unstated and often questionable / You must have an ulterior motive for your behavior, since there is no obvious reason for it. She must have some ulterior motive for being nice to me— what does she really want?

opiate

sleep producer; deadener of pain;Opiates are used in medicine to reduce severe pain. / By such opiates, she made the people forget their difficulties and accept their unpleasant circumstances. the opiate of all-day chewing gum

legerdemain

sleight of hand / "The magician demonstrated his renowned legerdemain. "

smattering

slight knowledge / I don't know whether it is better to be ignorant of a subject or to have a mere smattering of information about it.

peccadillo

slight offense / If we examine these escapades carefully, we will realize that they are mere peccadilloes rather than major crimes.

saturate

soak / Their clothes were saturated by the rain.

plutocracy

society ruled by the wealthy / From the way the government caters to the rich, you might think our society is a plutocracy rather than a democracy.

macerate

soften by soaking in liquid; waste away to make sth (especially food) soft by leaving it in a liquid; to become soft in this way / "The strawberries had been soaking in the champagn for so long that they had begun to macerate: they literally fell apart at the touch of a spoon. "

regeneration

spiritual rebirth / Modern penologists strive for the regeneration of the prisoners.

stupor

state of apathy; daze; lack of awareness / In his stupor, the addict was unaware of the events taking place around him.

parallelism

state of being parallel; similarity / There is a striking parallelism between the twins. I think he exaggerates the parallelism between the two cases.

squat

stocky; short and thick; short and wide or fat, in a way that is not attractive / Tolkien's hobbits are somewhat squat, sturdy little creatures, fond of good ale, good music, and good food.

repository

storehouse / Libraries are repositories of the world's best thoughts. My father is a repository of family history.

raconteur

story-teller / My father was a gifted raconteur with an unlimited supply of anecdotes.

spate

sudden flood;a large number of things, which are usually unpleasant, that happen suddenly within a short period of time / "I am worried about the possibility of a spate if the rains do not diminish soon. The bombing was the latest in a spate of terrorist attacks. "

stint

supply; allotted amount; assigned portion of work / He performed his daily stint cheerfully and willingly.

natation

swimming / The Red Cross emphasizes the need for courses in natation.

pachyderm

thick-skinned animal / The elephant is probably the best-known pachyderm.

prophylactic

used to prevent disease / Despite all prophylactic measures introduced by the authorities, the epidemic raged until cool weather set in.

prolix

verbose; drawn out / Her prolix arguments irritated and bored the jury.

secession

withdrawal;the fact of an area or group becoming independent from the country or larger group that it belongs to / The secession of the Southern states provided Lincoln with his first major problem after his inauguration.

sedative

" a drug that makes sb go to sleep or makes them feel calm and relaxedcalming drug or influence, tranquillizer " / It is dangerous to drive after taking the sedative; it brings drowsiness.

ostensible

" apparent ; professed; pretended" / Although the ostensible purpose of this expedition is to discover new lands, we are really interested in finding new markets for our products.

propitiate

" appease " / The natives offered sacrifices to propitiate the gods. Sacrifices were made to propitiate the gods.

valor

" bravery ;great courage, especially in war" / He received the Medal of Honor for his valor in battle.

wheedle

" cajole; coax ; deceive by flattery" / She knows she can wheedle almost anything she wants from her father.

loquacious

" talkative " / She is very loquacious and can speak on the telephone for hours.

verity

truth; reality / The four verities were revealed to Buddha during his long meditation.

migratory

wandering / The return of the migratory birds to the northern sections of this country is a harbinger of spring.

witticism

witty saying; facetious remark / What you regard as witticisms are often offensive to sensitive people.

ordination

ceremony conferring holy orders;the act or ceremony of making sb a priest, minister / The candidate for ordination had to meet with the bishop and the diocean officers before being judged ready to be ordained a deacon.

negation

denial / I must accept his argument since you have been unable to present any negation of his evidence. This political system was the negation of democracy.

levee

earthen or stone embankment to prevent flooding / As the river rose and threatened to overflow the levee, emergency workers rushed to reinforce the walls with sandbags.

timid

easily frightened; apprehensive;shy and nervous; not brave / He was timid and cowardish; always backing up at daunting situations.

omnivorous

eating both plant and animal food; devouring everything / Some animals, including humans, are omnivorous and eat both meat and vegetables; others are either carnivorous or herbivorous. She has always been an omnivorous reader.

seasoned

experienced / Though pleased with her new batch of rookies, the basketball coach wished she had a few more seasoned players on the team.

legend

explanatory list of symbols on a map / "The legend at the bottom of the map made it clear which symbols stood for rest areas along the highway and which stood for public camp sites. "

vent

express; utter;to express feelings, especially anger, strongly / He vented his wrath on his class. He vented his anger on the referee.

prognosis

forecasted course of a disease; prediction / If the doctor's prognosis is correct, the patient will be in a coma for at least twenty-four hours.

paramount

foremost in importance; supreme / Proper nutrition and hygiene are of paramount importance in adolescent development and growth.

vanguard

forerunners; advance forces / We are the vanguard of a tremendous army that is following us. The company is proud to be in the vanguard of scientific progress.

presage

foretell / The vultures flying overhead presaged the discovery of the corpse in the desert.

oracular

foretelling; mysterious / Oedipus could not understand the oracular warning he received.

premonition

forewarning / We ignored these premonitions of disaster because they appeared to be based on childish fears.

oblivion

forgetfulness / Her work had fallen into a state of oblivion; no one bothered to read them. He often drinks himself into oblivion.

seminal

germinal; influencing future developments; related to seed or semen;very important and having a strong influence on later developments / Although Freud has generally been regarded as a seminal thinker who shaped the course of psychology, his psychoanalytic methods have come under attack recently.

orient

get one's bearings; adjust, orthe eastern part of the world, especially China and Japan / Philip spent his first day in Denver orienting himself to the city. It took him some time to orient himself in his new school.

spectral

ghostly / We were frightened by the spectral glow that filled the room.

vampire

ghostly being that sucks the blood of the living / Children were afraid to go to sleep at night because of the many legends of vampires.

severity

harshness; plainness / The newspapers disapproved of the severity of the sentence.

serrated

having a sawtoothed edge / "The beech tree is one of many plants that have serrated leaves. "

plausible

having a show of truth but open to doubt; specious / Even though your argument is plausible, I still would like to have more proof.

odorous

having an odor / This variety of hybrid tea rose is more odorous than the one you have in your garden.

perspicacious

having insight; penetrating; astute / The brillant lawyer was known for his perspicacious deductions.

multiform

having many forms / Snowflakes are multiform but always hexagonal.

multilingual

having many languages / Because they are bordered by so many countries, the Swiss people are multilingual.

versatile

having many talents; capable of working in many fields / He was a versatile athlete; at college he had earned varsity letters in baseball, football, and track. He's a versatile actor who has played a wide variety of parts.

musky

having the odor of musk / She left a trace of musky perfume behind her.

tenure

holding of an office; time during which such an office is held / He was permanent tenure in this position and cannot be fired.

retentive

holding; having a good memory / The pupil did not need to spend much time in study as he had a retentive mind. She has an amazingly retentive memory.

nostalgia

homesickness; longing for the past / The first settlers found so much work to do that they had little time for nostalgia.

mortify

humiliate; punish the flesh;make somebody feel very ashamed or embarrassed / She was so mortified by her blunder that she ran to her room in tears.

parody

humorous imitation; travesty / We enjoyed the clever parodies of popular songs that the chorus sang.

scavenge

hunt through discarded materials for usable items; search, especially for food / If you need car parts that the dealers no longer stock, try scavenging for odd bits and pieces at the auto wreckers' yards. Much of their furniture was scavenged from other people's garbage

supposition

hypothesis; surmise;assumption / I based my decision to confide in him on the supposition that he would be discreet.

lassitude

languor; weariness / The hot, tropical weather created a feeling of lassitude and encouraged drowsiness.

usury

lending money at illegal rates of interest / "The loan shark was found guilty of usury. "

stygian

literary dark / The stygian room reminded him of an empty space.

syllogism

logical formula consisting of a major premise, a minor premise and a conclusion; deceptive or specious argument / There must be a fallacy in this syllogism; I cannot accept its conclusion.

valid

logically convincing; sound; legally acceptable / You're going to have to come up with a better argument if you want to convince me that your reasoning is valid.

lank

long and thin / lank, gaunt, Abraham Lincoln was a striking figure. Her lank black hair dropped lifelessly to her shoulders.

longevity

long life / When he reached ninety, the old man was proud of his longevity. He prides himself on the longevity of the company.

odyssey

long, evenful journey / The refugee's journey from Cambodia was a terrifying odyssey.

nether

lower / Tradition locates hell in the nether regions.

optional

not compulsory; left to one's choice / I was impressed by the range of optional accessories for my microcomputer that were available.

unguent

ointment;a soft substance that is used for rubbing onto the skin to heal it / "Apply this unguent to the sore muscles before retiring. "

rave

overwhelmingly favorable review;to talk or write about sth in a very enthusiastic way / Though critic John Simon seldom has a good word to say about contemporary plays, his review of All in the Timing was a total rave. The series has received raves from TV critics.

travail

painful labor / How long do you think a man can endure such travail and degradation without rebelling?

stipple

paint or draw with dots / "Seurat carefully stippled dabs of pure color on the canvas, juxtaposing dots of blue and yellow that the viewer's eye would interpret as green. "

mauve

pale purple / "The mauve tint in the lilac bush was another indication that spring had finally arrived. "

pallid

pale; wan / Because his occupation required that he work at night and sleep during the day, he had an exceptionally pallid complexion. She found him on the bed, pallid and shivering.

mollycoddle

pamper; indulge excessively; / Don't mollycoddle the boy, Maud! You'll spoil him. She was mollycoddled as a child.

sere

parched; dry / After the unseasonably dry winter the Berkeley hills looked dusty and sere.

stickler

perfectionist; person who insists things be exactly right / "The Internal Revenue Service agent was a stickler for accuracy; no approximations or rough estimates would satisfy him. "

sham

pretend / He shammed sickness to get out of going to school. Is he really sick or is he just shamming ?

sibylline

prophetic; oracular;mysterious and difficult to understand / Until their destruction by fire in 83 B.C., the sibylline books were often consulted by the Romans.

tutelary

protective; pertaining to a guardianship / I am acting in my tutelary capacity when I refuse to grant you permission to leave the campus.

remonstrance

protest; objection;a protest or complaint / The authorities were deaf to the pastor's remonstrances about the lack of police protection in the area.

maxim

proverb; a truth pithily stated / Aesop's fables illustrate moral maxims.

rebus

puzzle in which pictures stand for words / A coven of witches beside a tree is a possible rebus for the town Coventry.

resurgent

rising again after defeat, etc. / The resurgent nation surprised everyone by its quick recovery after total defeat.

sarcasm

scornful remarks, stinging rebuke / His feelings were hurt by the sarcasm of his supposed friends. ‘That will be useful,’ she snapped with heavy sarcasm

perennial

something long-lasting / Tese plants are hardy perennials and will bloom for many years.

paean

song of praise or joy / paeans celebrating the victory filled the air.

suffuse

spread over / A blush suffused her cheeks when we teased her about her love affair.

unfaltering

steadfast / She approached the guillotine with unfaltering steps.

protrude

stick out / His fingers protruded from the holes in his gloves.

libretto

text of an opera / The composer of an opera's music is remembered more frequently than the author of its libretto.

taut

tight; ready / The captain maintained that he ran a taut ship.

oscillate

vibrate pendulumlike; waver;swing / It is interesting to note how public opinion oscillates between the extremes of optimism and pessimism.

unbridled

violent;not controlled and therefore extreme / She had a sudden fit of unbridled rage.

peripatetic

walking about; moving / The peripatetic school of philosophy derives its name from the fact that Aristotle walked with his pupils while discussing philosophy with them.

martial

warlike / The sound of marital music was always inspiring to the young poet.

tycoon

wealthy leader / John D. Rockefeller was a prominent tycoon.

languid

weary; sluggish; listless / Her siege of illness left her languid and pallid.

sinecure

well-paid position with little responsibility / My job is no sinecure; I work long hours and have much responsibility.

phlegmatic

" calm ; not easily disturbed" / The nurse was a cheerful but phlegmatic person, unexcited in the face of sudden emergencies.

solace

" comfort in trouble" / I hope you will find solace in the thought that all of us share your loss.

pusillanimous

" cowardly ; fainthearted" / You should be ashamed of your pusillanimous conduct during this dispute.

wily

" cunning ; artful" / She is as wily as a fox in avoiding trouble.

stalemate

" deadlock ;impasse " / Negotiations between the union and the employers have reached a stalemate; neither side is willing to budge from previously stated positions.

loathe

" detest " / We loathed the wicked villain.

slight

" insult to one's dignity; snub" / Hypersensitive and ready to take offense at any discourtesy, Bertha was always on the lookout for real or imaginary slights. Nick took her comment as a slight on his abilities as a manager.

meddlesome

" interfering " / He felt his marriage was suffering because of his meddlesome mother-in-law.

opalescent

" iridescent " / The Ancient Mariner admired the opalescent sheen on the water.

testy

" irritable ; short-tempered;" / My advice is to avoid discussing this problem with him today as he is rather testy and may shout at you.

succulent

" juicy ; full of richness" / "To some people, Florida citrus fruits are more succulent than those from California. "

realm

" kingdom ; sphere" / The realm of possibilities for the new invention was endless.

torpor

" lethargy ; sluggishness; dormancy" / Nothing seemed to arouse him from his torpor; he had wholly surrendered himself to lethargy.

tepid

" lukewarm " / "During the summer, I like to take a tepid bath, not a hot one. "

partisan

" one-sided ; prejudiced; committed to a party" / On certain issues of conscience, she refused to take a partisan stand.

lucrative

" profitable " / He turned his hobby into a lucrative profession. Had the plan worked it would have proved highly lucrative.

reticent

" reserved ; uncommunicative ; inclined to silence" / Hughes preferred reticent employees to loquacious ones, noting that the formers' dislike of idle chatter might ensure their discretion about his affairs.

resuscitate

" revive " / The lifeguard tried to resuscitate the drowned child by applying artificial respiration.

ramshackle

" rickety ; falling apart; tumbledown " / The boys propped up the ramshackle clubhouse with a couple of boards.

servitude

" slavery ; compulsory labor" / Born a slave, Douglass resented his wife of servitude and plotted to escape to the North.

seamy

" sordid ; unwholesome;unpleasant and immoral" / In the Godfather, Michael Corleone is unwilling to expose his wife and children to the seamy side of his life as the son of a Mafia don.

portly

" stout ; corpulent" / The salesclerk tactfully referred to the overweight customer as portly rather than fat.

throttle

" strangle " / "The criminal tried to throttle the old man with his bare hands. "

saunter

" stroll slowly; to walk in a slow relaxed way" / "As we sauntered through the park, we stopped frequently to admire the spring flowers. "

obdurate

" stubborn " / He was obdurate in his refusal to listen to our complaints.

outstrip

" surpass ; outdo" / Jesse Owens easily outstripped his competitors to win the gold metal at the Olympic Games.

renounce

"abandon; disown; repudiate; give up; disown; " / Even though she knew she would be burned at the stake as a witch, Joan of Arc refused to renounce her belief that her voices came from God. He had renounced his former associates.

relinquish

"abandon; give up " / I will relinquish my claims to this property if you promise to retain my employees.

recondite

"abstruse; profound; secret; obscure " / He read many recondite books in order to obtain the material for the scholarly thesis.

preposterous

"absurd; ridiculous; outrageous ;completely unreasonable, especially in a way that is shocking or annoying" / "When the candidate tried to downplay his youthful experiments with marijuana by saying he hadn't inhaled, we all thought, ""What a preposterous excuse!"" These claims are absolutely preposterous! It's preposterous to suggest that everything was her fault! "

verisimilitude

"appearance of truth; likelihood; authenticity " / Critics praised her for the verisimilitude of her performance as Lady Macbeth. She was completely believable.

rhetoric

"art of effective communication; insincere or grandiloquent language; eloquence , oratory " / All writers, by necessity, must be skilled in rhetoric.

quiescent

"at rest; dormant ; inactive" / After this geyser erupts, it will remain quiescent for twenty-four hours.

offensive

"attacking; insulting; distasteful; obnoxious " / Getting into street brawls is no minor offense for professional boxers, who are required by law to restrict their offensive impulses to the ring. In meetings, she always takes the offensive before she can be criticized The programme contains language which some viewers may find offensive.

unwieldy

"awkward; cumbersome ; unmanageable" / The large carton was so unwieldy that the movers had trouble getting it up the stairs.

seethe

"be disturbed; boil; fume " / The nation was seething with discontent as the nobleman continued their arrogant ways. Inwardly he was seething at this challenge to his authority.

obligatory

"binding; required; compulsory " / It is obligatory that books borrowed from the library be returned within two weeks.

vendetta

"blood feud; feud " / The rival mobs engaged in a bitter vendetta. He has accused the media of pursuing a vendetta against him.

revelry

"boisterous merrymaking; festivity , merrymaking " / New Year's Eve is a night of revelry. We could hear sounds of revelry from next door.

ramification

"branching out; subdivision; complication " / We must examine all the ramifications of this problem.

succinct

"brief; terse; compact; concise " / His remarks are always succinct and pointed.

lout

"clumsy person; yob " / The delivery boy is an awkward lout.

renegade

"deserter; traitor , outlaw " / Because he had abandoned his post and joined forces with the Indians, his fellow officers considered the hero of Dances with Wolves a renegade.

reprehensible

"deserving blame; deplorable ;morally wrong and deserving criticism" / Your vicious conduct in this situation is reprehensible.

malicious

"dictated by hatred or spite; malevolent , spiteful " / The malicious neighbor spread the gossip. He took malicious pleasure in telling me what she had said.

sardonic

"disdainful; sarcastic; cynical; mocking " / The sardonic humor of nightclub comedians who satirize or ridicule patrons in the audience strikes some people as amusing and others as rude.

unruly

"disobedient; lawless; disorderly ;difficult to control or manage" / The only way to curb this unruly mob is to use tear gas.

repudiate

"disown; disavow; reject " / He announced that he would repudiate all debts incurred by his wife. Socialism had been repudiated at the polls.

sanctimonious

"displaying ostentatious or hypocritical devoutness; self-righteous " / You do not have to be so sanctimonious to prove that you are devout.

refute

"disprove; rebut; deny " / The defense called several respectable witnesses who were able to refute the false testimony of the prosecution's only witness.

stanza

"division of a poem, verse " / "Do you know the last stanza of ""The Star-Spangled Banner""?"

repellent

"driving away; unattractive; very unpleasant; causing strong dislike; repulsive " / Mosquitoes find the odor so repellent that they leave any spot where this liquid has been sprayed. I found the pictures repellent. Their political ideas are repellent to most people.

resonant

"echoing; resounding ; deep and full in sound" / The deep, resonant voice of the actor James Earl Jones makes him particulary effective when he appears on stage.

maudlin

"effusively sentimental " / I do not like such maudlin pictures. I call them tearjerkers.

verve

"enthusiasm; liveliness; gusto " / She approached her studies with such verve that it was impossible for her to do poorly.

milieu

"environment; means of expression; background " / His milieu is watercolors, although he has produced excellent oil paintings and lithographs. The findings of the report refer to a particular social and cultural milieu.

superfluous

"excessive; overabundant, unnecessary " / Please try not to include so many superfluous details in your report; just give me the bare facts.

meticulous

"excessively careful; fastidious, thorough " / He was meticulous in checking his accounts and never made mistakes.

primordial

"existing at the beginning (of time); rudimentary; primeval " / The Neanderthal Man is one of our primordial ancestors.

politic

"expedient; prudent ; well devised; wise " / Even though he was disappointed, he did not think it politic to refuse the offer.

probe

"explore with tools; investigate " / The surgeon probed the wound for foreign matter before suturing it.

traduce

"expose to slander " / His opponents tried to traduce the candidate's reputation by spreading rumors about his past.

potential

"expressing possibility; latent; possible " / The juvenile delinquent is a potential murderer.

penury

"extreme poverty " / When his pension fund failed, George feared he would end his days in penury.

overwrought

"extremely agitated; hysterical, distraught " / When Kate heard the news of the sudden tragedy, she became too overwrought to work and had to leave the office early.

prohibitive

"extremely high (of prices etc.); exorbitant " / The super computer's price was prohibitive.

lilliputian

"extremely small; diminutive, tiny " / Tiny and delicate, the model was built on a lilliputian scale.

timorous

"fearful; demonstrating fear; timid " / His timorous manner betrayed the fear he felt at the moment.

replenish

"fill up again, top up " / "Before she could take another backpacking trip, Carla had to replenish her stock of freeze-dried foods. "

propriety

"fitness; correct conduct; etiquette " / I want you to behave at this dinner with propriety; don't embarass me.

sleazy

"flimsy; unsubstantial;dirty, unpleasant and not socially acceptable, especially because sex is involved;immoral and unpleasant; disreputable " / This is a sleazy fabric; it will not wear well.

retinue

"following; attendants; entourage " / "The queen's retinue followed her down the aisle. "

waive

"give up temporarily; yield; forgo " / I will waive my rights in this matter in order to expedite our reaching a proper decision. He waived his right to appeal against the verdict. We have decided to waive the tuition fees in your cas

voluptuous

"gratifying the senses; buxom; sensual " / The nobility during the Renaissance led voluptuous lives.

wane

"grow gradually smaller; decrease, fade " / From now until December 21, the winter solstice, the hours of daylight will wane. Her enthusiasm for the whole idea was waning rapidly. Their popularity waned during that period.

macabre

"gruesome, ghoulish ; grisl y " / The city morgue is a macabre spot for the uninitiated.

trite

"hackneyed; commonplace; banal " / Thr trite and predictable situations in many television programs alienate many viewers.

snicker

"half-stifled laugh; titter ;to laugh in a quiet unpleasant way, especially at sth rude or at sb's problems or mistakes" / "The boy could not suppress a snicker when the teacher sat on the tack. "

malignant

"having an evil influence; virulent; malevolent " / This is a malignant disease; we must have to use drastic measures to stop its spread.

vapid

"insipid; inane;lacking interest or intelligence; dull " / She delivered an uninspired and vapid address.

willful

"intentional; headstrong; done deliberately, although the person doing it knows that it is wrong" / Donald had planned to kill his wife for months; clearly, her death was a case of deliberate, willful murder, not a crime of passion committed by a hasty, willful youth unable to foresee the consequences of his deeds. The report concluded that her death was a result of wilful neglect.

retain

"keep; employ; preserve " / Fighting to retain his seat in Congress, Senator Foghorn retained a new manager to head his reelection campaign.

levity

"lack of seriousness or steadiness; frivolity " / Stop giggling abd wriggling around in the pew; such levity is improper in church.

listless

"lacking in spirit or energy; lethargic " / We had expected him to be full of enthusiasm and were surprised by his listless attitude.

profusion

"lavish expenditure; overabundant condition; abundance " / Seldom have I seen food and drink served in such profusion as at the wedding feast.

livid

"lead-coloredl; black and blue; ashen; enraged; furious " / His face was so livid with rage that we were afraid that he might have an attack of apoplexy.

prevaricate

"lie; beat about the bush " / "Some people believe that to prevaricate in a good cause is justifiable and regard the statement as a ""white lie."" "

roster

"list; rota " / They print the roster of players in the season's program.

palatial

"magnificent; splendid very large and impressive, like a palace " / He proudly showed us through his palatial home.

monumental

"massive; historic , major" / Writing a dictionary is a monumental task. We have a monumental task ahead of us.

niggardly

"meanly stingy; parsimonious; mean; miserly " / The niggardly pittance the widow receives from the government cannot keep her from poverty.

officious

"meddlesome; excessively pushy in offering one's services; self-important " / After her long flight, Jill just wanted to nap, but the officious bellboy was intent on showing her all the special features of the deluxe suite.

squabble

"minor quarrel; bickering " / Children invariably get involved in petty squabbles; wise parents know when to interfere and when to let the children work things out on their own.

miscellany

"mixture of writings on various subjects; assortment " / This is an interesting miscellany of nineteenth-century prose and poetry.

sobriety

"moderation (especially regarding indulgence in alcohol); seriousness " / Neither drunkards nor comics are noted for sobriety. She was a model of sobriety and honesty.

retiring

"modest; shy ;preferring not to spend time with other people" / Given Susan't retiring personality, no one expected her to take up public speaking; surprisingly enough, she became a star of the school debate team.

sacrosanct

"most sacred ; inviolable" / The brash insurance salesman invaded the sacrosanct privacy of the office of the president of the company. I'll work till late in the evening, but my weekends are sacrosanct.

maim

"mutilate; injure, incapacitate;to injure sb seriously, causing permanent damage to their body; incapacitate " / The hospital could not take care of all who had been mangled or maimed in the railroad accident. Hundreds of people are killed or maimed in car accidents every week.

tautological

"needlessly repetitious; tautologous " / "In the sentence ""It was visible to the eye,"" the phrase ""to the eye"" is tautological."

titter

"nervous laugh;to laugh quietly,especially in a nervous or embarrassed way; giggle " / "Her aunt's constant titter nearly drove her mad. There was an embarrassing pause on stage and the audience began to titter. "

nebulous

"not clear, vague ; hazy; cloudy" / She had only a nebulous memory of her grandmother's face.

rudimentary

"not developed; elementary; basic " / His dancing was limited to a few rudimentary steps. His understanding of the language is very rudimentary. Some dinosaurs had only rudimentary teeth.

objective

"not influenced by emotions; fair; unbiased " / Even though he was her son, she tried to be objective about his behavior.

provenance

"origin or source of something; origin " / I am not interested in its provenance; I am more concerned with its usefulness than with its source. There's no proof about the provenance of the painting

uncouth

"outlandish; clumsy; boorish; coarse " / Most biographers portray Lincoln as an uncouth and ungainly young man.

stereotyped

"oversimplified; lacking individuality; seen as a type rập khuôn; lặp lại như đúc (về hình ảnh, tư tưởng, tính cách..) " / "My chief objection to the book is that the characters are stereotyped; they come across as ethnic caricatures, not as real people with individual quirks, fears, and dreams. stereotyped images of women in advertisements những hình ảnh phụ nữ rập khuôn trong các quảng cáo "

podium

"pedestal; raised platform; lectern " / "The audience applauded as the conductor made his way to the podium. "

purgatory

"place of spiritual expiation; hell " / In this purgatory, he could expect no help from his comrades. Getting up at four o'clock every morning is sheer purgatory.

unequivocal

"plain; obvious; unambiguous " / "My answer to your proposal is an unequivocal and absolute ""No."""

luscious

"pleasing to taste or smell; deliciou s or sexually attractive (woman)" / The ripe peach was luscious.

ravage

"plunder; despoil; devastate " / The marauding army ravaged the countryside. The countryside has been ravaged by pollution.

pragmatic

"practical (as opposed to idealistic); concerned with the practical worth or impact of something; realistic " / This coming trip to France should provide me with a pragmatic test of the value of my conversational French class.

precept

"practical rule guiding conduct, principle " / Love thy neighbor as thyself is a worthwhile precept.

overweening

"presumptuous; arrogant " / His overweening pride in his accomplishments was not justified.

lampoon

"ridicule; satirize " / This article lampoons the pretensions of some movie moguls. His cartoons mercilessly lampooned the politicians of his time.

painstaking

"showing hard work; taking great care; thorough " / The new high-frequency word list is the result of painstaking efforts on the part of our research staff.

vilify

"slander; malign ; revile " / She is a liar and is always trying to vilify my reputation.

servile

"slavish; cringing; fawning ; wanting too much to please sb and obey them" / Constantly fawning on his employer, humble Uriah Heap was a servile creature.

obsequious

"slavishly attentive; servile ; sycophantic" / Helen valued people who behaved as if they respected themselves; nothing irritated her more than an excessively obsequious waiter or a fawning salesclerk.

spangle

"small metallic piece sewn to clothing for ornamentation; sequin " / "The thousands of spangles on her dress sparkled in the glare of the stage lights. "

mote

"small speck;a very small piece of dust; speck " / "The tiniest mote in the eye is very painful. "

negligible

"so small, trifling, or unimportant as to be easily disregarded; insignificant " / Because the damage to his car had been negligible, Michael decided he wouldn't bother to report the matter to his insurance company.

pariah

"social outcast " / I am not a pariah to be shunned and ostracized.

quagmire

"soft, wet, boggy land; complex or dangerous situation from which it is difficult to free oneself; bog ; morass " / Up to her knees in mud, Myra wondered how on earth she was going to extricate herself from this quagmire.

scapegoat

"someone who bears the blame for others; fall guy " / After the Challenger disaster, NASA searched for scapegoats on whom they could cast the blame. He realized he'd been set up as the fall guy. She felt she had been made a scapegoat for her boss's incompetence.

pacify

"soothe; make calm or quiet; subdue; placate " / Dentists criticize the practice of giving fussy children sweets to pacify them.

mollify

"soothe; placate " / We tried to mollify the hysterical child by promising her many gifts.

malign

"speak evil of; defame; slander " / Because of her hatred of the family, she maligns all who are friendly to them.

polyglot

"speaking several languages; multilingual " / New York City is a polyglot community because of the thousands of immigrants who settle there.

niggle

"spend too much time on minor points; carp; bother; quibble " / Let's not niggle over details.

strew

"spread randomly; sprinkle; scatter " / "Preceding the bride to the altar, the flower girl will strew rose petals along the aisle. "

musty

"stale; spoiled by age; dank smelling damp and unpleasant because of a lack of fresh air " / The attic was dark and musty.

lurk

"stealthily lie in waiting; slink; exist unperceived; skulk " / Who knows what evils lurk in the hearts of men? The shadow knows. the murderer lurks all day long in the bush, for fear of being discovered by the lumberers There was someone skulking behind the bushes.

precipitous

"steep; overhasty; sheer; hasty, abrupt " / This hill is difficult to climb because it is so precipitous; one slip, and our descent will be precipitous as well.

penurious

"stingy; parsimonious; destitute, penniless " / He was a penurious man, averse to spending money even for the necessities of life.

proviso

"stipulation; provision ;a condition that must be accepted before an agreement can be made" / I am ready to accept your proposal with the two proviso that you meet your obligations within the next two weeks. He agreed to their visit with the proviso that they should stay no longer than one week.

provoke

"stir up anger; cause retaliation; goad " / In order to prevent a sudden outbreak of hostilities, we must not provoke our foe. Be careful what you say— he's easily provoked.

reprieve

"temporary stay; a stay of execution " / During the twenty-four-hour reprieve, the lawyers sought to make the stay of execution permanent.

pulsate

"throb; buzz " / We could see the blood vessels in his temple pulsate as he became more angry.

stifle

"to prevent sth from happening; to prevent a feeling from being expressed: suppress ; extinguish; inhibit; to feel unable to breathe, or to make sb unable to breathe, because it is too hot and/or there is no fresh air: suffocate " / Halfway through the boring lecture, Laura gave up trying to stifle her yawns. I felt I was stifling in the airless room. They hope the new rules will not stifle creativity.

rhapsodize

"to speak or write in an exaggeratedly enthusiastic manner; go into raptures about " / She greatly enjoyed her Hawaiian vacation and rhapsodized about it for weeks.

ruminate

"to think deeply about sth; chew the cud; ponder " / We cannot afford to wait while you ruminate upon these plans.

sinewy

"tough; strong and firm; wiry " / "The steak was too sinewy to chew The runner was tall and sinewy. "

quisling

"traitor who aids invaders, collaborator " / In his conquest of Europe, Hitler was aided by the quislings who betrayed their own people and served in the puppet governments established by the Nazis.

quietude

"tranquillity; calm ;the state of being still and quiet" / He was impressed by the air of quietude and peace that pervaded the valley.

rendition

"translation; artistic interpretation of a song, etc." / The audience cheered enthusiastically as she completed her rendition of the aria.

superficial

"trivial; shallow " / Since your report gave only a superficial analysis of the problem, I cannot give you more than a passing grade.

mutinous

"unruly; rebellious " / The captain had to use force to quiet his mutinous crew.

spry

"vigorously active; nimble; sprightly " / "She was eighty years old, yet still spry and alert. still spry at eighty (ở tuổi tám mươi hãy còn nhanh nhẹn hoạt bát) "

surveillance

"watching; guarding ;observation " / The FBI kept the house under constant surveillance in the hope of capturing all the criminals at one time.

ponderous

"weighty; unwieldy; tedious ; laboured " / His humor lacked the light touch; his jokes were always ponderous.

pandemonium

"wild tumult, chaos " / "When the ships collided in the harbor, pandemonium broke out among the passengers. Pandemonium broke out when the news was announced. There was pandemonium in the classroom till the head appeared. "

wizened

"withered; shrivelled " / The wizened old man in the home for the aged was still active and energetic.

toil

"work laboriously; make slow painful progress; slave " / "You must toil through 3500 words list in order to achieve a high score on GRE. Hundreds of men toiled for years at building the pyramid. I've been slaving away all day trying to get this work finished. "

nicety

" precision ; minute distinction" / I cannot distinguish between such niceties of reasoning.

mitigate

"appease; alleviate " / Nothing he did could mitigate her wrath; she was unforgiving.

profligate

"dissipated; wasteful ; licentious" / In this profilgate company, she lost all sense of decency.

queasy

"easily nauseated ; squeamish" / As the ship left the harbor, he became queasy and thought that he was going to suffer from seasickness.

puny

"insignificant; tiny; weak; feeble " / Our puny efforts to stop the flood were futile.

misadventure

"mischance; ill luck; mishap " / The young explorer met death by misadventure.

nurture

"nourish; educate; foster " / The head Start program attempts to nurture prekindergarten children so that they will do well when they enter public school.

mandatory

"obligatory; compulsory " / These instructions are mandatory; any violation will be severely punished.

seep

"ooze; trickle " / During the rainstorm, water seeped through the crack in the basement wall and damaged the floor boards. Blood was beginning to seep through the bandages.

obsolete

"outmoded; out of date " / Hip is an obsolete expression; it went out with love beads and tie-dye shirts.

parsimonious

"stingy; excessively frugal; mean " / His parsimonious nature did not permit him to enjoy any luxuries.

preponderance

"superiority of power, quantity, etc.; predominance " / The rebels sought to overcome the preponderance of strength of the government forces by engaging in guerrilla tactics. There is still a preponderance of male managers in the profession.

reputed

"supposed; rumoured " / He is the reputed father of the child. He is reputed to be the best heart surgeon in the country.

mobility

ability to move spontaneously / Certain organisms exhibit remarkable motility; motile spores, for example, may travel for miles before coming to rest.

tangible

able to be touched; real; palpable / Although Tom did not own a house, he had several tangible assets--a car, a television, a PC--that he could sell if he needed cash.

solvent

able to pay all debts / By dint of very frugal living, he was finally able to become solvent and avoid bankruptcy proceedings.

tranquillity

calmness; peace / After the commotion and excitement of the city, I appreciate the tranquillity of these fields and forests.

serenity

calmness; placidity / The serenity of the sleepy town was shattered by a tremendous explosion.

revoke

cancel; retract / Repeat offenders who continue to drive under the influence of alcohol face having their driver's licenses permanently revoked.

tensile

capable of being stretched / Mountain climbers must know the tensile strength of their ropes. This experiment demonstrates the tensile strength of the wire. You'll need high tensile cable for the job

prehensile

capable of grasping or holding / Monkeys use not only their arms and legs but also their prehensile tails in traveling through the trees.

plenary

complete; full / The union leader was given plenary power to negotiate a new contract with the employers. The new committee holds its first plenary session this week.

sedate

composed; grave;slow, calm and relaxed;unhurried / The parents were worried because they felt their son was too quiet and sedate.

narcissist

conceited person;a person who admires himself or herself too much, especially their appearance / A narcissist is his own best friend.

tureen

deep dish for serving soup / "The waiters brought the soup to the tables in silver tureens. "

profound

deep; not superficial; complete / Freud's remarkable insights into human behavior caused his fellow scientists to honor him as a profound thinker.

subsidy

direct financial aid by government, etc. / Without this subsidy, American ship operators would not be able to compete in world markets.

squalid

dirty; neglected; poor;filthy / It is easy to see how crime can breed in such a squalid neighborhood.

reek

emit (odor) / The room reeked with stale tobacco smoke. His breath reeked of tobacco. Her denials reeked of hypocrisy.

parity

equality; close resemblance / I find your analogy inaccurate because I do not see the parity between the two illustrations.

plethora

excess; overabundance / She offered a plethora of excuses for her shortcomings.

voluble

fluent; glib / She was a voluble speaker, always ready to talk. Evelyn was very voluble on the subject of women's rights.

saturnine

gloomy / Do not be misled by his saturnine countenance; he is not as gloomy as he looks.

nascent

incipient; coming into being / If we could identify these revolutionary movements in their nascent state, we would be able to eliminate serious trouble in later years.

lavish

liberal; wasteful / The actor's lavish gifts pleased her. He enhanced his position by making lavish gifts to members of the king's inner circle.

unfettered

liberated; freed from chains;not controlled or restricted / Chained to the wall for months on end, the hostage despaired that he would ever be unfettered.

rousing

lively; stirring / And now, let's have a rousing welcome for TV's own Roseanne Arnold, who'll lead us in a rousing rendition of 'The Star-Spangled Banner.'

retrospective

looking back on the past / It is only when we become retrospective that we can appreciate the tremendous advances made during this century. She felt a pang of retrospective sympathy for Mel.

lascivious

lustful / Because they might arouse lascivious impulses in their readers, the lewd books were banned by the clergy.

libidinous

lustful, having or expressing strong sexual feelings / They objected to his libidinous behavior.

scanty

meager; insufficient / Thinking his helping of food was scanty, Oliver Twist asked for more. Details of his life are scanty.

optimum

most favorable / If you wait for the optimum moment to act, you may never begin your project .

"stagnant "

motionless; stale; dull / The stagnant water was a breeding ground for disease

orifice

mouthlike opening; small opening;a hole or opening, especially one in the body / The Howe Caverns were discovered when someone observed that a cold wind was issuing from an orifice in the hillside.

mobile

movable; not fixed / The mobile blood bank operated by the Red Cross visited our neighborhood today.

skulk

move furtively and secretly / He skulked through the less fashionable sections of the city in order to avoid meeting any of his former friends.

lumber

move heavily of clumsily / Still somewhat torpid after its long hibernation, the bear lumbered through the woods.

occult

mysterious; secret; supernatural / The occult rites of the organization were revealed only to members.

senility

old age; feeble mindedness of old age / Most of the decisions are being made by the junior members of the company because of the senility of the president.

passe

old-fashioned; past the prime / Her style is passe and reminiscent of the Victorian era.

malingerer

one who feigns illness to escape duty / The captain ordered the sergeant to punish all malingerers and force them to work.

misanthrope

one who hates mankind / We thought the hermit was a miantrope because he shunned our society.

unilateral

one-sided / This legislation is unilateral since it binds only one party in the controversy.

mediocre

ordinary; commonplace / We were disappointed because he gave a rather mediocre performance in this role.

pedestrian

ordinary; unimaginative / Unintentionally boring, he wrote page after page of pedestrian prose.

proscribe

ostracize; banish; outlaw / Antony, Octavius and Lepidus proscribed all those who had conspired against Julius Caesar.

translucent

partly transparent / We could not recognize the people in the next room because of the translucent curtains that separated us.

madrigal

pastoral song / His program of folk songs included several madrigals which he sang to the accompaniment of a lute.

pinnacle

peak / We could see the morning sunlight illuminate the pinnacle while the rest of the mountain lay in shadow. He spent more than twenty years at the pinnacle of his profession. Formula One is the pinnacle of motor racing.

tangential

peripheral; only slightly connected; digressing / Despite Clark's attempts to distract her with tangential remarks, Lois kept on coming back to her main question: why couldn't he come out to dinner with Superman and her?

millinery

person who makes or sells women's hats / The millinery displayed fashionable hats in the street where many women passed by.

poseur

person who pretends to be sophisticated, elegant, etc., to impress others / Some thought Dali was a brillant painter; others dismissed him as a poseur.

pyromaniac

person with an insane desire to set things on fire / "The detectives searched the area for the pyromaniac who had set these costly fires. "

thermal

pertaining to heat / The natives discovered that the host springs gave excellent thermal baths and began to develop their community as a health resort.

marital

pertaining to marriage / After the publication of his book on marital affairs, he was often consulted by married people on the verge of divorce.

vernal

pertaining to spring / We may expect vernal showers all during the month of April.

pulmonary

pertaining to the lungs / "In his researches on pulmonary diseases, he discovered many facts about the lungs of animals and human beings. "

topography

physical features of a region / Before the generals gave the order to attack, they ordered a complete study of the topography of the region.

pediatrician

physician specializing in children's diseases. noun a doctor who studies and treats the diseases of children / "The family doctor advised the parents to consult a pediatrician about their child's ailment. "

potent

powerful; persuasive; greatly influential / The jury was swayed by the highly potent testimony of the crime's sole eyewitness.

mode

prevailing style / She was not used to their lavish mode of living.

narrative

related to telling a story / "A born teller of tales, Olsen used her impressive narrative skills to advantage in her story ""I Stand Here Ironing."""

thematic

relating to a unifying motif or idea / Those who think of Moby Dick as a simple adventure story about whaling miss is underlying thematic import.

schematic

relating to an outline or diagram; using a system of symbols / In working out the solution to an analytical logic question, you may find it helpful to construct a simple schematic diagram illustrating the relationships between the items of information given in the question.

nemesis

revenging agent;punishment or defeat that is deserved and cannot be avoided / Captain Bligh vowed to be Christian's nemesis.

paucity

scarcity / They closed the restaurant because the paucity of customers made it uneconomical to operate.

premonitory

serving to warn / You should have visited a doctor as soon as you felt these premonitory chest pains.

ordeal

severe trial or affliction, a difficult or unpleasant experience / Terry Anderson spoke movingly of his long ordeal as a hostage in Lebanon. The hostages spoke openly about the terrible ordeal they had been through. She's extremely distressed by the whole ordeal.

rigor

severity / Many settlers could not stand the rigors of the New England winters. This crime must be treated with the full rigour of the law.

nuance

shade of difference in meaning or color / The unskilled eye of the layperson has difficulty in dicerning the nuances of color in the paintings. You need to be able to convey the subtle nuances of meaning of each word.

whet

sharpen; stimulate / The odors from the kitchen are whetting my appetite; I will be ravenous by the time the meal is served. The book will whet your appetite for more of her work.

ostentatious

showy; pretentious; trying to attract attention / Trump's latest casino in Atlantic City is the most ostentatious gambling place in the East: it easily outglitters its competitors.

scintilla

shred; least bit;a very small amount of sth / You have not produced a scintilla of evidence to support your argument. There is not a scintilla of truth in what she says.

rent

tear or rip; split / "The conflict over abortion threatens to split our nation, creating a rent in the social fabric that will be difficult to mend. The sun shone through a rent in the clouds Mặt trời chiếu qua kẽ hở trong đám mây "

overhaul

thoroughly examine the condition of and repair if necessary / It is necessary for the engineers of NASA to overhaul the rocket everyday; otherwise, an incident similar to that of Challenger accident might happen.

trident

three-pronged spear / "Neptune is usually depicted as rising from the sea, carrying his trident on his shoulder. "

titillate

tickle;to interest or excite sb, especially in a sexual way / I am here not to titillate my audience but to enlighten it. The book has no artistic merit - its sole aim is to titillate (the reader)

tether

tie with a rope / Before we went to sleep, we tethered the horses to prevent their wandering off during the night.

turncoat

traitor / The British considered Benedict Arnold a loyalist; the Americans considered him a turncoat.

trek

travel; journey / The tribe made their trek further north that summer in search of game. They reached the refugee camp after an arduous two-day trek across the mountains.

veracious

truthful / I can recommend him for this position because I have always found him veracious and reliable.

singular

unique; extraordinary; odd / Though the young man tried to understand Father William's singular behavior, he still found it odd that the old man incessantly stood on his head.

lumen

unit of light energy (one candle's worth) / In buying light bulbs, she checked not only their power, as measured in watts, but their brightness, as measured in lumens.

missive

a letter, especially a long or an official one / The ambassador received a missive from the Secretary of State. a letter, especially a long or an official one

misnomer

a name or a word that is not appropriate or accurate; wrong name; incorrect designation / His tyrannical conduct proved to all that his nickname, King Eric the Just, was a misnomer. ‘Villa’ was something of a misnomer—the place was no more than an old farmhouse.

spectrum

colored band produced when a beam of light passes through a prism / The visible portion of the spectrum includes red at one end and violet at the other.

merger

combination (of two business corporations) / When the firm's president married the director of financial planning, the office joke was that it wasn't a marriage, it was a merger.

therapeutic

curative / "Now better known for its racetrack, Saratoga Springs first gained attention for the therapeutic qualities of its famous ""healing waters."""

panacea

cure-all; remedy for all diseases / There is no easy panacea that will solve our complicated international situation.

malediction

curse / The witch uttered maledictions against her captors.

pensive

dreamily thoughtful; thoughtful with a hint of sadness thinking deeply about sth, especially because you are sad or worried / The pensive youth gazed at the painting for a long time and then sighed.

libido

emotional urges behind human activity;sexual desire / The psychiatrist maintained that suppression of the libido often resulted in maladjustment and neuroses.

weather

endure the effects of weather or other forces / He weathered the changes in his personal life with difficulty, as he had no one in whom to confide. Her face was weathered by the sun.

worldly

engrossed in matters of this earth; not spiritual / You must leave your worldly goods behind you when you go to meet your Maker. At 15, he was more worldly than his older cousins who lived in the country.

ovation

enthusiastic applause / When Placido Domingo came on stage in the first act of La Boheme, he was greeted by a tremendous ovation.

suppliant

entreating; beseeching / He could not resist the dog's suppliant whimpering, and he gave it some food.

tantamount

equal; having the same bad effect as sth else / Your ignoring their pathetic condition is tantamount to the murder. If he resigned it would be tantamount to admitting that he was guilty.

laudatory

expressing praise / The critics' laudatory comments helped to make her a star.

tirade

extended scolding; denunciation / Long before he had finished his tirade, we were sufficiently aware of the seriousness of our misconduct.

pterodactyl

extinct flying reptile / The remains of pterodactyls indicate that these flying reptiles had a wingspan of as much as twenty feet.

minute

extremely small / The twins resembled one another closely; only minute differences set them apart.

philanderer

faithless lover; flirt / Swearing he had never so much as looked at another woman, Jack assured Jill he was no philanderer.

ravel

fall apart into tangles; unravel or untwist; entangle;to make a situation or problem more complicated / A sigle thread pulled loose, and the entire scarf started to ravel.

relapse

fall back or sink again;to go back into a previous condition or into a worse state after making an improvement / The economy relapsed into a depression from the peak. Two days after leaving the hospital she relapsed into a coma.

windfall

fallen fruit; unexpected lucky event / This huge tax refund is quite a windfall. The hospital got a sudden windfall of £300 000. She had an unexpected windfall when a cousin died.

splice

fasten together; unite / Before you splice two strips of tape together, be sure to line them up evenly.

patriarch

father and ruler of a family or tribe / In many primitive tribes, the leader and lawmaker was the patriarch.

propitious

favorable; kindly / I think it is advisable that we wait for a more propitious occasion to announce our plans; this is not a good time.

nepotism

favoritism (to a relative) / John left his position with the company because he felt that advancement was based on nepotism rather than ability.

xenophobia

fear or hatred of foreigners / When the refugee arrived in America, he was unprepared for the xenophobia he found there.

trepidation

fear; trembling agitation / We must face the enemy without trepidation if we are to win this battle.

obsession

fixed idea; continued brooding / This obsession with the supernatural has made him unpopular with his neighbors.

meretricious

flashy; tawdry; falsely attractive / Her jewels were inexpensive but not meretricious.

sherbet

flavored dessert ice / I prefer raspberry sherbet to ice cream since it is less fattening.

preempt

head off; forestall by acting first; appropriate for oneself; supplant / Hoping to preempt any attempts by the opposition to make educational reform a hot political issue, the candidate set out her own plan to revitalize the public schools. She was just about to apologize when he pre-empted her.

timidity

lack of self-confidence or courage / If you are to succeed as a salesperson, you must first lose your timidity and fear of failure.

modicum

limited quantity / Although his story is based on a modicum of truth, most of the events he describes are fictitious.

qualified

limited; restricted / Unable to give the candidate full support, the mayor gave him only a qualified endorsement.

queue

line / They stood patiently in the queue outside the movie theatre.

repertoire

list of works of music, drama, etc., a performer is prepared to present / The opera company decided to include Madame Butterfly in its repertoire for the following season.

vegetate

live in a monotonous way;to spend time doing very little and feeling bored / I do not understand how you can vegetate in this quiet village after the adventurous life you have led.

vivacious

lively or animated; sprightly / She had always been vivacious and sparkling. He had three pretty, vivacious daughters.

skittish

lively; frisky;easily excited or frightened and therefore difficult to control / She is as skittish as a kitten playing with a piece of string.

languish

lose animation; lose strength / In stories, lovelorn damsels used to languish and pine away. She continues to languish in a foreign prison.

loll

lounge about;sit or stand in a lazy, relaxed way / "They lolled around in their chairs watching television. My head lolled against his shoulder. "

philanthropist

lover of mankind; doer of good;a rich person who helps the poor and those in need, especially by giving money / As he grew older, he became famous as a philanthropist and benefactor of the needy. He was a wealthy businessman and philanthropist. The trust was set up by an American philanthropist.

supine

lying on back / The defeated pugilist lay supine on the canvas.

mendacious

lying; false / He was pathological liar, and his friends learned to discount his mendacious stories.

rarefied

made less dense / The mountain climbers had difficulty breathing in the rarefied atmosphere. Climbers may experience difficulty breathing in the rarefied air at high altitudes.

stipulate

make express conditions, specify / Before agreeing to reduce American military forces in Europe, the president stipulated that NATO teams be allowed to inspect Soviet bases.

promulgate

make known by official proclamation or publication / As soon as the Civil Service Commission promulgates the names of the successful candidates, we shall begin to hire members of our staff.

yeoman

man owing small estate; middle-class farmer / "It was not the aristocrat but the yeoman who determined the nation's policies. "

megalomania

mania for doing grandiose things / Developers who spend millions trying to build the world's tallest skyscraper suffer from megalomania.

variegated

many-colored / Without her glasses, Gretchen saw the fields of tulips as a variegated blur.

requiem

mass for the dead; dirge / They played Mozart's Requiem at the funeral.

sustenance

means of support, food, nourishment / In the tropics, the natives find sustenance easy to obtain because of all the fruit trees. There's not much sustenance in a bowl of soup. Elections are essential for the sustenance of parliamentary democracy.

lode

metal-bearing veinl; a line of ore / "If this lode that we have discovered extends for any distance, we have found a fortune. "

regime

method or system of government / When a Frenchman mentions the Old Regime, he refers to the government existing before the revolution.

leniency

mildness; permissiveness / Considering the gravity of the offense, we were surprised by the leniency of the sentence. She appealed to the judge for leniency.

misdemeanor

minor crime / The culprit pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor rather than face trial for a felony.

urchin

mischievous child (usually a boy) / Get out! This store is no place for grubby urchins!

waggish

mischievous; humorous; tricky;funny, clever and not serious / "He was a prankster who, unfortunately, often overlooked the damage he could cause with his waggish tricks. "

philistine

narrow-minded person, uncultured and exculsively interested in material gain / We need more men of culture and enlightenment; we have too many philistines among us.

subjective

occurring or taking place within the mind; unreal / Your analysis is highly subjective; you have permitted your emotions and your opinions to color your thinking. Everyone's opinion is bound to be subjective.

tyranny

oppression; cruel government / Frederick Douglass fought against the tyranny of slavery throughout his entire life. The children had no protection against the tyranny of their father.

semblance

outward appearance; guise / Although this book has a semblance of wisdom and scholarship, a careful examination will reveal many errors and omissions. The ceasefire brought about a semblance of peace. Life at last returned to some semblance of normality.

ragamuffin

person wearing tattered clothes / "He felt sorry for the ragamuffin who was begging for food and gave him money to buy a meal. "

stoic

person who is indifferent to pleasure or pain / The doctor called her patient a stoic because he had borne the pain of the examination without whimpering.

tanner

person who turns animal hides into leather / Using a solution of tanbark, the tanner treated the cowhide, transforming it into supple leather.

metallurgical

pertaining to the art of removing metals from ores / During the course of his metallurgical research, the scientist developed a steel alloy of tremendous strength.

lunar

pertaining to the moon / lunar craters can be plainly seen with the aid of a small telescope.

obstetrician

physician specializing in delivery of babies / "Unlike midwives, who care for women giving birth at home, obstetricians generally work in a hospital setting. Her obstetrician could not be present at the birth Bác sĩ sản khoa đã không có mặt khi (cô ta) sanh "

sheathe

place into a case / As soon as he recognized the approaching men, he sheathed his dagger and hailed them as friends. He put a knife or ‚Üë sword into a ‚Üë sheath

rostrum

platform for speech-making; pulpit / "The crowd murmured angrily and indicated that they did not care to listen to the speaker who was approaching the rostrum. "

sportive

playful / Such a sportive attitude is surprising in a person as serious as you usually are.

solstice

point at which the sun is farthest from the equator / The winter solstice usually occurs on December 21.

zenith

point directly overhead in the sky; summit / When the sun was at its zenith, the glare was not as strong as at sunrise and sunset. The rock band was at the zenith of its creative powers.

strut

pompous walk / His strut as he marched about the parade ground revealed him for what he was: a pompous buffoon.

vantage point

position giving an advantage;a position from which you watch something; a point in time or a situation from which you consider something, especially the past / They fired upon the enemy from behind trees, walls and any other point of vantage they could find. The cafe was a good vantage point for watching the world go by.

puissant

powerful; strong; potent / We must keep his friendship for he will make a puissant ally.

salvage

rescue from loss / All attempts to salvage the wrecked ship failed. He wondered what he could do to salvage the situation. What can I do to salvage my reputation?

wizardry

sorcery; magic / Merlin amazed the knights with his wizardry.

scintillate

sparkle; flash / "I enjoy her dinner parties because the food is excellent and the conversation scintillates. diamonds scintillating in the candlelight scintillate with wit trí tuệ rất sắc sảo "

taxonomist

specialist in classifying (animals, etc.) / Dental patterns often enable the taxonomist to distinguish members of one rodent species from those of another.

prostrate

stretch out full on ground; lying on the ground and facing downwards / "He prostrated himself before the idol. She was prostrate with grief after her son's death. He stumbled over Luke's prostrate body. "

obstinate

stubborn / We tried to persuade him to give up smoking, but he was obstinate and refused to change.

propellant

substance that propels or drives forward / "The development of our missile program has forced our scientists to seek more powerful propellants. "

strut

supporting bar / The engineer calculated that the strut supporting the rafter needed to be reinforced.

miasma

swamp gas; heavy, vaporous atmosphere, often emanating from decaying matter; pervasive corrupting influence a mass of air that is dirty and smells unpleasant / The smog hung over Victorian London like a dark cloud; noisome, reeking of decay, it was a visible miasma.

soliloquy

talking to oneself / The soliloquy is a device used by the dramatist to reveal a character's innermost thoughts and emotions.

rubric

title or heading (in red print); directions for religious ceremony; protocol / In ordaining the new priests, the bishop carefully observed all the rubrics for the ordination service.

temporize

to delay making a decision or giving a definite answer, in order to gain time; avoid committing oneself; gain time / I cannot permit you to temporize any longer; I must have a definite answer today.

sepulcher

tomb;a place for a dead body, either cut in rock or built of stone / "Annabel Lee was buried in a sepulcher by the sea. "

modulation

toning down; changing from one key to another / When we she spoke, it was with quiet modulation of voice.

warren

tunnels in which rabbits live; crowded conditions in which people live / "The tenement was a veritable warren, packed with people too poor to live elsewhere. "

welter

turmoil; bewildering jumble;a large and confusing amount of sth / "The existing welter of overlapping federal and state proclaims cries out for immediate reform. "

torque

twisting force; force producing rotation / With her wrench she applied sufficient torque to the nut the loosen it. The more torque an engine has, the bigger the load it can pull in the same gear.

substantiate

verify; support / I intend to substantiate my statement by producing witnesses. The results of the tests substantiated his claims. They made accusations which could not be substantiated.

pernicious

very destructive, harmful / He argued that these books had a pernicious effect on young and susceptible minds. Ageism is equally as offensive and pernicious as sexism.

vital

vibrant and lively; critical; living, breathing / The vital, highly energetic first aid instructor stressed that it was vital in examining accident victims to note their vital signs.

onslaught

vicious assault;a strong or violent attack / We suffered many casualties during unexpected onslaght of the enemy troops.

throes

violent anguish;violent pains, especially at the moment of death / The throes of despair can be as devastating as the spasms accompanying physical pain.

welter

wallow / At the height of the battle, the casualties were so numerous that the victims weltered in their blood while waiting for medical attention.

ramble

wander aimlessly (physically or mentally) / Listening to the teacher ramble, Judy wondered whether he'd ever get to his point.

vagabond

wanderer; tramp;a person who has no home or job and who travels from place to place / "In summer, college students wander the roads of Europe like carefree vagabonds. "

prodigal

wasteful; reckless with money / The prodigal son squandered his inheritance.

pandemic

widespread; affecting the majority of people;a disease that spreads over a whole country or the whole world / They feared the AIDS epidemic would soon reach pandemic proportions.

wangle

wiggle out; fake; to get sth that you or another person wants by persuading sb or by a clever plan / She tried to wangle an invitation to the party. I'll try to wangle a contribution out of him

sinuous

winding; bending in and out; not morally honest / The snake moved in a sinuous manner.

vintner

winemaker; seller of wine / "The poet wondered what the vintners could buy that would be half as precious as the wine they sold. "

malevolent

wishing evil / We must thwart his malevolent schemes.

retraction

withdrawal / He dropped his libel suit after the newspaper published a retraction of its statement. He demanded a full retraction of the allegations against him.

recession

withdrawal; retreat; time of low economic activity / The slow recession of the flood waters created problems for the crews working to restore power to the area. The economy is in deep recession.

matriarch

woman who rules a family or larger social group / The matriarch ruled her gypsy tribe with a firm hand.

onomatopoeia

words formed in imitation of natural sounds / "Words like ""rustle"" and ""gargle"" are illustrations of onomatopoeia."

militate

work against / Your record of lateness and absence will militate against your chances of promotion.

secular

worldly; not pertaining to church matters; temporal / The church leaders decided not interfere in secular matters.

miscreant

wretch; villain / His kindness to the miscreant amazed all of us who had expected to hear severe punishment pronounced.

subpoena

writ summoning a witness to appear / The prosecutor's office was ready to serve a subpoena on the reluctant witness.

writ

written command issued by a court;a legal document from a court telling sb to do or not to do sth / The hero of Leonard's novel is a process server who invents unorthodox ways of serving writs on reluctant parties. The company has been served with a writ for breach of contract. We fully intend to issue a writ against the newspaper.

mannered

" affected ; not natural" / Attempting to copy the style of his wealthy neighbors, Gatsby adopted a mannered, artificial way of speech.

magisterial

" authoritative ; imperious" / The learned doctor laid down the law to his patient in a magisterial tone of voice.

puerile

" childish " / His puerile pranks sometimes offended his more mature friends.

turmoil

" confusion ; strife" / Conscious he had sinned, he was in a state of spiritual turmoil.

unkempt

" dishevelled ; with uncared-for appearance" / The beggar was dirty and unkempt.

vertigo

" dizziness ; giddiness " / We test potential plane pilots for susceptibility to spells of vertigo.

reverberate

" echo ; resound" / The entire valley reverberated with the sound of the church bells.

precise

" exact " / If you don't give me precise directions and a map, I'll never find your place.

prolong

" extend ; draw out; lengthen" / In their determination to discover ways to prolong human life, doctors fail to take into account that longer lives are not always happier ones.

zealot

" fanatic ; person who shows excessive zeal" / It is good to have a few zealots in our group for their enthusiasm is contagious.

simulate

" feign " / He simulated insanity in order to avoid punishment for his crime.

ultimate

" final ; not susceptible to further analysis" / Scientists are searching for the ultimate truths.

rig

" fix or manipulate" / The ward boss was able to rig the election by bribing people to stuff the ballot boxes with ballots marked in his candidate's favor. He said the election had been rigged.

redoubtable

" formidable ; causing fear" / During the Cold War period, neighboring countries tried not to offend the Russians because they could be redoubtable foes.

putrid

" foul; rotten; decayed;" / The gangrenous condition of the wound was indicated by the putrid smell when the bandages were removed.

muster

" gather ; assemble; summon " / Washington mustered his forces at Trenton.

unfeigned

" genuine ; real " / She turned so pale that I am sure her surprise was unfeigned.

relent

" give in " / When her stern father would not relent and allow her to marry Robert Browning, Elizabeth Barrett eloped with her suitor.

promontory

" headland ;a long narrow area of high land that goes out into the sea" / "They erected a lighthouse on the promontory to warn approaching ships of their nearness to the shore. "

susceptible

" impressionable ; easily influenced; having little resistance, as to a disease" / He was a very susceptible young man, and so his parents worried that he might fall into bad company.

obnoxious d

" offensive " / I find your behavior obnoxious; please mend your ways.

slake

" quench ; sate" / When we reached the oasis, we were able to slake our thirst.

recumbent

" reclining ; lying down completely or in part" / "The command ""AT EASE"" does not permit you to take a recumbent position."

overbearing

" trying to control other people in an unpleasant way bossy; arrogant; decisively important, domineering " / "Certain of her own importance and of the unimportance of everyone else, Lady Bracknell was intolerably overbearing in manner. ""In choosing a husband,"" she said, ""good birth is of overbearing importance; compared to that, neither wealth nor talent signifi例句: e"

unsightly

" ugly ;not pleasant to look at" / Although James was an experienced emergency room nurse, he occasionally became queasy when faced with a particularly unsightly injury.

mortician

" undertaker " / The mortician prepared the corpse for burial.

vortex

" whirlwind; whirlpool ; center of turbulence; predicament into which one is inexorably plunged" / Sucked into the vortex of the tornado, Dorothy and Toto were carried from Kansas to Oz.

volition

"act of making a conscious choice; free will " / She selected this dress of her own volition. They left entirely of their own volition (= because they wanted to).

vigor

"active strength; vitality " / Although he was over seventy years old, Jack had the vigor of a man in his prime.

winsome

"agreeable; gracious; engaging " / By her winsome manner, she made herself liked by everyone who met her.

prelate

"church dignitary ( giáo sĩ cấp cao (giám mục hoặc tổng giám mục) ) a priest of high rank in the Christian Church, such as a ↑ bishop or ↑ cardinal " / The archbishop of Moscow and other high-ranking prelates visited the Russian Orthodox seminary.

prominent

"conspicuous; notable; protruding; noticeable " / Have you ever noticed that Prince Charles's prominent ears make him resemble the big-eared character in Mad comics? She was prominent in the fashion industry.

supercilious

"contemptuous; haughty; superior " / I prefer Jill's modesty to Jack's supercilious and arrogant attitude. She gave a supercilious smile.

vitriolic

"corrosive; sarcastic; bitter " / Such vitriolic criticism is uncalled for.

wont

"custom; habitual procedure; accustomed " / As was his wont, he jogged two miles every morning before going to work.

mores

"customs; conventions " / The mores of Mexico are those of Spain with some modifications.

trenchant

"cutting; keen; incisive " / I am afraid of his trenchant wit for it is so often sarcastic.

lineage

"descent; ancestry " / He traced his lineage back to Mayflower days.

plummet

"fall sharply; plunge " / Stock prices plummeted as Wall Street reacted to the rise in interest rates.

portend

"foretell; presage; foreshadow " / The king did not know what these omens might portend and asked his soothsayers to interpret them.

nugatory

"futile; worthless " / This agreement is nugatory for no court will enforce it.

mammoth

"gigantic; huge " / The mammoth corporations of the twentieth century are a mixed blessing

raspy

"grating; harsh ;aving a rough sound, as if the person has a sore throat croaky " / The sergeant's raspy voice grated on the recruits' ears.

prevail

"induce; triumph over" / He tried to prevail on her to type his essays for him. We were horrified at the conditions prevailing in local prisons. Those beliefs still prevail among certain social groups.

mutter

"murmur or grumble " / The child muttered at the doll. Workers continued to mutter about the management. I muttered something about needing to get back to work. She heard him mutter an oath under his breath. She muttered something about the incompetence of the office staff.

propinquity

"nearness; kinship; proximity " / Their relationship could not be explained as being based on mere propinquity: they were more than relatives; they were true friends.

myopic

"nearsighted; short-sighted " / In thinking only of your present needs and ignoring the future, you are being rather myopic.

pejorative

"negative in connotation; having a belittling effect; derogatory " / Instead of criticizing Clinton's policies, the Republicans made pejorative remarks about his character.

rift

"opening; break; breach, division " / The plane was lost in the stormy sky until the pilot saw the city through a rift in the clouds.

tract

"pamphlet; a region of indefinite size; stretch " / The King granted William Penn a tract of land in the New World.

predilection

"partiality; preference;liking, " / Although the artist used various media from time to time, she had a predilection for watercolors.

placid

"peaceful; calm; tranquil " / After his vacation in this placid section, he felt soothed and rested.

nonentity

"person of no importance; nonexistence; nobody a person without any special qualities, who has not achieved anything important " / Don't dismiss John as a nonentity; in his quiet way, he's very important to the firm.

proponent

"person who supports or proposes (an idea); advocate " / After the bill had been amended and re-amended in committee, even its original proponents didn't want to vote in its favor.

pharisaical

"pertaining to Pharisees, who paid scrupulous attention to tradition; self-righteous; hypocritical " / "Walter Lippmann has pointed out that moralists who do not attempt to explain the moral code they advocate are often regarded as pharisaical and ignored. "

provincial

"pertaining to a province; limited in outlook; unsophisticated; narrow-minded " / As provincial governor, Sir Henry administered the Queen's law in his remote corner of Canada. In spite of his education and travels, he has remained very provincial.

retaliate

"repay in kind (usually for bad treatment); take revenge " / Fear that we will retaliate immediately deters our foe from attacking us.

machinations

"schemes; plot , intrigue " / I can see through your wily machinations.

upbraid

"scold; reproach ;to criticize sb or speak angrily" / I must upbraid him for his unruly behavior.

specious

"seemingly reasonable but incorrect; misleading " / Let us not be misled by such specious arguments.

shambles

"slaughterhouse; scene of carnage; mess " / By the time the police arrived, the room was a shambles.

whit

"smallest speck; jot; a very small amount" / There is not a whit of intelligence or understanding in your observations.

rebuff

"snub; beat back; an unkind refusal of a friendly offer, request or suggestion rejection " / "She rebuffed his invitation so smoothly that he did not realize he had been snubbed. "

quirk

"startling twise; caprice; peculiarity " / By a quirk of fate, he found himself working for the man whom he had discharged years before. Everyone has their own little quirks and mannerisms. By a strange quirk of fate they had booked into the same hotel.

turbulence

"state of violent agitation; upheaval " / We were frightened by the turbulence of the ocean during the storm. We experienced severe turbulence during the flight

penchant

"strong inclination; liking; fondness " / He had a strong penchant for sculpture and owned many statues.

quash

"subdue; crush; squash; overturn ; supress " / The authorities acted quickly to quash the student rebellion, sending in tanks to cow the demonstrators. His conviction was later quashed by the Court of Appeal. The rumours were quickly quashed.

subsidiary

"subordinate; secondary; additional; extra " / This information may be used as subsidiary evidence but is not sufficient by itself to prove your argument.

sultry

"sweltering;very hot and uncomfortable, muggy ; ( sexual attractive, sexy ) " / "He could not adjust himself to the sultry climate of the tropics. We went out into the still, sultry heat of the afternoon. "

methodical

"systematic;done in a careful and logical way; disciplined, precise " / An accountant must be methodical and maintain order among his financial records. She is very slow but methodical in her work.

retroactive

"taking effect before its enactment (as a law) or imposition (as a tax), retrospective " / Because the new pension law was retroactive to the first of the year, even though Martha had retired in February she was eligible for the pension.

manifest

"understandable; clear " / His evil intentions were manifest and yet we could not stop him. His nervousness was manifest to all those present. The anger he felt is manifest in his paintings.

uninhibited

"unrepressed; unrestrained " / The congregation was shocked by her uninhibited laughter during the sermon.

refrain

"v. abstain from; resist n. chorus desist from " / Whenever he heard a song with a lively chorus, Sol could never refrain from joining in on the refrain. Please refrain from smoking.

wary

"very cautious " / The spies grew wary as they approached the sentry.

momentous

"very important; historic " / On this momentous occasion, we must be very solemn.

quarry

"victim; object of a hunt; prey " / The police closed in on their quarry. The hunters lost sight of their quarry in the forest. The photographers pursued their quarry through the streets.

parry

"ward off a blow; deflect " / He was content to wage a defensive battle and tried to parry his opponent's thrusts.

reprobation

severe disapproval / The students showed their reprobation of his act by refusing to talk with him.

lustrous

shining / Her large and lustrous eyes gave a touch of beauty to an otherwise drab face.

pedantic

showing off learning; bookish / Leaving his decisions with humorous, down-to-earth anecdotes, Judge Walker was not at all pedantic legal scholar.

wince

shrink back; flinch;to suddenly make an expression with your face that shows that you are feeling pain or embarrassment / "The screech of the chalk on the blackboard made her wince. I still wince at the memory of the stupid things I did Tôi vẫn còn cau mày mỗi khi nhớ lại những điều ngốc nghếch mà mình đã làm "

wither

shrivel; decay / Cut flowers are beautiful for a day, but all too soon they wither. The grass had withered in the warm sun.

occlude

shut; close;to cover or block something / A blood clot occluded an artery to the heart.

winnow

sift; separate good parts from bad / "This test will winnow out the students who study from those who don't bother. "

muted

silent; muffled; toned down / In the funeral parlor, the mourners' voices had a muted quality.

synchronous

similary timed; simultaneous with;happening or existing at the same time / We have many examples of scientists in different parts of the world who have made synchronous discoveries.

warble

sing; babble, to sing with rapidly changing notes / Every morning the birds warbled outside her window.

obloquy

slander; disgrace; infamy / I resent the obloquy that you are casting upon my reputation.

revile

slander; vilify; to criticize sb/sth in a way that shows how much you dislike them / He was avoided by all who feared that he would revile and abuse them if they displeased him.

oblique

slanting; deviating from the perpendicular or from a straight line / "The sergeant ordered the men to march ""oblique right."""

sluggish

slow; lazy; lethargic / After two nights without sleep, she felt sluggish and incapable of exertion. The growth of the export market has helped to compensate for sluggish demand at home.

stealth

slyness; sneakiness; secretiveness; the fact of doing sth in a quiet or secret way / Fearing detection by the sentries on duty, the scout inched his way toward the enemy camp with great stealth. The government was accused of trying to introduce the tax by stealth. Lions rely on stealth when hunting.

satellite

small body revolving around a larger one / During the first few years of the Space Age, hundreds of satellites were launched by Russia and the United States.

vent

small opening; outlet / "The wine did not flow because the air vent in the barrel was clogged. "

rivulet

small stream / "As the rains continued, the trickle of water running down the hillside grew into a rivulet that threatened to wash away a portion of the slope. Rain ran in tiny rivulets down the window. "

pallet

small, poor bed / "The weary traveler went to sleep on his straw pallet. "

simper

smirk; smile affectedly;to smile in a silly and annoying way / Complimented on her appearance, Stella self-consciously simpered. ‘You're such a darling,’ she simpered.

steep

soak; saturate; expensive / Be sure to steep the fabric in the dye bath for the full time prescribed. £2 for a cup of coffee seems a little steep to me.

sodden

soaked; dull, as if from drink / He set his sodden overcoat near the radiator to dry.

staid

sober; sedate;not amusing or interesting; boring and old-fashioned / Her conduct during the funeral ceremony was staid and solemn. The museum is trying to get rid of its staid image.

monolithic

solidly uniform; unyielding / Knowing the importance of appearing resolute, the patriots sought to present a monolithic front.

ventriloquist

someone who can make his or her voice seem to come from another person or thing / This ventriloquist does an act in which she has a conversation with a wooden dummy.

novelty

something new; newness / The computer is no longer a novelty around the office. There's a certain novelty value in this approach.

sleeper

something originally of little value or importance that in time becomes very valuable / Unnoticed by the critics at its publication, the eventual Pulitzer Prize winner was a classic sleeper.

precedent

something preceding in time that may be used as an authority or guide for future action / This decision sets a precedent for future cases of a similar nature.

poultice

soothing application applied to sore and inflamed portions of the body / "He was advised to apply a flaxseed poultice to the inflammation. "

waffle

speak equivocally about an issue / When asked directly about the governor's involvement in the savings and loan scandal, the press secretary waffled, talking all around the issue. The report is just full of waffle.

prate

speak foolishly; boast idly / Let us not prate about our qualities; rather, let our virtues speak for themselves.

tempo

speed of music / I find the conductor's tempo too slow for such a brilliant piece of music.

polarize

split into opposite extremes or camps / The abortion issue has polarized the country into pro-choice and anti-abortion camps.

rend

split; tear apart;to tear sth apart with force or violence / "In his grief, he tried to rend his garments. "

vitiate

spoil the effect of; make inoperative / Fraud will vitiate the contract.

mottled

spotted / When he blushed, his face took on a mottled hue.

maculated

spotted; stained / Instead of writing that Gorbachev had a birthmark on his forehead, the pompous young poet sang of the former premier's maculated brow.

pervasive

spread throughout / Despite airing them for several hours, she could not rid her clothes of the pervasive odor of mothbals that clung to them. A sense of social change is pervasive in her novels.

spat

squabble; minor dispute; a short argument or disagreement about sth unimportant / What had started out as a mere spat escalated into a full-blown argument.

writhe

squirm, twist / "He was writhing in pain, desperate for the drug his body required. She was writhing around on the floor in agony. "

scotch

stamp out; thwart; hinder; to stop sth from happening; to take action to end sth / Heather tried to scotch the rumor that she had stolen her best friend's fiance. Plans for a merger have been scotched. Rumours that he had fled the country were promptly scotched by his wife.

philatelist

stamp-collector / "When she heard the value of the Penny Black stamp, Phyllis was inspired to become a philatelist. "

rout

stampede; drive out;to defeat sb completely in a competition, a battle, etc / The reinforcements were able to rout the enemy

multiplicity

state of being numerous / He was appalled by the multuplicity of details he had to complete before setting out on his mission. This situation can be influenced by a multiplicity of different factors.

responsiveness

state of reacting readily to appeals, order, etc. / The audience cheered and applauded, delighting the performers by its responsiveness.

paradox

statement that looks false but is actually correct; a contradictory statement / "Wordworth's ""The child is father to the man"" is an example of paradox. It is a curious paradox that professional comedians often have unhappy personal lives. "

plagiarize

steal another's ideas and pass them off as one's own / The editor could tell that the writer had plagiarized parts of the article; he could recognize whole paragraphs from the original source.

viscous

sticky, gluey / Melted tar is a viscous substance.

rigid

stiff and unyielding; strict; hard and unbending / By living with a man to whom she was not married, George Eliot broke Victorian society's most rigid rule of respectable behavior.

miserly

stingy; mean / The miserly old man hoarded his coins not out of prudence but out of greed.

stoke

stir up a fire; feed plentifully;to make people feel sth more strongly / As a Scout, Marisa learned how to light a fire, how to stoke it if it started to die down, and how to extinguish it completely. Increased borrowing was stoking up a consumer boom.

suture

stitches sewn to hold the cut edges of a wound or incision; material used in sewing / "We will remove the sutures as soon as the wound heals. "

touchstone

stone used to test the fineness of gold alloys; criterion / What touchstone can be used to measure the character of a person? Grammar was regarded as the touchstone of all language performance.

vagrant

stray; random; / "He tried to study, but could not collect his vagrant thoughts. a vagrant imagination sự tưởng tượng vẩn vơ "

stamina

strength; staying power;the physical or mental strength that enables you to do sth difficult for long periods of time / I doubt that she has the stamina to run the full distance of the marathon race. It takes a lot of stamina to run a marathon.

undergird

strengthen the base of / Whereas relativity theory undermined the Newtonian mechanics, cosmology was undergirded by it.

martinet

strict disciplinarian / The commanding officer was a martinet who observed each regulation to the ltter.

percussion

striking one object against another sharply / "The drum is a percussion instrument. "

transport

strong emotion / Margo was a creature of extremes, at one moment in transports of joy over a vivid sunset, at another moment in transports of grief over a dying bird.

scuffle

struggle confusedly; move off in a confused hurry.; a short and not very violent fight or struggle / "The twins briefly scuffled, wrestling to see which of them would get the toy. When their big brother yelled, ""Let go of my Gameboy!"" they scuffled off down the hall. Scuffles broke out between police and demonstrators. He was involved in a scuffle with a photographer. "

pertinacious

stubborn; persistent / He is bound to succeed because his pertinacious nature will not permit him to quit.

refractory

stubborn; unmanageable / The refractory horse was eliminated from the race when he refused to obey the jockey.

perverse

stubbornly wrongheaded; wicked and unacceptable / When Hannibal Lecter was in a perverse mood, he ate the flesh of his victims. She finds a perverse pleasure in upsetting her parents. Do you really mean that or are you just being deliberately perverse?

pore

study industriously; ponder; scrutinize / Determined to become a physician, Beth spends hours poring over her anatomy text.

philology

study of language / The professor of philology advocated the use of Esperanto as an international language.

paleontology

study of prehistoric life / The professor of paleontology had a superb collection of fossils.

subaltern

subordinate / The captain treated his subalterns as though they were children rather than commissioned officers.

surrogate

substitute / "For a fatherless child, a male teacher may become a father surrogate. She saw him as a sort of surrogate father. For these people, television is a surrogate for real life. As Tolkien noted some time ago, magic is often a surrogate for technology. "

potable

suitable for drinking / The recent drought in the Middle Atlantic States has emphasized the need for extensive research in ways of making sea water potable.

menial

suitable for sevants; low, not skilled or important, and often boring or badly paid / I cannot understand why a person of your ability and talent should engage in such menial activities.

recapitulate

summarize / Let us recapitulate what has been said thus far before going ahead. To recapitulate briefly, the three main points are these…

vertex

summit / Let us drop a perpendicular line from the vertex of the triangle to the base.

perfunctory

superficial; not thorough; lacking interest, care, or enthusiasm / The auditor's perfunctory inspection of the books overlooked many errors.

redundant

superfluous; excessively wordy; repetitious / Your composition is redundant; you can easily reduce its length. The picture has too much redundant detail.

supererogatory

superfluous; more than needed or demanded / We have more than enough witnesses to corroborate your statement; to present any more would be supererogatory.

litany

supplicatory prayer / On this solemn day, the congregation responded to the prayers of the priest during the litany with fervor and intensity.

patronize

support; act superior toward / Experts in a field sometimes appear to patronize people who are less knowledgeable of the subject.

satiate

surfeit; satisfy fully / The guests, having eaten until they were satiated, now listened inattentively to the speakers.

reconnaissance

survey of enemy by soldiers; reconnoitering / If you encounter any enemy soldiers during your reconnaissance, capture them for questioning.

relic

surviving remnant; memento / Egypt's Department of Antiquities prohibits tourists from taking mummies and other ancient relics out of the country. The pictures on the walls were relics from the days before her marriage.

vulnerable

susceptible to wounds / Achilles was vulnerable only in his heel.

leery

suspicious; cautious; wary / Don't eat sushi at this restaurant; I'm a bit leery about how fresh it is.

meteoric

swift; momentarily brilliant / We all wondered at his meteoric rise to fame.

turgid

swollen; distended / The turgid river threatened to overflow the levees and flood the contryside.

tumid

swollen; pompous; bombastic / I especially dislike his tumid style; I prefer writing which is less swollen and bombastic.

resumption

taking up again; recommencement;the act of beginning sth again after it has stopped / During the summer break, Don had not realized how much he missed university life: at the resumption of classes, however, he felt marked excitement and pleasure. We are hoping for an early resumption of peace talks.

obelisk

tall column tapering and ending in a pyramid / "Cleopatra's Needle is an obelisk in New York City's Central Park. "

palpable

tangible; easily perceptible / I cannot understand how you could overlook such a palpable blunder. The tension in the room was almost palpable.

prey

target of a hunt; victim / In Stalking the Wild Asparagus, Euell Gibbons has as his prey not wild beasts but wild plants.

sully

tarnish; soil / He felt that it was beneath his dignity to sully his hands in such menial labor. By cheating they have sullied the good name of their country.

savory

tasty; pleasing, attractive, or agreeable / Julia Child's recipes enable amateur chefs to create savory delicacies for their guests.

quip

taunt;to make a quick and clever remark / You are unpopular because you are too free with your quips and sarcastic comments. ‘Don’t bank on it!’ he quipped, when I asked him to be careful with the money. ‘I hope you’re not in a hurry!’ she quipped, and everyone laughed.

tribute

tax levied by a ruler; mark of respect / The colonists refused to pay tribute to a foreign despot.

tithe

tax of one-tenth / Because he was an agnostic, he refused to pay his tithes to the clergy.

pedagogue

teacher / He could never be a stuffy pedagogue; his classes were always lively and filled with humor.

sophist

teacher of philosophy; quibbler; employer of fallacious reasoning / You are using all the devices of a sophist in trying to prove your case; your argument is specious.

pedagogy

teaching; art of education / Though Maria Montessori gained fame for her innovations in pedagogy, it took years before her teaching techniques became common practice in American schools.

tantalize

tease; torture with disappointment;to make a person or an animal want sth that they cannot have or do / Tom loved to tantalize his younger brother with candy; he knew the boy was forbidden to have it.

remission

temporary moderation of disease symptoms; cancellation of a debt; forgiveness or pardon / Though Senator Tsongas had been treated for cancer, his symptoms were in remission, and he was considered fit to handle the strains of a Presidential race. The symptoms reappeared after only a short remission.

scaffold

temporary platform for workers; bracing framework; platform for execution / Before painting the house, the workers put up a scaffold to allow them to work on the second story.

sojourn

temporary stay;a temporary stay in a place away from your home / After his sojourn in Florida, he began to long for the colder climate of his native New England home.

pathos

tender to sorrow; pity; quality in art or literature that produces these feelings. / The quiet tone of pathos that ran through the novel never degenerated into the maudlin or the overly sentimental. All the pathos of the poem is in the last lineall the pathos of the poem is in the last line

salutary

tending to improve; beneficial; wholesome / The punishment had a salutary effect on the boy, as he became a model student.

nomenclature

terminology; system of names / She struggled to master scientific nomenclature.

terminology

terms used in a science or art / The special terminology developed by some authorities in the field has done more to confuse laypersons than to enlighten them.

sententious

terse; concise; aphoristic;trying to sound important or intelligent, especially by expressing moral judgements / After reading so many redundant speeches, I find his sententious style particulary pleasing.

occident

the West;the western part of the world, especially Europe and America / It will take occident to understand the ways and customs of the orient.

unction

the act of anointing with oil / The anointing with oil of a person near death is called extreme unction.

prosody

the art of versification / This book on prosody contains a rhyming dictionary as well as samples of the various verse forms.

molecule

the smallest particle (one or more atoms) of a substance that has all the properties of that substance / In chemistry, we study how atoms and molcules react to form new substances. A molecule of water consists of two atoms of hydrogen and one atom of oxygen.

veneer

thin layer; cover / Casual acquaintances were deceived by his veneer of sophistication and failed to recognize his fundamental shallowness.

tenuous

thin; rare; slim / The allegiance of our allies is held by rather tenuous ties; let us hope they will remain loyal.

millennium

thousand-year period; period of happiness and prosperity / I do not expect the milennium to come during my lifetime. For millennia, it was accepted that the earth was at the centre of the universe.

platitude

trite remark; commonplace statement / The platitudes in his speech were applauded by the vast majority in his audience; only a few people perceived how trite his remarks were.

shunt

turn aside; divert; sidetrack / If the switchman failed to shunt the Silver Streak onto a side track, the train would plow right into Union Station. John was shunted sideways to a job in sales.

wry

twisted; with a humorous twist / We enjoy Dorothy Parker's verse for its wry wit.

litotes

understatement for emphasis / "To say, ""He little realizes,"" when we mean that he does not realize at all, is an example of the kind of understatement we call litotes."

unintimidating

unfrightening / Though Phil had expected to feel overawed when he met Joe Montana, he found the experience unintimidating and relaxing.

unwitting

unintentional; not knowing;not aware of what you are doing or of the situation you are involved in / She was the unwitting tool of the swindlers He became an unwitting accomplice in the crime. She was the unwitting cause of the argument.

retribution

vengeance; compensation; punishment for offenses / The evangelist maintained that an angry deity would exact retribution from the sinners. People are seeking retribution for the latest terrorist outrages.

protean

versatile; able to take on many forms / A remarkably protean actor, Alec Guinness could take on any role.

mammal

vertebrate animal whose female suckles its young / Many people regard the whale as a fish and do not realize that it is a mammal.

plumb

vertical / Before hanging wallpaper it is advisable to drop a plumb line from the ceiling as a guide.

munificent

very generous / The munificent gift was presented to the bride by her rich uncle.

myriad

very large number / myriads of mosquitoes from the swamps invaded our village every twilight.

pauper

very poor person / "Though Widow Brown was living on a reduced income, she was by no means a pauper. He died a pauper. "

prim

very precise and formal; exceedingly proper / Many people commented on the contrast between the prim attire of the young lady and the inappropriate clothing worn by her escort. You can't tell her that joke— she's much too prim and proper.

mite

very small object or creature; small coin / Gnats are annoying mites that sing.

nefarious

very wicked / He was universally feared because of his many nefarious deeds.

robust

vigorous; strong / The candidate for the football team had a robust physique.

profane

violate; desecrate / Tourists are urged not to profane the sanctity of holy places by wearing improper garb.

transgression

violation of a law; sin / Forgive us our transgressions; we know not what we do.

nomadic

wandering / Several nomadic tribes of Indians would hunt in this area each year.

licentious

wanton; lewd; dissolute / The licentious monarch helped bring about his country's downfall.

ribald

wanton; profane;referring to sex in a rude but humorous way / He sang a ribald song that offended many of the more prudish listeners.

squander

waste / The prodigal son squandered the family estate.

undermine

weaken; sap / The recent corruption scandals have undermined many people's faith in the city government. Our confidence in the team has been seriously undermined by their recent defeats. Recent changes have undermined teachers' morale.

unique

without an equal; single in kind / You have the unique distinction of being the first student whom I have had to fail in this course.

random

without definite purpose, plan, or aim; haphazard / Although the sponsor of the raffle claimed all winners were chosen at random, people had their suspicions when the grand prize went to the sponsor's brother-in-law.

verbatim

word for word / He repeated the message verbatim.

swathe

wrap around; bandage / "When I visited him in the hospital, I found him swathed in bandages. "

malfeasance

wrongdoing / The authorities did not discover the campaign manager's malfeasance until after he had spent most of the money he had embezzled.

submissive

yielding; timid / Crushed by his authoritarian father, Will had no defiance left in him; he was totally submissive in the face of authority. She followed him like a submissive child.

legacy

a gift made by a will / Part of my legacy from my parents is an album of family photographs. Future generations will be left with a legacy of pollution and destruction. The problems were made worse by the legacy of centuries of neglect.

scad

a great quantity / "Refusing Dave's offer to lend him a shirt, Phil replied, ""No, thanks: I've got scads of clothes."""

orientation

act of finding oneself in society / Freshman orientation provides the incoming students with an opportunity to learn about their new environment and their place in it.

summation

act of finding the total, summary / In his summation, the lawyer emphasized the testimony given by the two witnesses. The exhibition presents a summation of the artist's career.

vicarious

acting as a substitute; done by a deputy / Many people get a vicarious thrill at the movies by imagining they are the characters on the screen. he got a vicarious thrill out of watching his son score the winning goal

precocious

advanced in development / By her rather adult manner of discussing serious topics, the child demonstrated that she was precocious.

suffragist

advocate of voting rights (for women) / In recognition of her efforts to win the vote for women, Congress authorized coining a silver dollar honoring the suffragist Susan B. Anthony.

posthumous

after death (as of child born after father's death or book published after author's death) / The critics ignored his works during his lifetime; it was only after the posthumous publication of his last novel that they recognized his great talent. A posthumous collection of her work has just been published. The posthumous award of a medal for bravery

palatable

agreeable; pleasing to the taste / Neither Jack's underbaked opinions nor his overcooked casseroles were palatable to me. Some of the dialogue has been changed to make it more palatable to an American audience.

yield

amount produced; crop; income on investment / An experienced farmer can estimate the annual yield of his acres with surprising accuracy. The research has yielded useful information.

papyrus

ancient paper made from stem of papyrus plant / The ancient Egyptians were among the first to write on papyrus.

wrath

anger; fury / "She turned to him, full of wrath, and said, ""What makes you think I'll accept lower pay for this job than you get?"""

parasite

animal or plant living on another; toady; sycophant / The tapeworm is an example of the kind of parasite that may infest the human body. He regards students as parasites on society.

perquisite

any gain above stipulated salary / The perquisites attached to this job make it even more attractive than the salary indicates. Politics used to be the perquisite of the property-owning classes.

sanction

approve; ratify / Nothing will convince me to sanction the engagement of my daughter to such a worthless young man.

plauditory

approving; applauding / The theatrical company reprinted the plauditory comments of the critics in its advertisement.

stemfrom

arise from / Milton's problems in school stemmed from his poor study habits.

symmetry

arrangement of parts so that balance is obtained; congruity / The addition of a second tower will give this edifice the symmetry that it now lacks.

presumptuous

arrogant; taking liberties / It seems presumptous for one so relatively new to the field to challenge the conclusions of its leading experts.

treatise

article treating a subject systematically and thoroughly / He is preparing a treatise on the Elizabethan playwrights for his graduate degree. A treatise on applied mathematics

sophistication

artificiality; unnaturalness; act of employing sophistry in reasoning / Sophistication is an acquired characteristic, found more frequently among city dwellers than among residents of rural areas. She spoke simply and directly, without sophistication.

supposititious

assumed; counterfeit; hypothetical / I find no similarity between your supposititious illustration and the problem we are facing.

premise

assumption; postulate / Because Jack had based his argument upon a faulty premise, his opponent cheerfully pointed out the holes in his logic.

moribund

at the point of death / The doctors called the family to the bedside of the moribund patient.

proxy

authorized agent / Please act as my proxy and vote for this slate of candidates in my absence. You can vote either in person or by proxy.

shirk

avoid (responsibility, work, etc.); malinger;to avoid doing sth you should do, especially because you are too lazy / Brian has a strong sense of duty; he would never shirk any responsibility. Discipline in the company was strict and no one shirked. She never shirked her responsibilities.

ubiquitous

being everywhere; omnipresent / "That Christmas ""The Little Drummer Boy"" seemed ubiquitous: Justin heard the tune everywhere he went."

subliminal

below the threshold / We may not be aware of the subliminal influences that affect our thinking.

reproach

blame; censure / I want my work to be above reproach and without error He reproached himself for not telling her the truth.

unimpeachable

blameless and exemplary;that you cannot doubt or question / Her conduct in office was unimpeachable and her record is spotless.

sanguinary

bloody;nvolving or liking killing and blood / The battle of lwo Jina was unexpectedly sanguinary with many casualties.

palette

board on which a painter mixes pigments / At the present time, art supply stores are selling a paper palette that may be discarded after use.

vaunted

boasted; bragged; highly publicized / This much vaunted project proved a disappointment when it collapsed.

magniloquent

boastful, pompous / In their stories of the trial, the reporters ridiculed the magniloquent speeches of the defense attorney.

vainglorious

boastful; excessively conceited / She was a vainglorious and arrogant individual.

obstreperous

boisterous; noisy;noisy and difficult to control / The crowd became obstreperous and shouted their disapproval of the proposals made by the speaker.

stilted

bombastic; stiffly pompous;not natural or relaxed; too formal / His stilted rhetoric did not impress the college audience; they were immune to bombastic utterances. We made stilted conversation for a few moments.

tedium

boredom; weariness / We hope this radio will help overcome the tedium of your stay in the hospital.

obeisance

bow / She made an obeisance as the king and queen entered the room.

pugilist

boxer / The famous pugilist Cassius Clay changed his name to Muhammed Ali.

respiration

breathing; exhalation / The doctor found that the patient's years of smoking had adversely affected both his lung capacity and his rate of respiration.

resplendent

brilliant; lustrous;brightly coloured in an impressive way / The toreador wore a resplendent costume called a suit of lights. He glimpsed Sonia, resplendent in a red dress.

nonplus

bring to a halt by confusion; perplex / Jack's uncharacteristic rudeness nonplussed Jill, leaving her uncertain how to react.

rationalization

bringing into conformity with reason / All attempts at rationalization at this time are doomed to failure; tempers and emotions run too high for intelligent thought to prevail. No amount of rationalization could justify his actions.

spatula

broad-bladed instrument used for spreading or mixing / "The manufacturers of this frying pan recommended the use of a rubber spatula to avoid scratching the specially treated surface. "

sibling

brother or sister / We may not enjoy being siblings, but we cannot forget that we still belong to the same family.

sheaf

bundle of stalks of grain; any bundle of things tied together / The lawyer picked up a sheaf of papers as he rose to question the witness.

onus

burden; responsibility / The emperor was spared the onus of signing the surrender papers; instead, he relegated the assignment to his generals. The report puts the onus of children's early education firmly on the parents.

smolder

burn without flame; be liable to break out at any moment / "The rags smoldered for hours before they burst into flame. "

mercantile

concerning trade / I am more interested in the opportunites available in the mercantile field than I am in those in the legal profession.

terse

concise; abrupt; pithy / I admire his terse style of writing; he comes directly to the point.

obfuscate

confuse; muddle / Do not obfuscate the issues by dragging in irrelevant arguments.

solecism

construction that is flagrantly incorrect grammatically / I must give this paper a failing mark because it contains many solecisms.

restraint

controlling force / She dreamt of living an independent life, free of all restraints.

orthography

correct spelling / Many of us find English orthography difficult to master because so many of our words are written phonetically.

perversion

corruption; turning from right to wrong / "Inasmuch as he had no motive for his crimes, we could not understand his perversion. the perversion of the evidence to suit powerful interests sự xuyên tạc chứng cớ cho phù hợp với lợi ích của kẻ quyền thế her account was a perversion of the truth bài tường thuật của cô ta là một cách bóp méo sự thật the perversion of normal desires sự lầm lạc của các ham muốn bình thường the sexual perversion sự trụy lạc giới tính, sự loạn dâm "

pluck

courage / Even the adversaries of young Indiana Jones were impressed by the boy's pluck in trying to rescue the archeological treasure they had stolen.

mettle

courage; spirit / When challenged by the other horses in the race, the thoroughbred proved its mettle by its determination to hold the lead.

tribunal

court of justice / The decision of the tribunal was final and the prisoner was sentenced to death.

statutory

created by statute or legislative action;fixed by law; that must be done by law / The judicial courts review and try statutory crimes.

pan

criticize harshly / Hoping for a rave review of his new show, the playwright was miserable when the critics panned it unanimously.

pulverize

crush or grind into very small particles / Before sprinkling the dried herbs into the stew, Michael first pulverized them into a fine powder.

prune

cut away; trim / With the help of her editor, she was able to prune her manuscript into publishable form.

marred

damaged; disfigured / She had to refinish the marred surface of the table.

obscure

dark; vague; unclear / Even after I read the poem a fourth time, its meaning was still obscure.

obscure

darken; make unclear / At times he seemed purposely to obscure his meaning, preferring mystery to clarity.

murkiness

darkness; gloom / The murkiness and fog of the waterfront that evening depressed me.

slander

defamation; utterance of false and malicious statements / Unless you can prove your allegations, your remarks constitute slander.

libelous

defamatory; injurious to the good name of a person / He sued the newspaper because of its libelous story. There have been several libellous statements posted on a website in the UK.

mulct

defraud a person of something / The lawyer was accused of trying to mulct the boy of his legacy.

respite

delay in punishment; interval of relief; rest / The judge granted the condemned man a respite to enable his attorneys to file an appeal. She continued to work without respite.

render

deliver; provide; represent;make / He rendered aid to the needy and indigent.

raze

destroy completely;raze something to completely destroy a building, town, etc. so that nothing is left / The owners intend to raze the hotel and erect an office building on the site. The village was razed to the ground.

resolution

determination / Nothing could shake his resolution to succeed despite all difficulties.

resolve

determination / Nothing could shake his resolve that his children would get the best education that money could buy.

sensual

devoted to the pleasures of the senses; carnal; voluptous / I cannot understand what caused him to drop his sensual way of life and become so ascetic.

piety

devoutness; reverence for God / Living her life in prayer and good works, Mother Teresa exemplifies the true sprit of piety.

sap

diminish; undermine / The element kryptonite had an unhealthy effect on Superman: it sapped his strength. Years of failure have sapped him of his confidence.

refectory

dining hall / "In this huge refectory, we can feed the entire student body at one sitting. "

protocol

diplomatic etiquette / We must run this state dinner according to protocol if we are to avoid offending any of our guests.

stratified

divided into classes; arranged into strata / As the economic gap between the rich and the poor increased, Roman society grew increasingly stratified.

potion

dose (of liquid);a drink of medicine or poison; a liquid with magic powers / "Tristan and Lsolde drink a love potion in the first act of the opera. "

oratorio

dramatic poem set to music / The Glee Club decided to present an oratorio during their recital.

swill

drink greedily / "Singing, ""Yo, ho, ho, and a bottle of rum,"" Long John Silver and his fellow pirates swilled their grog. "

quaff

drink with relish;to drink a large amount of sth quickly / As we quaffed our ale, we listened to the gay songs of the students in the tavern.

lethargic

drowsy; dull / The stuffy room made her lethargic; she felt as if she was about to nod off.

provender

dry food; fodder / I am afraid of a severe winter because I have stored a large quantity of provender for the cattle.

prosaic

dull and unimaginative; matter-of-fact; factual / Though the ad writers had come up with a highly creative campaign to publicize the company's newest product, the head office rejected it for a more prosaic, down-to-earth approach.

stolidity

dullness; impassivenss / The earthquake shattered his usual stolidity; trembling, he crouched on the no longer stable ground.

zeal

eager enthusiasm / Wang's zeal was contagious; soon all his fellow students were busily making posters, inspired by his ardent enthusiasm for the cause. She went about the task with the zeal of an enthusiast.

oligarchy

government by a few / The feudal oligarchy was supplanted by an autocracy.

vouchsafe

grant condescendingly; guarantee;to give, offer or tell sth to sb, especially in order to give them a special advantage / I can safely vouchsafe you fair return on your investment.

magnitude

greatness; extent / It is difficult to comprehend the magnitude of his crime.

verdigris

green coating on copper which has been exposed to the weather / "Despite all attempts to protect the statue from the elements, it became coated with verdigris. "

lechery

gross lewdness; lustfulness / In his youth he led a life of lechery and debauchery; he did not mend his ways until middle age.

trilogy

group of three works / Romain Rolland's novel Jean Christophe was first published as a trilogy.

proliferate

grow rapidly; spread; multiply / Times of economic hardship inevitably encourage countless get-rich-quick schemes to proliferate

tutelage

guardianship; training / Under the tutelage of such masters of the instrument, she made rapid progress as a virtuoso. under the tutelage of a master craftsman

wan

having a pale or sickly color; pallid / "Suckling asked, ""Why so pale and wan, fond lover?"""

rancid

having the odor of stale fat / A rancid odor filled the ship's galley and nauseated the crew. There was a rancid smell coming from the kitchen.

prophetic

having to do with predicting the future / In interpreting Pharaoh's prophetic dream, Joseph said that the seven fat cows eaten by the seven lean cows represented seven years of plenty followed by seven years of famine.

precipitate

headlong; rash / Do not be precipitate in this matter; investigate further.

potpourri

heterogeneous mixture; medley / He offered a potpourri of folk songs from many lands.

prodigy

highly gifted child; marvel / Menuhin was a prodigy, performing wonders on his violin when he was barely eight years old. Mozart was an infant prodigy, composing music at the age of four.

waif

homeless child or animal / Although he already had eight cats, he could not resist adopting yet another feline waif.

vagrant

homeless wanderer / "Because he was a stranger in town with no visible means of support, Martin feared he would be jailed as a vagrant. "

quixotic

idealistic but impractical / His head is in the clouds; he is constantly presenting these quixotic schemes.

utopia

imaginary land with perfect social and political system (xã hội không tưởng);an imaginary place or state in which everything is perfect / Shangri-la was the name of James Hilton's Tibetan utopia.

pastiche

imitation of another's style in musical composition or in writing / We cannot even say that her music is a pastiche of this or that composer; it is rather, reminiscent of many musicians. She's an expert in the art of pastiche and parody.

mimicry

imitation;the action or skill of being able to copy the voice, movements, etc. of others / Her gift for mimicry was so great that her friends said that she should be in the theater.

sophomoric

immature; shallow / Your sophomoric remarks are a sign of your youth and indicate that you have not given much thought to the problem.

transitoriness

impermanence / Conscious that all things pass, the psalmist relates the transitoriness of happiness and fame.

metaphor

implied comparison / "He soared like an eagle is an example of a simile; ""He is an eagle in flight,"" is a metaphor."

levy

impose (a fine); collect (a payment);to use official authority to demand and collect a payment, tax, etc / "Crying ""No taxation withouth representation,"" the colonists demonstrated against England's power to levy taxes. a tax levied by the government on excess company profits "

spontaneity

impulsiveness; absence of premeditation / What I liked best about Dale's parties was their spontaneity: a couple of friends would drop by, someone would pull out a fiddle or guitar, and before you knew it the party would be in full swing. There is a lack of spontaneity in her performance.

pellmell

in confusion; disorderly;very quickly and in a way that is not controll / The excited students dashed pellmell into the stadium to celebrate the victory.

virtual

in essence; for practical purposes / She is a virtual financial wizard when it comes to money matters. The company has a virtual monopoly in this area of trade. He married a virtual stranger.

vassal

in feudalism, one who held land of a superior lord / The lord demanded that his vassals contribute more to his military campaign.

sadistic

inclined to cruelty / If we are to improve conditions in this prison, we must first get rid of the sadistic warden. He took sadistic pleasure in taunting the boy.

prone

inclined to; prostrate;liable / She was prone to sudden fits of anger. Working without a break makes you more prone to error.

subsume

include; encompass / Does the general theory of relativity contradict Newtonian physics, or is Newton's law of gravity subsumed into Einstein's larger scheme? All these different ideas can be subsumed under just two broad categories.

unobtrusive

inconspicuous; not blatant;not attracting unnecessary attention / The secret service agents in charge of protecting the President tried to be as unobtrusive as possible. The service at the hotel is efficient and unobtrusive.

wax

increase; grow / With proper handling, his fortunes waxed and he became rich.

mealymouthed

indirect speech; hypocritical; evasive;not willing or honest enough to speak in a direct or open way about what you really think / Rather than tell Jill directly what he disliked, Jack made a few mealymouthed comments and tried to change the subject.

opportunist

individual who sacrifices principles for expediency by taking advantage of circumstances / Forget about ethics! He's such an opportunist that he'll vote in favor of any deal that will give him a break.

proselytize

induce someone to convert to religion or belief / In these interfaith meetings, there must be no attempt to proselytize; we must respect all points of view.

wreak

inflict;to do great damage or harm to somebody/something / I am afraid he will wreak his vengeance on the innocent as well as the guilty. Their policies would wreak havoc on the economy. He swore to wreak vengeance on those who had betrayed him.

mayhem

injury to the body;confusion and fear, usually caused by violent behaviour or by some sudden shocking event / The riot was marked not only by mayhem, with its attendant loss of life and limb, but also by arson and pillage. There was absolute mayhem when everyone tried to get out at once. It only takes a few stupid people to create mayhem in a crowd.

tessellated

inlaid; mosaic;made from small flat pieces arranged in a pattern / "I recall seeing a table with a tesselated top of bits of stone and glass in a very interesting pattern. "

perceptive

insightful; aware; wise / Although Maud was a generally perceptive critic, she had her blind sports: she could never see flaws in the work of her friends.

paltry

insignificant; petty / This is a paltry sum to pay for such a masterpiece.

slur

insult to one's character or reputation; slander / Polls revealed that the front-runner's standing had been damaged by the slurs and innuendoes circulated by his opponent's staff.

misconstrue

interpret incorrectly; misjudge / She took the passage seriously rather than humourously because she misconstrued the author's ironic tone.

prelude

introduction; forerunner / I am afraid that this border raid is the prelude to more serious attacks.

prefactory

introductory / The chairman made a few prefactory remarks before he called on the first speaker.

preamble

introductory statement / In the preamble to the Constitution, the purpose of the document is set forth. The aims of the treaty are stated in its preamble. She gave him the bad news without preamble.

withdrawn

introverted; remote;not wanting to talk to other people; extremely quiet and shy / Rebuffed by his colleagues, the initially outgoing young researcher became increasingly withdrawn.

rankle

irritate; fester / The memory of having been jilted rankled him for years. Her comments still rankled. His decision to sell the land still rankled with her.

pique

irritation; resentment / She showed her pique by her refusal to appear with the other contestants at the end of the contest. When he realized nobody was listening to him, he left in a fit of pique.

quarantine

isolation of a person, place, or ship to prevent spread of infection / We will have to place this house under quarantine until we determine the nature of the disease.

seclusion

isolation; solitude / One moment she loved crowds; the next, she sought seclusion.

yoke

join together, unite / I don't wish to be yoked to him in marriage, as if we were cattle pulling a plow. The Hong Kong dollar was yoked to the American dollar for many years.

spartan

lacking luxury and comfort; sternly disciplined / Looking over the bare, unheated room with its hard cot, he wondered what he was doing in such spartan quarters. Only his spartan sense of duty kept him at his post.

peripheral

marginal; outer / We lived, not in central London, but in one of those peripheral suburbs that spring up on the outskirts of the great city.

striated

marked with parallel bands; grooved / The glacier left many striated rocks.

nubile

marrigeable;sexually attractive / Mrs. Bennet, in Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen, was worried about finding suitable husbands for her five nubile daughters.

proletarian

member of the working class / The aristocrats feared mob rule and gave the right to vote only to the wealthy, thus depending the proletarians of a voice in government. Marx hoped that the proletarian revolution would soon follow.

qualms

misgivings / His qualms of conscience had become so great that he decided to abandon his plans.

projectile

missile / Man has always hurled projectiles at his enemy whether in the form of stones or of highly explosive shells.

medley

mixture / The band played a medley of Gershwin tunes. The building was a medley of styles from different periods.

satirical

mocking / The humor of cartoonists Gary Trudeau often is satirical; though the comments of the Doonesbury characters, Trudeau ridicules political corruption and folly.

paragon

model of perfection / The class disliked him because the teacher was always pointing him out as a paragon of virtue.

paradigm

model; example; pattern / Pavlov's experiment in which he trains a dog to salivate on hearing a bell is a paradigm of the conditioned-response experiment in behavioal psychology.

temper

moderate; tone down or restrain; toughen (steel) / Not even her supervisor's grumpiness could temper Nancy's enthusiasm for her new job. The hot sunny days were tempered by a light breeze.

lull

moment of calm / Not wanting to get wet, they waited under the awning for a lull in the rain. Just before an attack everything would go quiet but we knew it was just the lull before the storm (= before a time of noise or trouble).

potentate

monarch; sovereign / The potentate spent more time at Monte Carlo than he did at home on his throne.

simian

monkeylike / Lemurs are nocturnal mammals and have many simian characteristics, although they are less intelligent than monkeys.

low

moo;the long deep sound made by a cow / From the hilltop, they could see the herd like ants in the distance; they could barely hear the cattle low.

phobia

morbid fear / Her fear of flying was more than mere nervousness; it was a real phobia.

maternal

motherly / Many animals display maternal instincts only while their offspring are young and helpless.

mercenary

motivated solely by money or gain / "I'm not in this war because I get my kicks waving flags, said the mercenary soldier. ""I'm in it for the dough."""

propagate

multiply; spread / Since bacteria propagate more quickly in unsanitary environments, it is important to keep hospital rooms clean. Television advertising propagates a false image of the ideal family.

regicide

murder of a king or queen / The beheading of Mary Queen of Scots was an act of regicide.

reciprocal

mutual; exchangeable; interacting / The two nations signed a reciprocal trade agreement. The two colleges have a reciprocal arrangement whereby students from one college can attend classes at the other.

runic

mysterious; set down in an ancient alphabet / Tolkien's use of Old English words and inscriptions in the runic alphabet give The Lord of the Rings its atmosphere of antiquity.

recount

narrate or tell; count over again;to tell sb about sth, especially sth that you have experienced / About to recount the latest adventure of Sherlock Holmes, Watson lost track of exactly how many cases Holmes had solved and refused to begin his tale until he'd recounted them one by one. She was asked to recount the details of the conversation to the court.

ravine

narrow valley with steep sides / "Steeper than a gully, less precipitous than a canyon, a ravine is, like them, the product of years of erosion. "

sectarian

narrow-minded; limited in scope / As university chaplain, she sought to address universal religious issues and not limit herself to mere sectarian concerns.

propensity

natural inclination / Convinced of his own talent, Sol has an unfortunate propensity to belittle the talents of others.

sextant

navigation tool used to determine a ship's latitude and longitude / Given a clear night, with the aid of his sextant and compass, he could keep the ship safely on course.

proximity

nearness / The deer sensed the hunter's proximity and bounded away.

spruce

neat and trim / Every button buttoned, tie firmly in place, young Alex Keaton looked spruce and tidy for his job interview at the bank.

natty

neatly or smartly dresssed / Priding himself on being a natty dresser, the gangster Bugsy Siegel collected a wardrobe of imported suits and ties.

requisite

necessary requirement / Many colleges state that a student must offer three years of a language as a requisite for admission. She lacks the requisite experience for the job.

neologism

new or newly coined word or phrase / "As we invent new techniques and professions, we must also invent neologisms such as ""microcomputer"" and ""astronaut"" to describe them."

outmoded

no longer stylish; old-fahioned / Unconcerned about keeping in style, Lenore was perfectly happy to wear outmoded clothes as long as they were clean and unfrayed.

passive

not active; acted upon / Mahatma Gandhi urged his followers to pursue a program of passive resistance as he felt that it was more effective than violence and acts of terrorism.

theoretical

not practical or applied; hypothetical / Bob was better at applied engineering and computer programming than he was at theoretical physics and math. While I can still think of some theoretical objections to your plan, you've convinced me of its basic soundness. The first year provides students with a sound theoretical basis for later study.

recurrent

occurring again and again / These recurrent attacks disturbed us and we consulted a physician.

quaint

odd; old-fashioned; picturesque / "Her quaint clothes and old-fashioned language marked her as an eccentric. "

piebald

of different colors; motled; spotted / You should be able to identify Polka Dot in this race; he is the only piebald horse running.

optometrist

one who fits glasses to remedy visual defects / Although an optometrist is qualified to treat many eye disorders, she may not use medicinesor surgery in her examinations.

polygamist

one who has more than one spouse at a time / He was arrested as a polygamist when his two wives filed complaints about him.

patent

open for the public to read; obvious / It was patent to everyone that the witness spoke the truth.

manipulate

operate with the hands; control or change by artful means / How do you manipulate these puppets? As a politician, he knows how to manipulate public opinion.

mandate

order; charge / In his inaugural address, the President stated that he had a mandate from the people to seek an end to social evils such as poverty and poor housing. The election victory gave the party a clear mandate to continue its programme of reform.

pendant

ornament (hanging from a necklace, etc.) / The grateful team presented the coach with a silver chain and pendant engraved with the school's motto.

rococo

ornate; highly decorated / The rococo style in furniture and architecture, marked by scrollwork and excessive decoration, flourished during the middle of the eighteenth century.

pretentious

ostentatious; ambitious;trying to appear important, intelligent, etc. in order to impress other people; trying to be sth that you are not, in order to impress / I do not feel that your limited resources will permit you to carry out such a pretentious program. It was just an ordinary house— nothing pretentious.

perimeter

outer boundary / To find the perimeter of any quadrilateral, we add the lengths of the four sides.

simplistic

oversimplified;making a problem, situation, etc. seem less difficult or complicated than it really is / Though Jack's solution dealt adequately with one aspect of the problem, it was simplistic in failing to consider various complicating factors that might arise.

palimpsest

parchment used for second time after original writing has been erased / Using chemical reagents, scientists have been able to restore the original writings on many palimpsests.

proscenium

part of stage in front of curtain / "In the theater-in-the-round there can be no proscenium or proscenium arch. "

penumbra

partial shadow (in an eclipse) / During an eclipse, we can see an area of total darkness and a lighter area, which is the penumbra.

trajectory

path taken by a projectile / The police tried to locate the spot from which the assassin had fired the fatal shot by tracing the trajectory of the bullet.

resignation

patient submissiveness; statement that one is quitting a job / If Bob Cratchit had not accepted Scrooge's bullying with timid resignation, he might have gotten up the nerve to hand in his resignation. There were calls for her resignation from the board of directors.

stipend

pay for services / There is a nominal stipend for this position.

pseudonym

pen name / Samuel Clemens' pseudonym was Mark Twain.

transparent

permitting to light to pass through freely; easily detected / Your scheme is so transparent that it will fool no one.

sage

person celebrated for wisdom / Hearing tales of a mysterious Master of All Knowledge who lived in the hills of Tibet, Sandy was possessed with a burning desire to consult the legendary sage.

malcontent

person dissatisfied with existing state of affairs / He was one of the few malcontents in the Congress; he constantly voiced his objections to the Presidential program. The strike was engineered by a handful of malcontents.

reprobate

person hardened in sin, devoid of a sense of decency / I cannot understand why he has so many admirers if he is the reprobate you say he is.

magnate

person of prominence or influence / The steel magnate decided to devote more time to city politics.

supernumerary

person or thing in excess of what is necessary; extra; more than you normally need; extra / His first appearance on the stage was as a supernumerary in a Shakespearean tragedy.

masochist

person who enjoys his own pain / "The masochist begs, ""Hit me."" The sadist smiles and says, ""I won't."" Anyone who goes jogging for two hours a day must be a masochist! "

optimist

person who looks on the bright side / The pessimist says the glass is half-empty; the optimist says it is half-full.

pontifical

pertaining to a bishop or pope; pompous or pretentious / From the very beginning of his ministry it was clear from his pontifical pronouncements that John was destined for a high pontifical office.

traumatic

pertaining to an injury caused by violence / "In his nightmares, he kept on recalling the traumatic experience of being wounded in battle. Our journey home was pretty traumatic chuyến đi trở về nhà của chúng tôi khá là gian khổ Divorce can be traumatic for everyone involved. "

pathological

pertaining to disease / As we study the pathological aspects of this disease, we must not overlook the psychological elements.

thespian

pertaining to drama, an actor / Her success in the school play convinced her she was destined for a thespian career.

seismic

pertaining to earthquakes / The Richter scale is a measurement of seismic disturbances.

valedictory

pertaining to farewell / I found the valedictory address too long; leave-taking should be brief.

piscatorial

pertaining to fishing / "He spent many happy hours at the lake in his piscatorial activities. "

mnemonic

pertaining to memory / He used mnemonic tricks to master new words.

psychopathic

pertaining to mental derangement / The psychopathic patient suffers more frequently from a disorder of the nervous system than from a diseased brain.

pecuniary

pertaining to money / I never expected a pecuniary reward for my work in this activity.

monetary

pertaining to money / Jane held the family purse strings: she made all monetary decisions affecting the household.

vitreous

pertaining to or resembling glass;'hard, shiny and transparent like glass (như thủy tinh) / "Although this plastic has many vitreous qualties such as transparency, it is unbreakable. "

nautical

pertaining to ships or navigation / The Maritime Museum contains many models of clipper ships, logbooks, anchors and many other items of a nautical nature.

metaphysical

pertaining to speculative philosophy / The modern poets have gone back to the fanciful poems of the metaphysical poets of the seventeenth century for many of their images.

sartorial

pertaining to tailors / He was as famous for the sartorial splendor of his attire as he was for his acting.

somatic

pertaining to the body; physical / Why do you ignore the spiritual aspects and emphasize only the corporeal and the somatic ones?

sensuous

pertaining to the physical senses; operating through the senses / He was stimulated by the sights, sounds and smells about him; he was enjoying his sensuous experience. I'm drawn to the poetic, sensuous qualities of her paintings.

physiological

pertaining to the science of the function of living organisms / To understand this disease fully, we must examine not only its physiological aspects but also its psychological elements.

"stellar "

pertaining to the stars / He was the stellar attraction of the entire performance.

sylvan

pertaining to the woods; rustic / His paintings of nymphs in sylvan backgrounds were criticized as oversentimental.

relevant

pertinent; referring to the case in hand / Teri was impressed by how relevant Virginia Woolf's remarks were to her as a woman writer; it was as if Woolf had been writing with Teri's situation in mind.

supplicate

petition humbly; pray to grant a favor / "We supplicate Your Majesty to grant him amnesty. "

minutiae

petty details / She would have liked to ignore the minutiae of daily living.

superimpose

place over something else / "Your attempt to superimpose another agency in this field will merely increase the bureaucratic nature of our government. A diagram of the new road layout was superimposed on a map of the city. "

perspicuous

plainly expressed / Her perspicuous comments eliminated all posibility of misinterpretation.

premeditate

plan in advance / She had premeditated the murder for months, reading about common poisons and buying weed killer that contained arsenic.

scenario

plot outline; screenplay; opera libretto / Scaramouche startled the other actors in the commedia troupe when he suddenly departed from their customary scenario and began to improvise.

perigee

point of moon's orbit when it is nearest the earth / The rocket which was designed to take photographs of the moon was launched as the moon approached its perigee.

matrix

point of origin; array of numbers or algebraic symbols; mold or die / Some historians claim the Nile Valley was the matrix of the Western civilization.

viper

poisonous snake / "The habitat of the horned viper, a particularly venomous snake, is in sandy regions like the Sahara or the Sinai peninsula. "

verbiage

pompous array of words;the use of too many words, or of more difficult words than are needed, to express an idea / After we had waded through all the verbiage, we discovered that the writer had said very little.

vogue

popular fashion / Jeans became the vogue on many college campuses. This novel had a great vogue ten years ago.

permeable

porous; allowing passage through / Glass is permeable to light.

procrastinate

postpone; delay / It is wise not to procrastinate; otherwise, we find ourselves bogged down in a mass of work that should have been finished long ago.

pragmatist

practical person / No pragmatist enjoys becoming involved in a game that he can never win The successful teacher is invariably a pragmatist and a realist.

precedent

preceding in time, rank, etc. / Our discussions, precedent to this event, certainly did not give you any reason to believe that we would adopt your proposal.

materialism

preoccupation with physical comforts and things / By its nature, materialism is opposed to idealism, for where the materialist emphasizes the needs of the body, the idealist emphasizes the needs of the soul.

regimen

prescribed diet and habits / I doubt whether the results warrant our living under such a strict regimen. A strict regimen of wheat-free diet in the hospital had a favourable effect.

subterfuge

pretense; evasion;a secret, usually dishonest, way of behaving / As soon as we realized that you had won our support by a subterfuge we withdrew our endorsement of your candidacy. Journalists often use subterfuge to obtain material for stories.

paranoia

psychosis marked by delusions of grandeur or persecution / Suffering from paranois, he claimed everyone was out to get him; ironically, his claim was accurate; even paranoids have enemies. Her passion for cleanliness borders on paranoia.

whiff

puff or gust (of air, scent, etc.); hint / "The slightest whiff of Old Spice cologne brought memories of George to her mind. he took up his pipe to have a few whiffs anh ta cầm cái điếu lên để hút một vài hơi Journalists caught a whiff of scandal and pursued the actress relentlessly. He caught a whiff of her perfume as she passed. "

wrest

pull away; take by violence / "With only ten seconds left to play, our team wrested victory from their grasp. To wrest a sword out of somebody's hand/from somebody's grasp Wrest the gun from his grasp! Hãy giật mạnh khẩu súng ra khỏi tay hắn! Foreign investors are trying to wrest control of the firm from the family "

pillory

punish by placing in a wooden frame; subject to criticism and ridicule / Even though he was mocked and pilloried, he maintained that he was correct in his beliefs.

punitive

punishing / He asked for punitive measures against the offender. There are calls for more punitive measures against people who drink and drive.

platonic

purely spiritual; theoretical; without sensual desire / Accused of impropriety in his dealings with female students, the professor maintained he had only a platonic interest in the women involved.

obtrusive

pushing forward;noticeable in an unpleasant way / I found her a very obstrusive person, constantly seeking the center of the stage.

marshal

put in order / At a debate tournament, extemporaneous speakers have only a minute or two to marshal their thoughts before addressing their audience.

septic

putrid; producing putrefaction / The hospital was in such a filthy state that we were afraid that many of the patients would suffer from septic poisoning. A dirty cut may go septic.

timbre

quality of a musical tone produced by a musical instrument / We identify the instrument producing a musical sound by its timbre. Differing timbres ensure that we are able to distinguish between notes produced by a flute and a viola.

poignancy

quality of being deeply moving; keenness of emotion / Watching the tearful reunion of the long-separated mother and child, the social worker was touched by the poignancy of the scene. Of particular poignancy was the photograph of their son with his sisters, taken the day before he died.

naivete

quality of being unsophisticated / I cannot believe that such naivete is unassumed in a person of her age and experience.

momentum

quantity of motion of a moving body; impetus / The car lost momentum as it tried to ascend the steep hill.

wrangle

quarrel; obtain through arguing; herd cattle, to argue angrily and usually for a long time about sth / They wrangled over their inheritance. the children were wrangling (with each other) over the new toy They're still wrangling over the financial details.

rummage

ransack; thoroughly search;to move things around carelessly while searching for sth / When we rummaged through the trunks in the attic, we found many souvenirs of our childhood days. She was rummaging around in her bag for her keys. I rummaged through the contents of the box until I found the book I wanted.

rant

rave; speak bombastically / As we heard him rant on the platform, we could not understand his strange popularity with many people.

lectern

reading desk / "The chaplain delivered his sermon from a hastily improvised lectern. "

rationalize

reason; justify an improper act / Do not try to rationalize your behavior by blaming your companions.

ratiocination

reasoning; act of drawing conclusions from premises;the process of thinking or arguing about sth in a logical way / While Watson was a man of average intelligence, Holmes was a genius, whose gift for ratiocination made him a superb detective.

maverick

rebel; nonconformist / To the masculine literary establishment, George Sand with her insistence on wearing trousers and smoking cigars was clearly a maverick who fought her proper womanly role.

recipient

receiver;a person who receives sth / Although he had been the recipient of many favors, he was not grateful to his benefactor.

neophyte

recent convert; beginner / This monuntain slope contains slides that will challenge esperts as well as neophytes.

reactionary

recoiling from progress; retrograde;a person who is opposed to political or social change / His program was reactionary since it sought to abolish many of the social reforms instituted by the previous administration.

reminiscence

recollection; memory / Her reminiscences of her experiences are so fascinating that she ought to write a book. The role of reminiscence in family history research should never be underestimated. Her music is full of reminiscences of African rhythms.

retrieve

recover; find and bring in / The dog was intelligent and quickly learned to retrieve the game killed by the hunter. Employers are anxious to retrieve the investment they have made in training their employees. You can only retrieve the situation by apologizing.

reprise

recurrent action; musical repetition; repeat performance;a repeated part of sth, especially a piece of music / At Waterloo, it was not the effect of any one skirmish that exhausted Colonel Audly; rather it was the cumulative effect of the constant reprises that left him spent.

ruddy

reddish; healthy-looking / His ruddy features indicated that he had spent much time in the open.

meditation

reflection; thought / She reached her decision only after much meditation. She found peace through yoga and meditation.

rebuttal

refutation; response with contrary evidence / The defense lawyer confidently listened to the prosecutor sum up his case, sure that she could answer his arguments in her rebuttal. The accusations met with a firm rebuttal.

limbo

region near heaven or hell where certain souls are kept / Among the divisions of Hell are Purgatory and limbo. His life seemed stuck in limbo; he could not go forward and he could not go back

rueful

regretful; sorrowful; dejected; feeling or showing that you are sad or sorry / The artist has captured the sadness of childhood in his portrait of the boy with the rueful countenance.

sidereal

relating to the stars / Although hampered by optical and mechanical flaws, the orbiting Hubble space telescope has relayed extraordinary images of distant sidereal bodies.

refurbish

renovate; make bright by polishing / The flood left a deposit of mud on everything; it was necessary to refurbish our belongings.

solder

repair or make whole by using a metal alloy / The plumber fixed the leak in the pipes by soldering a couple of joints from which water had been oozing. These wires must be soldered to the pins.

reimburse

repay / Let me know what you have spent and I will reimburse you. We will reimburse any expenses incurred while you are on company business.

reciprocate

repay in kind / If they attack us, we shall be compelled to reciprocate and bomb their territory. He smiled but his smile was not reciprocated.

requite

repay; revenge;to give sth such as love, kindness, a favour, etc. in return for what sb has given you / The wretch requited his benefactors by betraying them.

reiterate

repeat;to repeat sth that you have already said, especially to emphasize it / He reiterated the warning to make sure everyone understood it.

recant

repudiate; withdraw previous statement / Unless you recant your confession, you will be punished severely.

odium

repugnance; dislike;a feeling of hatred that a lot of people have towards somebody, because of something they have done / "I cannot express the odium I feel at your heinous actions."

solicit

request earnestly; seek / Knowing she needed to have a solid majority for the budget to pass, the mayor telephoned all the members of the city council to solicit their votes. They were planning to solicit funds from a number of organizations. Several members were persuaded to solicit for his removal from office.

sedentary

requiring sitting / Because he had a sedentary occupation, he decided to visit a gymnasium weekly.

recourse

resorting to help when in trouble / The boy's only recourse was to appeal to his father for aid. She made a complete recovery without recourse to surgery. The government, when necessary, has recourse to the armed forces. Drivers have little recourse but to wait until the weather clears.

paraphrase

restate a passage in one's own words while retaining thought of author / In 250 words or less, paraphrase this article.

rehabilitate

restore to proper condition / We must rehabilitate those whom we send to prison.

manacle

restrain; handcuff / "The police immediately manacled the prisoner so he could not escape. The slaves were chained and manacled. "

pinion

restrain; to hold or tie sb, especially by their arms, so that they cannot move / They pinioned his arms against his body but left his legs free so that he could move about.

temperate

restrained; self-controlled / Noted for his temperate appetite, he seldom gained weight.

repeal

revoke; annul / What would the effect on our society be if we decriminalized drug use by repealing the laws against the possession and sale of narcotics? The committee does not have the power to repeal the ban.

whorl

ring of leaves around stem; ring / "Identification by fingerprints is based on the difference in shape and number of whorls on the fingers. the whorl of a shell vòng xoắn của vỏ ốc "

wallow

roll in; indulge in; become helpless / "The hippopotamus loves to wallow in the mud. He loves to wallow in a hot bath after a game. "

surly

rude; cross / Because of his surly attitude, many people avoided his company.

snivel

run at the nose; snuffle; whine;to cry and complain in a way that people think is annoying / Don't you come sniveling to me complaining about your big brother.

saline

salty / The slightly saline taste of this mineral water is pleasant.

monotony

sameness leading to boredom / He took a clerical job, but soon grew to hate the monotony of his daily routine. She watches television to relieve the monotony of everyday life.

uniformity

sameness; consistency; monotony / After a while, the uniformity of TV situation comedies becomes boring.

sate

satisfy to the full; cloy;to satisfy a desire / Its hunger sated, the lion dozed.

savant

scholar / Our faculty includes many worldfamous savants.

pedant

scholar who overemphasizes book learning or technicalities a person who is too concerned with small details or rules especially when learning or teaching / Her insistence that the book be memorized marked the teacher as a pedant rather than a scholar. A pedant will always insist that you ask for ‘fewer’ items rather than ‘less’.

seminary

school for training future ministers; secondary school, especially for young women / Sure of his priestly vocation, Terrence planned to pursue his theological training at the local Roman Catholic seminary.

ornithologist

scientific student of birds / Auduborn's drawings of American bird life have been of interest not only to the ornithologists but also to the general public.

rail

scold; rant / You may rail at him all you want; you will never change him.

shrew

scolding woman / No one wanted to marry Shakespeare's Kate because she was a shrew.

sophistry

seemingly plausible but fallacious reasoning / Instead of advancing valid arguments, he tried to overwhelm his audience with a flood of sophistries. Convincing myself that I had gained in some way from my loss was just pure sophistry.

reserve

self-control; formal but distant manner / Although some girls were attracted by Mark's reserve, Judy was put off by it, for she felt his aloofness indicated a lack of openness. I accept your statement without reserve

truism

self-evident truth / Many a truism is well expressed in a proverb. It has become a truism that every woman wants to choose how she delivers her baby.

postulate

self-evident truth / We must accept these statements as postulates before pursuing our discussions any further.

penance

self-imposed punishment for sin / "The Ancient Mariner said, ""I have penance done and penance more will do,"" to atone for the sin of killing the albatross. She regards living in New York as a penance; she hates big cities. "

primogeniture

seniority by birth / By virtue of primogeniture, in some cultures the first-born child has many privileges denied his brothers and sisters.

sunder

separate; part / Northern and southern Ireland are politically and religiously sundered.

solemnity

seriousness; gravity / The minister was concerned that nothing should disturb the solemnity of the marriage service.

levitate

float in the air (especially by magical means) / "As the magician passed his hands over the recumbent body of his assistant, she appeared to rise and levitate about three feet above the table. "

lope

gallop slowly;to run taking long relaxed steps / As the horses loped along, we had an opportunity to admire the ever-changing scenery.

lien

legal claim on a property / There was a delay before Ralph could take possession of his late uncle's home; apparently, another claimant had a lien upon the estate.

lucre

money / Preferring lucre to undying fame, he wrote stories of popular appeal.

larder

pantry; place where food is kept / "The first thing Bill did on returning home from school was to check what snacks his mother had in the larder. "

linguistic

pertaining to language / The modern tourist will encounter very little linguistic difficulty as English has become an almost universal language.

list

tilt; lean over / That flagpole should be absolutely vertical; instead, it lists to one side.

lofty

very high / They used to tease him about his lofty ambitions.

sear

char or burn; brand;to burn the surface of sth in a way that is sudden and powerful orto cause sb to feel sudden and great pain / Accidentally brushing against the hot grill, she seared her hand badly. The heat of the sun seared their faces.

temperament

characteristic frame of mind; disposition; emotional excess / Although the twins look alike, they differ markedly in temperament: Tod is calm, but Rod is excitable.

universal

characterizing or affecting all; present everywhere / At first, no one shared Christopher's opinions; his theory that the world was round was met with universal disdain.

mountebank

charlatan; boastful pretender;a person who tries to trick people, especially in order to get their money / The patent medicine man was a mountebank.

quack

charlatan; impostor / Do not be misled by the exorbitant claims of this quack; he cannot cure you.

talisman

charm / She wore the talisman to ward off evil.

sanguine

cheerful; hopeful / Let us not be too sanguine about the outcome; something could go wrong.

masticate

chew / We must masticate our food carefully and slowly in order to avoid digestive disorders.

progeny

children; offspring / He was proud of his progeny but regarded George as the most promising of all his children. He was surrounded by his numerous progeny.

vociferous

clamorous; noisy, strident / The crowd grew vociferous in its anger and threatened to take the law into its own hands.

repartee

clever reply / He was famous for his witty repartee and his sarcasm.

maladroit

clumsy; bungling / In his usual maladroit way, he managed to upset the cart and spill the food.

militant

combative; bellicose / Althoughat this time he was advocating a policy of neutrality, one could usually find him adopting a more militant attitude.

lateral

coming from the side / In order to get good plant growth, the gardener must pinch off all lateral shoots.

ordain

command; arrange; consecrate / The king ordained that no foreigner should be allowed to enter the city. Fate had ordained that he should die in poverty Fate had ordained that they would never meet again.

perpetrate

commit an offense / Only an insane person could perpetrate such a horrible crime.

plebeian

common; pertaining to the common people / His speeches were aimed at the plebeian minds and emotions; they disgusted the more refined.

simile

comparison of one thing with another, using the word like or as / My love is like a red, red rose is a simile.

remunerative

compensating; rewarding;paying a lot of money / I find my new work so renumerative that I may not return to my previous employment.

unanimity

complete agreement / We were surprised by the unanimity with which our proposals were accepted by the different groups.

smirk

conceited smile / Wipe that smirk off your face! He smirked unpleasantly when we told him the bad news.

subsistence

existence; means of support; livelihood;the state of having just enough money or food to stay alive / "In those days of inflated prices, my salary provided mere subsistence. Many families are living below the level of subsistence. "

oust

expel; drive out;to force somebody out of a job or position of power, especially in order to take their place / The world wondered if Aquino would be able to oust Marcos from office. She is a strong supporter of the recently ousted president. The rebels finally managed to oust the government from power.

sustain

experience; support; nourish;maintain / He sustained such a severe injury that the doctors feared he would be unable to work to sustain his growing family. Which planets can sustain life?

opulence

extreme wealth; luxuriousness; abundance / The glitter and opulence of the ballroom took Cinderella's breath away.

parched

extremely dry; very thirsty / The parched desert landscape seemed hostile to life. Let's get a drink— I'm parched.

virulent

extremely poisonous / The virus is highly virulent and has made many of us ill for days.

visage

face; appearance / The stern visage of the judge indicated that she had decided to impose a severe penalty.

physiognomy

face;the shape and features of a person's face / He prided himself on his ability to analyze a person's character by studying his physiognomy.

practicable

feasible / The board of directors decided that the plan was practicable and agreed to undertake the project.

vixen

female fox; ill-tempered woman / "Aware that she was right once again, he lost his temper and called her a shrew and a vixen. "

melee

fight / The captain tried to ascertain the cause of the melee that had broken out among the crew members. I lost hold of her hand in the melee of people rushing towards the entrance.

replete

filled to capacity; abundantly supplied / The book is replete with humorous situations.

sordid

filthy; base; vile / The social worker was angered by the sordid housing provided for the homeless.

purchase

firm grasp or footing / The mountaineer struggled to get a proper purchase on the slippery rock.

tenacity

firmness; persistency; adhesiveness / It is extremely difficult to overcome the tenacity of a habit such as smoking.

paroxysm

fit or attack of pain, laughter, rage, a sudden strong feeling or expression of an emotion that cannot be controlled / When he heared of his son's misdeeds, he was seized by a paroxysm of rage.

spasmodic

fitful; periodic / The spasmodic coughing in the auditorium annoyed the performers.

moodiness

fits of depression or gloom / We could not discover the cause of her recurrent moodiness.

pliant

flexible; easily influenced / Catherine's disposition was pliant; she was like putty in her suitor's hands. He was deposed and replaced by a more pliant successor.

supple

flexible; pliant / "The angler found a supple limb and used it as a fishing rod. You must exercise your joints to keep them supple. "

parquet

floor made of wood strips inlaid in a mosic-like pattern.;a floor covering made of flat pieces of wood fixed together in a pattern / "In laying the floor, the carpenters combined redwood and oak in an elegant parquet. "

mellifluous

flowing smoothly; smooth / Italian is a mellifluous language.

viand

food / "There was a variety of viands at the feast. "

polity

form of government of nation or state / Our polity should be devoted to the concept that the government should strive for the good of all citizens.

satire

form of literature in which irony, sarcasm, and ridicule are employed to attack vice and folly / Gulliver's Travels, which is regarded by many as a tale for children, is actually a bitter satire attacking human folly.

panegyric

formal praise / The modest hero blushed to hear the speakers delivering panegyrics about his valorous act.

predecessor

former occupant of a post / I hope I can live up to the fine example set by my late predecessor in this office. The latest Ferrari is not only faster than its predecessors but also more comfortable. This computer has a larger memory that its predecessor.

noisome

foul smelling; unwholesome / I never could stand the noisome atmosphere surrounding the slaughter houses.

outskirts

fringes; outer borders;the parts of a town or city that are furthest from the centre / Living outskirts of Boston, Sarah sometimes felt as if she were cut off from the cultural heart of the city. We were driving through the outskirts of Baghdad.

magnanimity

generosity / Noted for his magnanimity, philanthropist Eugene Lang donated millions to charity.

zephyr

gentle breeze; west wind, a soft gentle wind / When these zephyrs blow, it is good to be in an open boat under a full sail.

morbid

given to unwholesome thought; gloomy;having or expressing a strong interest in sad or unpleasant things, especially disease or death; connected with disease / These morbid speculations are dangerous; we must lighten our spirits by emphasizing more pleasant matters. He had a morbid fascination with blood. My mind was filled with morbid thoughts of death.

ogle

glance coquettishly at; make eyes at / Sitting for hours at the sidewalk cafe, the old gentleman would oggle the young girls and recall his youthful romances. He was not in the habit of ogling women.

shimmer

glimmer intermittently / "The moonlight shimmered on the water as the moon broke through the clouds for a moment. The sea was shimmering in the sunlight. "

retrograde

go backwards; degenerate;making a situation worse or returning to how sth was in the past / Instead of advancing, our civilization seems to have retrograded in ethics and culture. The closure of the factory is a retrograde step.

traverse

go through or across / When you traverse this field, be careful of the bull.

objective

goal; aim / A degree in medicine was her ultimate objective.

transition

going from one state of action to another / During the period of transition from oil heat to gas heat, the furnace will have to be shut off.

sluggard

lazy person / You are a sluggard, a drone, a parasite, the angry father shouted at his lazy son.

pundit

learned Hindu; any learned person; authority on a subject; expert / Even though he discourses on the matter like a pundit, he is actually rather ignorant about this topic.

moratorium

legal delay of payment;a temporary stopping of an activity, especially by official agreement / If we declare a moratorium and delay collection of debts for six months, I am sure the farmers will be able to meet their bills.

rabid

like a fanatic; furious / He was a rabid follower of the Dodgers and watched them play whenever he could go to the ball park.

vulpine

like a fox; crafty / "She disliked his sly ways, but granted him a certain vulpine intelligence. "

ligneous

like wood / Petrified wood may be ligneous in appearance, but it is stonelike in composition.

parameter

limit; independent variable / We need to define the parameters of the problem. We had to work within the parameters that had already been established.

patois

local or provincial dialect / His years of study of the language at the university did not enable him to understand the patois of the natives. She began shouting at him in a patois he could not understand.

venue

location / The attorney asked for a change of venue; he thought his client would do better if the trial were held in a less conservative county. It's a popular venue for visitors to the area. The band will be playing at 20 different venues on their UK tour.

preclude

make impossible; eliminate / This contract does not preclude my being employed by others at the same time that I am working for you. Lack of time precludes any further discussion

preen

make oneself tidy in appearance; feel self-satisfaction / As Kitty preened before the mirror, carefully smoothing her shining hair, she couldn't help preening herself on her good looks. Will you stop preening yourself in front of the mirror?

rejuvenate

make young again / The charlatan claimed that his elixir would rejuvenate the aged and weary.

optician

maker and seller of eyeglasses / The patient took the prescription given him by his oculist to the optician.

testator

maker of a will / The attorney called in his secretary and his partner to witness the signature of the testator.

vivisection

act of dissecting living animals / The Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals opposed vivisection and deplored the practice of using animals in scientific experiments.

repulsion

act of driving back; distaste / The repulsion of the enemy forces was not accomplished bloodlessly; many of the defenders were wounded in driving the enemy back.

prescience

ability to foretell the future / Given the current wave of Japan-bashing, it does not take prescience forme to foresee problems in our future trade relations with Japan. She showed great prescience in selling her shares just before the market crashed.

nirvana

Buddihist teachings, the ideal state in which the individual loses himself in the attainment of an impersonal beatitude / Despite his desire to achieve nirvana, the young Buddhist found that even the buzzing of a fly could distract him from his meditation.

riveting

absorbing; engrossing / The reviewer described Byatt's novel Possession as a riveting tale: absorbed in the story, he had finished it in a single evening.

voyeur

Peeping / Jill called Jack a voyeur when she caught him aiming his binoculars at a bedroom window of the house next door.

plenitude

abundance; completeness / Looking in the pantry, we admired the plenitude of fruits and pickles we had preserved during the summer.

vituperative

abusive; scolding / He became more vituperative as he realized that we were not going to grant him his wish.

mishap

accident / With a little care you could have avoided this mishap. There were a few minor mishaps, but we got it all done in the end.

pittance

a small allowance or wage / He could not live on the pittance he received as a pension and had to look for an additional source of revenue.

minion

a servile dependent / He was always accompanied by several of his minions because he enjoyed their subservience and flattery. While I was waiting to see him, a minion brought me some tea.

wean

accustom a baby not to nurse; give up a cherished activity / "He decided he would wean himself away from eating junk food and stick to fruits and vegetables. Leopard cubs are weaned at three months. to wean someone from his bad habits làm cho người nào dứt bỏ những thói quen xấu "

ventral

abdominal;on or connected with the part of a fish or an animal that is underneath (or that in humans faces forward) / We shall now examine the ventral plates of this serpent, not the dorsal side.

swelter

be oppressed by heat;to be very hot in a way that makes you feel uncomfortable / "I am going to buy an air conditioning unit for my apartment as I do not intend to swelter through another hot and humid summer. Passengers sweltered in temperatures of over 90°F "

transpire

be revealed; happen / "When Austen writes the sentence ""It had just transpired that he had left gaming debts behind him,"" her meaning is not that the debts had just been incurred, but the the shocking news had just leaked out. This story, it later transpired, was untrue "

stint

be thrifty; set limits / Spare no expense, the bride's father said, refusing to stint on the wedding arrangements. She never stints on the food at her parties. We don't need to stint ourselves— have some more!

metamorphosis

change of form / The metamorphosis of caterpillar to butterfly is typical of many such changes in animal life.

reparable

capable of being repaired / Fortunately, the damages we suffered in the accident were reparable and our car looks brand new.

malleable

capable of being shaped by pounding / Gold is a malleable metal.

pander

cater to the low desires of others / The reviewer accused the makers of Lethal Weapon of pandering to the masses' taste of violence. Newspapers pandering to the public love of scandal

stultify

cause to appear or become stupid or inconsistent; frustrate or hinder / His long hours in the blacking factory left young Dickens numb and incurious, as if the menial labor had stultified his mind.

pivotal

central; critical;of great importance because other things depend on it / De Klerk's decision to set Nelson Mandela free was pivotal; without Mandela's release, there was no possibility that the African National Cogress would entertain talks with the South African government. Accountancy, law and economics are pivotal to a successful career in any financial services area.

periphery

edge, especially of a round surface / He sensed that there was something just beyond the periphery of his vision. The condition makes it difficult for patients to see objects at the periphery of their vision.

ovoid

egg-shaped / At Easter she had to cut out hundreds of brightly colored ovoid shapes.

resilient

elastic; having the power of springing back / Highly resilient, steel makes excellent bedsprings. These plants are very resilient to rough handling.

manumit

emancipate; free from bondage / Enlightened slave owners were willing to manumit their slaves and thus put an end to the evil slavery in the country.

underscore

emphasize / Adressing the jogging class, Kim underscored the importance to runners of good nutrition. His speech underscored the need for a clear policy.

scrutinize

examine closely and critically / Searching for flaws, the sergeant scrutinized every detail of the private's uniform. The statement was carefully scrutinized before publication.

surpass

exceed / Her SAT scores surpassed out expectations.

peon

landless agricultural worker; bond servant a worker on a farm in Latin America / The land reformers sought to liberate the peons and establish them as independent farmers.

parlance

language; idiom / All this legal parlance confuses me; I need an interpreter. The word ‘modem’ entered common parlance in the 1990s.

pine

languish, decline; long for, yearn / Though she tried to be happy living with Clara in the city, Heidi pined for the mountains and for her gruff but loving grandfather.

metropolis

large city / Every evening this terminal is filled with the thousands of commuters who are going from this metropolis to their homes in the suburbs. Barcelona has all the amenities you would expect to find in a great metropolis.

scourge

lash; whip; severe punishment / "They feared the plague and regarded it as a deadly scourge. Inflation was the scourge of the 1970s freeing the world from the scourge of nuclear weapons "

languor

lassitude; depression / His friends tried to overcome the languor into which he had fallen by taking him to parties and to the theater.

ultimatum

last demand; warning / Since they have ignored our ultimatum, our only recourse is to declare war.

terminus

last stop of railroad / After we reached the railroad terminus, we continued our journey into the wilderness on saddle horses. When the bus reached the terminus they were waiting to meet us.

sumptuous

lavish; rich;very expensive and looking very impressive / "I cannot recall when I have had such a sumptuous Thanksgiving feast. "

statute

law / We have many statutes in our law books which should be repealed. Under the statutes of the university they had no power to dismiss him.

litigation

lawsuit / Try to settle this amicably; I do not want to start litigation.

shyster

lawyer using questionable methods,a dishonest person, especially a lawyer / On L.A. Law, respectable attorney Brackman was horrified to learn that his newly discovered half brother was a cheap shyster.

punctilious

laying stress on niceties of conduct or form; precise / We must be punctilious in our planning of this affair, for any error may be regarded as a personal affront.

prerogative

privilege; unquestionable right / The President cannot levy taxes; that is the prerogative of the legislative branch of government. In many countries, education is still the prerogative of the rich.

visionary

produced by imagination; fanciful; mystical / She was given to visionary schemes that never materialized.

protract

prolong / Seeking to delay the union members' vote, the management team tried to protract the negotiations endlessly, but the union representatives saw through their strategy.

salient

prominent;most important or noticeable / One of the salient features of that newspaper is its excellent editorial page. She pointed out the salient features of the new design.

seemly

proper; appropriate / Lady Bracknell did not think it was seemly for Ernest to lack a proper family; no baby abandoned on a doorstep could grow up to marry her daughter. It was not considered seemly to talk in such a way in front of the children.

skimp

provide scantily; live very economically / They were forced to skimp on necessities in order to make their limited supplies last the winter.

synoptic

providing a general overview; summary / The professor turned to the latest issue of Dissertation Abstracts for a synoptic account of what was new in the field.

yore

time past / He dreamed of the elegant homes of yore, but gave no thought to their inelegant plumbing.

opportune

timely; well chosen / You have come at an opportune moment for I need a new secretary.

terminate

to bring to an end / When his contract was terminated unexpectedly, he desperately needed a new job. Your contract of employment terminates in December.

roil

to make liquids murky by stirring up sediment; to disturb / Be careful when you pour not to roil the wine; if you stir up the sediment you'll destroy the flavor.

suborn

to pay or persuade sb to do sth illegal, especially to tell lies in court;persuade to act unlawfully (especially to commit perjury) / "In the Godfather, the mobsters used bribery and threats to suborn the witnesses against Don Michael Corleone. "

stigma

token of disgrace; brand / I do not attach any stigma to the fact that you were accused of this crime; the fact that you were acquitted clears you completely.

vise

tool for holding work in place / "Before filling its edges, the keysmith took the blank key and fixed it firmly between the jaws of a vise. "

pestle

tool for mashing or grinding substances in a hard bowl / "From the way in which the elderly pharmacist pounded the drug with his pestle, young George could tell that his employer was agitated about something. "

petulant

touchy; peevish;bad-tempered and unreasonable, especially because you cannot do or have what you want / The feverish patient was petulant and restless. He behaved like a petulant child and refused to cooperate. Her tone of voice became abrupt and petulant.

trivia

trifles; unimportant matters / Too many magazines ignore newsworthy subjects and feature trivia. We spent the whole evening discussing domestic trivia.

laxative

"facilitating evacuation of the bowels thuốc nhuận tràng " / The effect of the constipation medicine is laxative; it empties the bowels.

lexicon

dictionary / I cannot find this word in any lexicon in the library.

limn

draw; outline; describe / Parodoxically, the more realistic the details this artist chooses, the better able to limn her fantastic, other-worldly landscapes.

lineaments

features, especially of the face / She quickly sketched the lineaments of his face.

luxuriant

fertile; abundant; ornate / Farming was easy in this luxuriant soil.

lithe

flexible; supple / Her figure was lithe and willowy.