1. tempestivity — timeliness, quality of occurring at the proper season or time
You return from the wars with rare tempestivity, for your younger brother even this week has filed a writ with the sheriff laying claim to your mother’s property.
2. purler — spectacular fall; [obsolete] resounding blow sending one to the ground
The repaired tarmac had not set well, and I came a purler as I tripped over a divot in the asphalt patch.
3. epistemology — theory of knowledge, study of how we know things we think we know
Dr. Johnson famously refuted Berkeley’s idealistic epistemology by kicking a stone, though it is Hume’s toe that is alleged to have almost magical properties.
4. cutler — seller or repairer of knives
After this desperate affair it was imperative that I have my sword ground anew, and so the next morning I took myself to the cutler on Tendreary Lane, and on the way I saw once more Lord Beltmore.
5. bezoar — concretion found in the stomach of some animals, believed to have power to protect against poison
He added a few grains of bezoar stone to counteract some of the mandragora’s toxic effect, noting how low his supply had become of that rare curative.
6. catoblepas — ancient name for African animal of unsure genus
Though today the catoblepas is usually thought to refer to a gnu, being described by Pliny as bull-like, other writers thought it more like a serpent, or even identified it with the fabled cockatrice.
7. apteryx — kiwi
In spite of its name, the flightless apteryx does have a wing, a vestigial appendage with a tiny claw at the end.
8. dug — pap or udder
We finally found her beneath the water heater, a hitherto unknown family of newborn kittens pulling away diligently at her dugs.
9. peon — day laborer; drudge, person of low social status
No, you are right, Señor Williams, you are right that you are not like these peons, but not for the reasons you claim: you are right because I do not think you could work for even a single hour without retreating like a coward back to this barstool from which you look down upon the world about you.
10. paeon (or pæon) — metrical foot with one long and three short syllables, in any order
Really, Mr. Carstairs! If you cannot distinguish between a paeon and a trochee followed by a spondee I have little hope for you!
Bonus Vocabulary
(British slang of the 19th Century)
toco — punishment, penalty
I admit I felt a tad discomfited when they gave Reggie toco for something I had done, but not nearly as much as if they’d beaten me instead of him.