1. infandous — of that which should not be told; odious in the extreme, horrid
I shuddered and steeled myself once more to descend those irregular stairs and enter the wretched basement where Jeremiah had spent the last days of his tortured life, to gaze once more upon the infandous figures in the charcoal drawings covering the damp walls, wherein he had essayed to depict the demons that haunted his dreams and perhaps, at the end, even his waking hours.
2. ophidian — of or related to snakes
Carson kept his legs beneath the blankets and wrenched his body around with an almost ophidian writhing turn as he wrenched himself to look at me and the doctor.
3. objective tinnitus — noise heard within the ear which can also be heard by another (usually through an instrument such as a stethoscope)
Though most would assume that objective tinnitus is simply a much louder form of the annoying ringing in the ears which plagues so many, in fact it is usually caused by the sound of blood rushing through vessels near the ear canal, and presents itself to both the sufferer and the observer as a rushing or ‘whooshing’ sound.
4. chifforobe — furniture piece with both drawers and a rod for hanging clothes
The old chifforobe‘s front doors had never completely closed, because the socket at the bottom was somehow offset from true center.
5. punter — [slang] person, esp. a customer; prostitute’s client; bettor
Padraic insisted that the peanut bowls always be filled to the brim, to keep the punters happy, as he always added.
6. jehu — [colloquial] fast driver, often furiously so; cabman
Our jehu proved equal to the task, and within a rather hair-raising fifteen minutes we found ourselves at Paddington Station.
7. foehn — dry warm wind blowing downhill in the Alps, esp. in Switzerland
Happy to feel both the foehn and the sun on his face, Hans walked briskly up the path to tend to his father’s cows.
8. wimple — medieval head covering for women formed from cloth over the head draped around the neck
Much of religious garb has its roots in the Middle Ages, such as the wimple still worn by most nuns, once a sign of higher class status among medieval women.
9. dithyrambic — extremely excited or emotional, frenzied, impassioned
Usually the most staid and perhaps boring of orators, St. Jean reached dithyrambic heights of impassioned speechifying as he reached the end of his peroration, pleading with all and sundry to fully support the new bypass.
10. mestizo — mixed race person, esp. a Latin American or Filipino with both native and European ancestry
Before the war, most Spaniards looked down upon the mestizos, even the very wealthy merchants with fine homes in Manila.
Bonus Vocabulary
(British slang)
banjo — to beat, to knock down, to thrash
The three miscreants caught their former teacher in the stadium stairwell and banjoed him mercilessly.