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DEFINITION: (adjective) Thrown into a state of intense fear or desperation.
SYNONYMS: panicky, terrified, frightened.
USAGE: Thousands of panic-stricken refugees fled the city.
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DEFINITION: (adjective) Shaped like a kidney.
SYNONYMS: kidney-shaped.
USAGE: While hiking through the rainforest, I came upon an unusual reniform leaf and picked it up to study it more closely.

DEFINITION: (noun) An earthquake originating under the sea floor.
SYNONYMS: submarine earthquake.
USAGE: The scientist developed a mathematical formula which helps understand how seaquakes result in tsunami waves.

DEFINITION: (adjective) Inferior in size or quality.
SYNONYMS: stunted, scrawny.
USAGE: A forest of pale, scrubby ferns ran down almost to the beach.

DEFINITION: (noun) Latticework used to support climbing plants.
SYNONYMS: trellis.
USAGE: The greenery that wove itself in, around, and through the treillage could be seen from her window and lifted her spirits on the days she could not go outdoors.

DEFINITION: (adjective) Giving freely and generously; liberal.
SYNONYMS: bighearted, bounteous, giving, openhanded, handsome, freehanded, big.
USAGE: Their bountiful host was bringing brandy, whisky, and liqueurs.

DEFINITION: (verb) Pretend to be someone you are not; sometimes with fraudulent intentions.
SYNONYMS: impersonate, pose.
USAGE: It had been agreed that, in their escape, she was to personate the character of a Creole lady, and Emmeline that of her servant.

DEFINITION: (verb) Be or provide a memorial to a person or an event.
SYNONYMS: immortalize, commemorate, record.
USAGE: This sculpture memorializes the victims of the concentration camps.

DEFINITION: (verb) Confer a trust upon.
SYNONYMS: confide, commit, trust.
USAGE: The messenger was entrusted with the general's secret.

DEFINITION: (noun) A final touch; a crowning achievement; a culmination.
SYNONYMS: capstone, finishing touch.
USAGE: Two hairy monsters flew at my throat, bearing me down...while a mingled guffaw from Heathcliff and Hareton put the copestone on my rage and humiliation.

DEFINITION: (adjective) Cheap and tasteless; gaudy.
SYNONYMS: flashy, garish, tawdry, trashy, brassy, cheap, loud, meretricious, tacky, tatty.
USAGE: The shelves groan with an array of gimcrack gifts from fans: a stuffed piranha fish ... a ceramic ... bull, a papier-mâché replica of an Apollo moonwalker.

DEFINITION: (noun) The ratio of live births in an area to the population of that area; expressed per 1000 population per year.
SYNONYMS: fertility, fertility rate, natality.
USAGE: As foreign aid increased poorer citizens' access to medical care, the country's birthrate rose.

DEFINITION: (adjective) Inclined to or marked by drowsiness.
SYNONYMS: somnolent.
USAGE: There, beside the fireplace, the brave old General used to sit; while the Surveyor...was fond of standing at a distance, and watching his quiet and almost slumberous countenance.

DEFINITION: (verb) Run away; usually includes taking something or somebody along.
SYNONYMS: abscond, absquatulate, go off, make off, run off, bolt.
USAGE: A robber...went and dug up the gold and decamped with it.

DEFINITION: (noun) A sign or notice for display in a public place.
SYNONYMS: bill, card, notice, poster, posting.
USAGE: The protesters were carrying placards denouncing the government's policy.

DEFINITION: (adjective) Thinkable; conceivable.
SYNONYMS: ponderable.
USAGE: Since the discovery of the vaccine, annihilation of the disease is at last cogitable.

DEFINITION: (verb) Walk as if unable to control one's movements.
SYNONYMS: careen, keel, lurch, reel, swag.
USAGE: The drunken man staggered into the room.

DEFINITION: (verb) Move or arrange oneself in a comfortable and cozy position.
SYNONYMS: draw close, nest, nestle, nuzzle, snuggle.
USAGE: We cuddled against each other to keep warm.

DEFINITION: (adjective) Based primarily on surmise rather than adequate evidence.
SYNONYMS: divinatory, hypothetical, suppositional, suppositious.
USAGE: Theories about the extinction of dinosaurs are still highly conjectural.

DEFINITION: (adjective) Lacking bodily or muscular strength or vitality.
SYNONYMS: debile, infirm, sapless, weakly, decrepit, rickety, weak.
USAGE: The old lady has been rather feeble since her illness.