The Scarlet Letter -- Vocabulary -- Set One
Name: ________________________________________
INSTRUCTIONS: There will usually be a 10-15 point reading and vocabulary quiz after every two chapters or so
of The Scarlet Letter. You may use definitions handwritten on these sheets on the vocabulary quizzes.
You will turn in your definitions homework study sheet after each quiz. Each set of 15 or more definitions is
worth five points, irrespective of the number of definitions in that particular set. To receive full credit on the
vocabulary homework, you must turn in at least 15 words in each set. If you do more, you will increase the
likelihood of acing the vocabulary portion of the quizzes, but you will not receive extra credit on the
homework.
Define the italicized word in context with a synonym or short phrase. Handwrite the definition directly on this
sheet. DO NOT type your vocabulary work.
You may work with other people in the class on these vocabulary assignments, but person must turn in his or
her own handwritten work.
PREFACE AND THE CUSTOM HOUSE.—INTRODUCTORY
1. a certain venerable personage
2. cherish a peculiar malevolence
3. As the public disapprobation would weigh very heavily
4. with a purpose to alter or expunge whatever might be found amiss
5. to make the best reparation in his power for the atrocities of which he has been adjudged guilty
6. As to enmity, or ill-feeling of any kind
7. a native reserve being thawed by this genial consciousness, we may prate of the circumstances that lie
around us (2)
8. this Custom-House sketch has a certain propriety
9. as editor, or very little more, of the most prolix among the tales
10. and exhibits few or no symptoms of commercial life; except, perhaps, a bark or brig (2)
11. this dilapidated wharf, which the tide often overflows
12. the track of many languid years is seen in a border of unthrifty grass
13. stands a spacious edifice of brick
14. the general truculency of her attitude
15. vixenly as she looks
16. if wintry or inclement weather
The Scarlet Letter -- vocabulary list, p. 1 of 24
17. from the general slovenliness of the place
18. chairs, exceedingly decrepit and infirm
19. The besom of reform has swept him out of office; and a worthier successor wears his dignity, and
pockets his emoluments (2)
20. bearded, sable-cloaked and steeple-crowned progenitor
21. No aim, that I have ever cherished, would they recognize as laudable
22. the race has ever since subsisted here
23. mingle his dust with the natal earth
24. it was chiefly this strange, indolent, unjoyous attachment for my native town
25. the whirlpool of political vicissitude
26. they had evidently some talisman or other that kept death at bay
27. after a torpid winter
28. Sagaciously, under their spectacles, did they peep
29. the obtuseness that allowed greater ones to slip between their fingers
30. the vigilance and alacrity with which they proceeded to lock
31. to require an eulogium on their praiseworthy caution
32. to represent all my excellent old friends as in their dotage
33. my coadjutors were not invariably old
34. They spoke with far more interest and unction of their morning's breakfast
35. tremulous quaver and cackle of an old man's utterance
The Scarlet Letter -- vocabulary list, p. 2 of 24
The Scarlet Letter -- Vocabulary -- Set Two
Name: ________________________________________
(Continuation of “The Custom House.”)
INSTRUCTIONS: There will usually be a 10-15 point reading and vocabulary quiz after every two chapters or so
of The Scarlet Letter. You may use definitions handwritten on these sheets on the vocabulary quizzes.
You will turn in your definitions homework study sheet after each quiz. Each set of 15 or more definitions is
worth five points, irrespective of the number of definitions in that particular set. To receive full credit on the
vocabulary homework, you must turn in at least 15 words in each set. If you do more, you will increase the
likelihood of acing the vocabulary portion of the quizzes, but you will not receive extra credit on the
homework.
Define the italicized word in context with a synonym or short phrase. Handwrite the definition directly on this
sheet. DO NOT type your vocabulary work.
You may work with other people in the class on these vocabulary assignments, but person must turn in his or
her own handwritten work.
36. or the blast of a clarion
37. His gourmandism was a highly agreeable trait
38. neither sacrificed nor vitiated any spiritual endowment
39. it always pleased and satisfied me to hear him expatiate on fish, poultry, and butcher's meat [p. 18
Bantam Classic edition has a typo: expiate for expatiate]
40. not in anger or retribution, but as if grateful for his former appreciation and seeking to resuscitate an
endless series of enjoyment (2)
41. the martial music of his own spirit-stirring recollections
42. The step was palsied now
43. leaning his hand heavily on the iron balustrade
44. His countenance, in this repose, was mild and kindly
45. elsewhere may be only a shapeless mound, cumbrous with its very strength
46. might well have amounted to obstinacy
47. just as [un]malleable and unmanageable as a ton of iron ore
48. any or all the polemical philanthropists of the age (2)
49. All merely graceful attributes are usually the most evanescent
50. so harassing to the interloper
The Scarlet Letter -- vocabulary list, p. 3 of 24
51. The merchants valued him not less than we, his esoteric friends
52. after growing fastidious by sympathy
53. this was a life which could not with impunity be lived too long
54. None of them, I presume, had ever read a page of my inditing
55. baskets of annatto
56. aged cobwebs that festoon its dusky beams
57. Prior to the Revolution there is a dearth of records
58. names of vessels that had long ago foundered at sea
59. clerks engrossed their stiff and formal chirography
60. as a person of such propensities inevitably must
61. There were several foolscap sheets
62. With his own ghostly voice, he had exhorted me
63. my filial duty
64. mouldy and moth-eaten lucubrations
65. so much indefatigable exercise
66. the smouldering glow of the half-extinguished anthracite
67. so pointless and inefficacious
68. the impalpable beauty of my soap-bubble
69. the enervating magic of place do not operate too long upon him
70. This faith, more than anything else, steals the pith
71. nor is it their custom ignominiously to kick the head which they have just struck off
72. to be pretty acutely sensible with which party my predilections lay
73. I recall the figures and appellations of these few
The Scarlet Letter -- vocabulary list, p. 4 of 24
The Scarlet Letter -- Vocabulary -- Set Three
Name: ________________________________________
INSTRUCTIONS: There will usually be a 10-15 point reading and vocabulary quiz after every two chapters or so
of The Scarlet Letter. You may use definitions handwritten on these sheets on the vocabulary quizzes.
You will turn in your definitions homework study sheet after each quiz. Each set of 15 or more definitions is
worth five points, irrespective of the number of definitions in that particular set. To receive full credit on the
vocabulary homework, you must turn in at least 15 words in each set. If you do more, you will increase the
likelihood of acing the vocabulary portion of the quizzes, but you will not receive extra credit on the
homework.
Define the italicized word in context with a synonym or short phrase. Handwrite the definition directly on this
sheet. DO NOT type your vocabulary work.
You may work with other people in the class on these vocabulary assignments, but person must turn in his or
her own handwritten work.
I. THE PRISON-DOOR
1. A throng of bearded men
2. in front of a wooden edifice
3. Utopia of human virtue
4. sepulchers in the old churchyard
5. something congenial in the soil
6. inauspicious portal (look up auspicious also)
II. THE MARKET-PLACE
1. bearded physiognomies
2. would have augured some awful business in hand
3. or other heterodox religionist
4. a boldness and rotundity of speech
5. handling of such malefactresses [malefactor]
6. If the hussy stood up
7. bodice of her gown
8. beyond what was allowed by the sumptuary regulations
The Scarlet Letter -- vocabulary list, p. 5 of 24
9. delicate, evanescent, and indescribable grace
10. halo of the misfortune and ignominy / ignominious
11. before this brazen hussy
12. where iniquity is dragged out into the sunshine
13. unkindly visaged women [visage]
14. With almost a serene deportment (2)
15. this contrivance of wood and iron
16. Had there been a Papist among the crowd of Puritans
17. so picturesque in her attire and mien
18. the stings and venomous stabs of public contumely
19. bitter and disdainful smile
20. Her mind… was preternaturally active
21. exhibition of these phantasmagoric forms
22. in token of antique gentility
23. gentle remonstrance in her daughter's pathway
24. dusky mirror in which she had been wont to gaze at it
25. This figure of the study and the cloister
III. THE RECOGNITION
1. its wreathed intervolutions in open sight
2. after your troubles and sojourn in the wilderness
3. Peradventure the guilty one stands
4. the sombre sagacity of age
5. hardness and obstinacy
6. to exhort her to repentance
7. a mouth which, unless when he forcibly compressed it, was apt to be tremulous
8. half-pleased, half-plaintive murmur
9. Woman, transgress not beyond the limits of Heaven's mercy
10. while the faculties of animal life remained entire
11. the scarlet letter threw a lurid gleam
The Scarlet Letter -- vocabulary list, p. 6 of 24
The Scarlet Letter -- Vocabulary -- Set Four
Name: ________________________________________
INSTRUCTIONS: There will usually be a 10-15 point reading and vocabulary quiz after every two chapters or so
of The Scarlet Letter. You may use definitions handwritten on these sheets on the vocabulary quizzes.
You will turn in your definitions homework study sheet after each quiz. Each set of 15 or more definitions is
worth five points, irrespective of the number of definitions in that particular set. To receive full credit on the
vocabulary homework, you must turn in at least 15 words in each set. If you do more, you will increase the
likelihood of acing the vocabulary portion of the quizzes, but you will not receive extra credit on the
homework.
Define the italicized word in context with a synonym or short phrase. Handwrite the definition directly on this
sheet. DO NOT type your vocabulary work.
You may work with other people in the class on these vocabulary assignments, but person must turn in his or
her own handwritten work.
IV. THE INTERVIEW
1. it proving impossible to quell her insubordination by rebuke (2)
2. a forcible type, in its little frame, of the moral agony which Hester Prynne had borne
3. the Indian sagamores
4. Mistress Prynne shall hereafter be more amenable to just authority
5. made it of peremptory necessity to postpone all other business
6. [The drink] soon proved its efficacy, and redeemed the leech's pledge
7. in requital of some lessons of my own
8. Without further expostulation or delay
9. I felt no love, nor feigned any
10. But, up to that epoch of my life
11. Thou hast kept the secret of thy paramour
V. HESTER AT HER NEEDLE
1. her sick and morbid heart
2. she was made the common infamy
3. and in which they might vivify and embody their images of woman's frailty
The Scarlet Letter -- vocabulary list, p. 7 of 24
4. The chain that bound her here was of iron links, and galling to her inmost soul
5. sable simplicity that generally characterized the Puritanic modes of dress
6. our stern progenitors
7. another possibility of toil and emolument
8. Hester sought not to acquire anything beyond a subsistence, of the plainest and most ascetic
description, for herself (2)
9. The poor… often reviled the hand that was stretched forth to succor them (2)
10. a word that had no distinct purport to their own minds
11. Again, a mystic sisterhood would contumaciously assert itself, as she met the sanctified frown of some
matron (4)
12. Fiend, whose talisman was that fatal symbol
13. They averred, that the symbol was not mere scarlet cloth
VI. PEARL
1. inscrutable decree of Providence
2. Her mother… had bought the richest tissues
3. Pearl's aspect was imbued with a spell of infinite variety
4. outward mutability
5. even some of the very cloud-shapes of gloom and despondency
6. by some irregularity in the process of conjuration
7. the sound of a witch's anathemas
8. instead of the fitful caprice
9. All this enmity and passion had Pearl inherited
10. an agony which she would fain have hidden
11. And Pearl, overhearing the ejaculation
12. nor was Pearl the only child to whom this inauspicious origin was assigned
The Scarlet Letter -- vocabulary list, p. 8 of 24
The Scarlet Letter -- Vocabulary -- Set Five
Name: ________________________________________
INSTRUCTIONS: There will usually be a 10-15 point reading and vocabulary quiz after every two chapters or so
of The Scarlet Letter. You may use definitions handwritten on these sheets on the vocabulary quizzes.
You will turn in your definitions homework study sheet after each quiz. Each set of 15 or more definitions is
worth five points, irrespective of the number of definitions in that particular set. To receive full credit on the
vocabulary homework, you must turn in at least 15 words in each set. If you do more, you will increase the
likelihood of acing the vocabulary portion of the quizzes, but you will not receive extra credit on the
homework.
Define the italicized word in context with a synonym or short phrase. Handwrite the definition directly on this
sheet. DO NOT type your vocabulary work.
You may work with other people in the class on these vocabulary assignments, but person must turn in his or
her own handwritten work.
VII. THE GOVERNOR'S HALL
1. influential place among the colonial magistracy
2. but was soon as imperious to be set down again
3. strength of coloring, which must have given a wan and pallid aspect to cheeks of a fainter bloom (2)
4. But Pearl, who was a dauntless child [also look up the more common form, undaunted]
5. She resembled, in her fierce pursuit of them, an infant pestilence
6. decorated with strange and seemingly cabalistic figures and diagrams
7. some with armor on their breasts, and others with stately ruffs and robes of peace
8. There was a steel head-piece, a cuirass, a gorget, and greaves, with a pair of gauntlets and a sword
hanging beneath; all, and especially the helmet and breastplate, so highly burnished as to glow (5)
9. This bright panoply was not meant for mere idle show
10. the exigencies of this new country had transformed Governor Bellingham into a soldier
11. Pearl… gave an eldritch scream
VIII. THE ELF-CHILD AND THE MINISTER
1. showing off his estate, and expatiating on his projected improvements
2. the genial benevolence of his private life (2)
The Scarlet Letter -- vocabulary list, p. 9 of 24
3. Chillingworth, a person of great skill in physic
4. what has ailed thy mother to bedizen thee in this strange fashion?
5. her soul, its present depravity, and future destiny!
6. she felt that she possessed indefeasible rights against the world
7. power of retribution for my sin
8. He looked now more care-worn and emaciated
9. “I feared the woman had no better thought than to make a mountebank of her child!”
10. illustration of the young minister's argument against sundering the relation of a fallen mother to the
offspring
IX. THE LEECH
1. Under the appellation of Roger Chillingworth
2. come forward to vindicate his claim
3. every remedy contained a multitude of far-fetched and heterogeneous ingredients
4. Nature's boon to the untutored savage
5. as if the proposed result had been the Elixir of Life
6. were alike importunate that he should make trial of the physician's frankly offered skill
7. plants with healing balm in them
8. the minister… withdrew again within the limits of what their church defined as orthodox
9. the site on which the venerable structure of King's Chapel
10. Here the pale clergyman piled up his library, rich with parchment-bound folios of the Fathers, and the
lore of Rabbis, and monkish erudition, of which the Protestant divines, even while they vilified and
decried that class of writers, were yet constrained often to avail themselves. (8)
11. With such commodiousness of situation
12. no fact or argument worthy of serious refutation
13. Doctor Forman, the famous old conjurer, who was implicated in the affair of Overbury (2)
14. joining in the incantations of the savage priests
15. Satan's emissary, in the guise of old Roger Chillingworth (2)
The Scarlet Letter -- vocabulary list, p. 10 of 24
The Scarlet Letter -- Vocabulary -- Set Six
Name: ________________________________________
INSTRUCTIONS: There will usually be a 10-15 point reading and vocabulary quiz after every two chapters or so
of The Scarlet Letter. You may use definitions handwritten on these sheets on the vocabulary quizzes.
You will turn in your definitions homework study sheet after each quiz. Each set of 15 or more definitions is
worth five points, irrespective of the number of definitions in that particular set. To receive full credit on the
vocabulary homework, you must turn in at least 15 words in each set. If you do more, you will increase the
likelihood of acing the vocabulary portion of the quizzes, but you will not receive extra credit on the
homework.
Define the italicized word in context with a synonym or short phrase. Handwrite the definition directly on this
sheet. DO NOT type your vocabulary work.
You may work with other people in the class on these vocabulary assignments, but person must turn in his or
her own handwritten work.
X. THE LEECH AND HIS PATIENT
1. like a sexton delving into a grave
2. aware that something inimical to his peace
3. “Why should not the guilty ones sooner avail themselves of this unutterable solace?”
4. in constraining them to penitential self-abasement (2) [look up penitence also]
5. that she would behave more decorously
6. no regard for human ordinances or opinions
7. temper, which there had been nothing in the physician's words to excuse or palliate
8. the somniferous school of literature
9. how Satan comports himself
XI. THE INTERIOR OF A HEART
1. the very fashion of his garments, were odious in the clergyman's sight
2. attributed all his presentiments to no other cause
3. given over to the machinations of his deadliest enemy
4. scholars among them, who had spent more years in acquiring abstruse lore
5. and etherealized, moreover, by spiritual communications with the better world
The Scarlet Letter -- vocabulary list, p. 11 of 24
6. It is inconceivable, the agony with which this public veneration tortured him!
7. through the chamber which these spectral thoughts had made so ghastly
8. To the untrue man, the whole universe is false,—it is impalpable,—it shrinks to nothing within his
grasp
XII. THE MINISTER'S VIGIL
1. perhaps actually under the influence of a species of somnambulism
2. clog his throat with catarrh and cough
3. which had seen him in his closet, wielding the bloody scourge
4. in the same inextricable knot
5. while standing on the scaffold, in this vain show of expiation
6. The glimmer of this luminary suggested the above conceits to Mr. Dimmesdale
7. The moment that he did so, there came what seemed a tumultuous rush of new life
8. communicating their vital warmth to his half-torpid system
9. cast his eyes towards the zenith
10. Pestilence was known to have been foreboded by a shower of crimson light (2)
11. on the cope of heaven
12. had extended his egotism over the whole expanse of nature, until the firmament itself should appear
no more than a fitting page for his soul's history and fate (2)
13. to hide the malevolence with which he looked upon his victim
14. with an awfulness that admonished Hester Prynne and the clergyman
15. We men of study, whose heads are in our books, have need to be straitly looked after
16. and the most replete with heavenly influences
17. a scurrilous jest against your reverence
18. But did your reverence hear of the portent that was seen
XIII. ANOTHER VIEW OF HESTER
1. even while his intellectual faculties retained their pristine strength
2. Elsewhere the token of sin, it was the taper of the sick-chamber
3. without one backward glance to gather up the meed of gratitude
The Scarlet Letter -- vocabulary list, p. 12 of 24
4. The public is despotic in its temper
5. inclined to show its former victim a more benign countenance than she cared to be favored with (2)
6. owing to the studied austerity of her dress
7. whether Hester Prynne were ever afterwards so touched, and so transfigured
8. age in which the human intellect, newly emancipated
9. the effluence of her mother's lawless passion
10. all other difficulties being obviated
11. under the semblance of a friend and helper
12. except by acquiescing in Roger Chillingworth's scheme of disguise
The Scarlet Letter -- vocabulary list, p. 13 of 24
The Scarlet Letter -- vocabulary list, p. 14 of 24
The Scarlet Letter -- Vocabulary -- Set Seven
Name: ________________________________________
INSTRUCTIONS: There will usually be a 10-15 point reading and vocabulary quiz after every two chapters or so
of The Scarlet Letter. You may use definitions handwritten on these sheets on the vocabulary quizzes.
You will turn in your definitions homework study sheet after each quiz. Each set of 15 or more definitions is
worth five points, irrespective of the number of definitions in that particular set. To receive full credit on the
vocabulary homework, you must turn in at least 15 words in each set. If you do more, you will increase the
likelihood of acing the vocabulary portion of the quizzes, but you will not receive extra credit on the
homework.
Define the italicized word in context with a synonym or short phrase. Handwrite the definition directly on this
sheet. DO NOT type your vocabulary work.
You may work with other people in the class on these vocabulary assignments, but person must turn in his or
her own handwritten work.
XIV. HESTER AND THE PHYSICIAN
1. her mother had accosted the physician
2. with safety to the common weal
3. or be transformed into something that should speak a different purport
4. “Nay, then, wear it, if it suit you better,” rejoined he
5. flickered over his visage so derisively
6. the closest propinquity of the man whom he had most vilely wronged
7. as if he had beheld some frightful shape, which he could not recognize, usurping the place of his own
image
8. due from me to him, whose bane and ruin I have been
9. By thy first step awry thou didst plant the germ of evil
XV. HESTER AND PEARL
1. show the wavering track of his footsteps, sere and brown, across its cheerful verdure (2)
2. which the old man was so sedulous to gather
3. every wholesome growth should be converted into something deleterious
The Scarlet Letter -- vocabulary list, p. 15 of 24
4. She upbraided herself for the sentiment
5. in the light of her nuptial smile
6. displayed remarkable dexterity in pelting them
7. half smiling at the absurd incongruity of the child's observation
8. and is petulant in its best of moods
9. Pearl, with her remarkable precocity and acuteness
10. affections, too, though hitherto acrid and disagreeable
11. tendency to hover about the enigma of the scarlet letter
12. in endowing the child with this marked propensity
13. there might not likewise be a purpose of mercy and beneficence
14. thoughts that now stirred in Hester's mind, with as much vivacity of impression
15. it was the talisman of a stern and severe, but yet a guardian spirit
16. with an asperity that she had never permitted to herself before
XVI. A FOREST WALK
1. her conscious heart imputed suspicion where none could have been felt
2. the mystery of the primeval forest
3. in the predominant pensiveness of the day
4. and scintillating with the vivacity excited by rapid motion
5. disease of sadness, which almost all children… inherit, with the scrofula
6. It was a little dell where they had seated themselves
7. perhaps, that, with its never-ceasing loquacity, it should whisper tales
8. chose to break off all acquaintance with this repining brook
XVII. THE PASTOR AND HIS PARISHIONER
1. So long estranged by fate and circumstances
2. Of penance, I have had enough! Of penitence, there has been none! (2)
3. The very contiguity of his enemy
4. or, perhaps, in the misanthropy of her own trouble, she left the minister to bear
5. presence of Roger Chillingworth,—the secret poison of his malignity
The Scarlet Letter -- vocabulary list, p. 16 of 24
6. “What we did had a consecration of its own….”
7. one solemn old tree groaned dolefully to another
8. other means of satiating his dark passion.
9. the yellow leaves will show no vestige of the white man's tread
10. It shall not cumber thy steps
11. Why shouldst thou tarry so much as one other day
The Scarlet Letter -- vocabulary list, p. 17 of 24
The Scarlet Letter -- vocabulary list, p. 18 of 24
The Scarlet Letter -- Vocabulary -- Set Eight
Name: ________________________________________
INSTRUCTIONS: There will usually be a 10-15 point reading and vocabulary quiz after every two chapters or so
of The Scarlet Letter. You may use definitions handwritten on these sheets on the vocabulary quizzes.
You will turn in your definitions homework study sheet after each quiz. Each set of 15 or more definitions is
worth five points, irrespective of the number of definitions in that particular set. To receive full credit on the
vocabulary homework, you must turn in at least 15 words in each set. If you do more, you will increase the
likelihood of acing the vocabulary portion of the quizzes, but you will not receive extra credit on the
homework.
Define the italicized word in context with a synonym or short phrase. Handwrite the definition directly on this
sheet. DO NOT type your vocabulary work.
You may work with other people in the class on these vocabulary assignments, but person must turn in his or
her own handwritten work.
XVIII. A FLOOD OF SUNSHINE
1. they were now holding a colloquy that was to decide their fate
2. he had watched, with morbid zeal and minuteness (3)
3. he was only the more trammelled by its regulations
4. what plea could be urged in extenuation of his crime
5. his mind was darkened and confused by the very remorse which harrowed it
6. transmuting the yellow fallen ones to gold
7. that wild, heathen Nature of the forest, never subjugated by human law
8. The small denizens of the wilderness hardly took pains to move out of her path
9. for a squirrel is such a choleric and humorous little personage
XIX. THE CHILD AT THE BROOK-SIDE
1. however inured to such behavior on the elf-child's part
2. any more than mollified by her entreaties
The Scarlet Letter -- vocabulary list, p. 19 of 24
3. burst into a fit of passion, gesticulating violently
XX. THE MINISTER IN A MAZE
1. So great a vicissitude in his life
2. this indistinctness and duplicity of impression, which vexed it with a strange disquietude (3)
3. thought this exemplary man
4. at once so slight and irrefragable
5. the woods seemed wilder, more uncouth with its rude natural obstacles
6. importunately obtrusive sense of change (2)
7. The good old man addressed him with the paternal affection and patriarchal privilege (2)
8. this excellent and hoary-bearded deacon
9. certain blasphemous suggestions that rose into his mind, respecting the communion supper
10. would have been petrified by his minister's impiety!
11. another impulse, more ludicrous, and almost as horrible
12. such as dissolute sailors so abound with
13. his buckramed habit of clerical decorum
14. gaining any strange gentleman a fair reception from yonder potentate you wot of
15. answered the clergyman, with a grave obeisance
16. the many precious souls he hath won from heathendom
17. those strange and wicked eccentricities to which he had been continually impelled
18. Will not my aid be requisite to put you in heart and strength
19. A good man's prayers are golden recompense
20. that Heaven should see fit to transmit the grand and solemn music of its oracles
XXI. THE NEW ENGLAND HOLIDAY
1. the craftsmen and other plebeian inhabitants of the town
2. irresistible desire to quaff a last, long, breathless draught of the cup of wormwood and aloes (4)
3. or else leave an inevitable and weary languor, after the lees of bitterness wherewith she had been
drugged, as with a cordial of intensest potency (4)
4. this bright and sunny apparition
The Scarlet Letter -- vocabulary list, p. 20 of 24
5. there was a certain singular inquietude and excitement in her mood
6. in regard to the unwonted jollity that brightened the faces of the people (2)
7. Into this festal season of the year
8. the several branches of jocularity
9. an exhibition with the buckler and broadsword
10. the interposition of the town beadle
11. depredations on the Spanish commerce
12. a man of probity and piety on land
13. it excited neither surprise nor animadversion
14. worn and shown them both with such a galliard air
15. with a mien of calmness, though in the utmost consternation
The Scarlet Letter -- vocabulary list, p. 21 of 24
The Scarlet Letter -- vocabulary list, p. 22 of 24
The Scarlet Letter -- Vocabulary -- Set Nine
Name: ________________________________________
INSTRUCTIONS: There will usually be a 10-15 point reading and vocabulary quiz after every two chapters or so
of The Scarlet Letter. You may use definitions handwritten on these sheets on the vocabulary quizzes.
You will turn in your definitions homework study sheet after each quiz. Each set of 15 or more definitions is
worth five points, irrespective of the number of definitions in that particular set. To receive full credit on the
vocabulary homework, you must turn in at least 15 words in each set. If you do more, you will increase the
likelihood of acing the vocabulary portion of the quizzes, but you will not receive extra credit on the
homework.
Define the italicized word in context with a synonym or short phrase. Handwrite the definition directly on this
sheet. DO NOT type your vocabulary work.
You may work with other people in the class on these vocabulary assignments, but person must turn in his or
her own handwritten work.
XXII. THE PROCESSION
1. the harmony of drum and clarion
2. who felt the stirrings of martial impulse
3. with plumage nodding over their bright morions
4. but distinguished by a ponderous sobriety (2)
5. imparted to him by angelic ministrations
6. a principal actor in all the works of necromancy that were continually going forward
7. They say, child, thou art of the lineage of the Prince of the Air
8. too much thronged to admit another auditor
9. an essential character of plaintiveness
10. She had an undulating, but, oftentimes, a sharp and irregular movement
11. which to-day was doubly indefatigable in its tiptoe dance
12. that flashes beneath the prow in the night-time
13. now thronged about Hester Prynne with rude and boorish intrusiveness
14. their own interest in this worn-out subject languidly reviving itself
15. the same scorching stigma was on them both
The Scarlet Letter -- vocabulary list, p. 23 of 24
XXIII. THE REVELATION OF THE SCARLET LETTER
1. whereas the Jewish seers had denounced judgments and ruin on their country
2. Now was heard again the clangor of the music
3. so apotheosized by worshipping admirers
4. he rose up out of some nether region
5. The Devil knew it well, and fretted it continually with the touch of his burning finger
XXIV. CONCLUSION
1. all of which must necessarily have been conjectural
2. how utterly nugatory is the choicest of man's own righteousness
3. by its completest triumph and consummation
4. found their earthly stock of hatred and antipathy transmuted into golden love (2)
5. the ethereal medium of joy
6. there appeared the semblance of an engraved escutcheon
7. ON A FIELD, SABLE, THE LETTER A, GULES
The Scarlet Letter -- vocabulary list, p. 24 of 24