1. barren: Sterile. Unfruitful. Unproductive.
The determined traveler surveyed the barren dunes that surrounded him as he trekked across the lifeless desert.

2. demagogue: An unprincipled popular orator. A leader who uses the people’s prejudices to advance his own interests.
The cruelly smiling demagogue watched from his balcony as the crowd he had inflamed with his oratory scoured the streets, looking for the hated foreigners.

3. wanton: Uncalled for or unjustifiable. Unbridled. Disregardful of justice or morality.
Through the lattice that hid her, the frightened girl peered at the wanton revelry of the bandits who had invaded the town square.

4. terse: Concise. Brief and pithy.
In a terse and pointed memo, she responded at once to the vicious attack on her published in the company memo.

5. malevolent: With ill will or evil intent.
The hungry panther, from his perch on a high branch, fixed the sleeping fawn with a malevolent glare.

6. pittance: A scanty income. A small allowance for living expenses.
The simple, ascetic life-style of the hermit in his forest shack made the pittance the villagers allotted for his support seem a princely sum.

7. quell: To suppress or vanquish. To quiet or allay.
The young man struggled to quell the powerful, forbidden emotions that moved him at the unexpected sight of his helpless enemy.

8. inter: (verb) To bury, especially in a grave.
We watched the dispassionate laborers inter the old miser, more than one of us harboring mixed feelings as his silver-studded coffin disappeared beneath the sod.

9. eschew: Abstain from. Avoid.
Though unaccustomed to children and inclined to rough and savage ways, every man-jack tacitly agreed to eschew profanity in the presence of the ingenuous golden girl.

10. verdant: Green with vegetation. Lush.
As we topped the final rise, we saw the verdant valley before us, and some were moved to tears by the beauty of the view.

11. shard: Fragment of broken pottery or of an eggshell.
The horticulturist filled the lower quarter of a flowerpot with jagged bits of terra cotta, the spaces between each shard and its neighbor providing a convenient well to store the excess water that passed through the soil that she piled on top.

12. revert: To return to a former practice or condition.
I saw the wolf pup, restored to health by a kindly forest ranger, running with a pack near the lake. Somehow, he had managed to gain acceptance and revert to life in the wild.

13. decorum: Propriety of speech, dress, or behavior. 
Though the boys were frisky, the stern deacon had only to cast a stern glance in their direction to restore the decorum appropriate to being in a church..

14. acrid: Sharp or stinging to the taste. Bitterly pungent. Irritating.
On the suddenly quiet battlefield, the only evidence of the recent carnage was the acrid smell of gunpowder.

15. founder: (verb) To fill with water and sink.
In spite of the best efforts of the fishermen to bail out the water, the waves soon flooded the boat and caused it to founder.

16. incisive: Penetrating. Keen or acute.
The defense attorney made short work of the prosecution's case with her incisive remarks about the total unreliability of the witness and the circumstantial nature of the rest of the evidence.

17. renege: To go back on one's word. To fail to perform as promised.
When the prospective buyer of the young couple's house was unable to get approval for a loan from the bank, she was obliged to renege on her offer.

18. transpire: To occur, happen, or take place. To escape as vapor.
As the day drew to a close, the townspeople gathered at their windows to see what would transpire when the sheriff found out that the strangers were still in town.

19. saunter: To stroll. To walk with a leisurely gait.
The schoolmaster's anger rose to a high pitch as he watched the class troublemaker saunter to his seat in yet another prolonged interruption of the class.

20. usurp: To seize and hold power by force or without right.
The duke spread rumors of imminent foreign invasion to distract the people from interfering with his plan to usurp the throne of their beloved king.

21. clairvoyant: (noun) One who has the power to see objects or actions beyond the normal range of vision.
The clairvoyant gazed deeply into the crystal ball and began describing the casino fated to be the site of her rapt listener’s good fortune.

22. antediluvian: Antiquated. primitive.
The antediluvian jokes he told, in a vain attempt to amuse us, had gray beards when my grandfather was a boy.

23. patricide: The killing of one’s father. One who commits such an act.
Oedipus, the Greek king who killed his father and married his mother, is probably the most infamous patricide in Western history.

24. surly: Rude, ill-tempered, unfriendly.
The surly gatekeeper almost left them standing in the cold rain, but the glint of their silver persuaded him to open the gate for them.

25. noisome: Offensive or disgusting. Harmful or noxious.
One did not have to go further than the canal, with the noisome odors emanating from its waters, to find a probable source of the sickness that hung over the town.

26. substantial: Of material nature; real or actual. Of ample quantity or size. O solid character or quality. Wealthy or influential.
The gathering of the clans had brought many of the most powerful clan chiefs down from the highlands, as well as some of the most substantial men in the kingdom.

27. dour: Sullen; gloomy. Hard; severe; stern.
In tearless, thin-lipped silence, the dour widow lowered the body of her husband into the grave she had dug, yielding nothing to the hard, pitiless land they had chosen to settle.

28. carp: (verb) Find fault. Complain unreasonably.
The woman clung to her positive attitude in the face of her traveling companion’s predilection to carp at the discomforts of the car, the poor quality of the food, and the mildew odor of the motel room.

29. gnarl: A knotty protuberance on the trunk or a branch of a tree.
The aborigine paused at the mouth of the cave, looked cautiously inside, then entered, first stooping to pick up a fallen bough with a large gnarl at one end to use as a club.

30. tangential: Merely touching or only slightly connected. Divergent or digressive.
The congressman belabored the matter of the high costs involved in implementing the measure, in spite of the fact that this was tangential to the central issue – the rights and wrongs of the proposal.

31. swarthy: Of dark color or complexion.
The old sailor’s swarthy appearance was, no doubt, as much due to long days’ exposure to the sun while at sea as it was to his ancestry.

32. salient: Prominent or conspicuous.
The salesman led the prospective buyer around the car, pointing out its salient features and expounding on their superiority.

33. pillage: To plunder. To rob with open violence.
As the last vestiges of resistance collapsed, the pitiless Mongol horde began to pillage the fallen city, leaving a swath of murder and rape in their wake.

34. pugnacious: Given to fighting. Quarrelsome.
The more the large woman drank, the more pugnacious she became, offering to "mop the floor" with anyone who dared to accept her challenge.

35. evanescent: Vanishing or fleeting. Tending to be or become scarcely perceptible.
As the sky lightened, signaling the impending dawn, the lone girl stared in awed fascination at the evanescent mist rising off the lake.

36. privation: State of being deprived of the usual comforts or necessities of life.
Until labor unions appeared to challenge the large farming combines, migratory farm workers generally lived under conditions of the most abject privation.

37. ostensible: Outwardly appearing to be so.
Although the poker player’s ostensible mien was one of bored disinterest, he could not entirely mask the predatory gleam in his eye as he surveyed the straight flush he knew would take this hand.

38.stagnant: Not flowing, as water or air. Foul from standing inactive. Sluggish; dull.
Though parched with thirst, the woman looked at the sun-bleached bones scattered around the stagnant pool and, with jaw-clenching effort, refrained from drinking.

39. secluded: Separated from others. Removed from commonly traveled paths.
The foot-sore traveler saw in the austere and secluded mountain cabin the haven she had been seeking for many a weary mile.

40. vestige: a trace of something no longer existent. A surviving remnant of some condition or practice.
Who can look upon the massive monoliths, silent vestiges of a druidic past, without feeling a sense of awe at the power that once held this land?

41. tenuous: Thin in form or consistency. Of slight significance or substance.
The conclusions drawn by the attorney were tenuous.

42. skulk: To move in a stealthy manner as if for evil purpose. To shirk duty.
The vultures could do nothing but skulk at a safe distance until the lion had sated himself.

43. inveterate: confirmed in practice, habit, or feeling. Chronic.
In spite of all the mishaps he had suffered, he remained an inveterate risk-taker.

44. alienated: Estranged. Indifferent or averse.
The woman’s abandonment of the boy had thoroughly alienated him from her.

45. craven: Cowardly. Mean-spirited.
The craven scoundrel did not scruple to shoot his erstwhile friend in the back.

46. metamorphosis: Transformation. Any complete chance in appearance or character.
The insect freed itself from its cocoon and dried its wings, completing the remarkable metamorphosis from ugly caterpillar to beautiful butterfly.

47. licentious: Sensuously unbridled. Lewd.
The slave girl threw herself with mounting frenzy into her licentious dance.

48. equivocate: To use ambiguous or misleading expressions.
When the thief was caught with the stolen goods in his possession, he knew that it was too late to equivocate.

49. vicarious: Experiencing in place of another.
The boy felt a vicarious thrill of victory as he watched his hero defeat the villains in the movie.

50. fiasco: An ignominious failure. A complete disaster.
As the investor watched the value of his holdings plummet, he knew that his investment strategy had been a fiasco.