Non-Moby-Dictionary

Some words culled from Thomas Morton's New English Canaan:

sleech, n.
1. Mud deposited by the sea or a river; soil composed of this.

2. A stretch of mud on a shore.

Hence sleechy a., slimy, muddy.


clunch, n.
1. A lump, a heavy and unshapely mass.
(Known only in mod. dialect, but prob. of considerable age.) [So EFris. klunt.]

2. A lumpish fellow, a clown, boor, lout. Cf. CLOD, CLOT. Obs. exc. dial. [So EFris. klunt.]

3. A (clumsy) hand, ‘fist’. Obs. [? Influenced by CLUTCH, or by CLENCH (see CLUNCH v.); but cf. EFris. klunt a clumsy, clodhopping foot.]

[ed. note: lumpish!]

cark, v.
1. trans. To load, burden; also, to charge or impose as a charge upon. Obs.

2. To burden with care, burden as care does; to worry, harass, vex, trouble. (Mostly in pa. pple.) Obs. or arch.; but see CARKING ppl. a.

3. intr. To be anxious, be full of anxious thought, fret oneself; to labour anxiously, to toil and moil. Obs. or arch.

4. In weakened sense (cf. CARE v.): To take thought or care, busy oneself. Obs.

A sentence: "Don't cark me with that sleechy clunch."

Moby-Dictionary

SALAMANDER
N.
1. a. A lizard-like animal supposed to live in, or to be able to endure, fire. Now only allusive.

b. Any tailed amphibian of the urodelous family Salamandridæ, or some closely allied family.
The land salamanders form the typical genus Salamandra; the water salamanders are the newts or tritons.

c. A figure of the mythical salamander used as an emblem.

2. transf. and fig. applied to persons, etc. with reference to sense 1a. a. gen.

b. A spirit supposed to live in fire.
See Paracelsus De Nymphis, Sylphis, Pygmæis, et Salamandris, etc., Wks. 1658 II. 388 seqq.

c. A woman who (ostensibly) lives chastely in the midst of temptations. Obs.

d. A soldier who exposes himself to fire in battle.

e. slang. A fire-eating juggler.

3. Applied to various articles used in fire or capable of withstanding great heat.

a. Asbestos. (Cf. salamander-stone; also F. salamandre pierreuse.)

b. An iron or poker used red-hot for lighting a pipe, igniting gunpowder, etc.

c. Metallurgy. ‘A mass of solidified material in a furnace hearth’ (Raymond); called also bear, horse, and sow.

d. Cookery. A circular iron plate which is heated and placed over a pudding or other dish to brown it.

e. Also (N. Amer.), a workman's brazier.

4. local U.S. A pouched rat or gopher, esp. Geomys pinetis.

5. A form of drinking a toast common among German students.
The full expression is einem einen salamander reiben

V.
a. intr. To live amidst fire, like the salamander.

b. trans. To submit to great heat.

c. Cookery. To brown by means of a salamander.


"For unless you own the whale, you are but a provincial and sentimentalist in Truth. But clear Truth is a thing for salamander giants only to encounter; how small the chances for the provincials then? What befel the weakling youth lifting the dread goddess's veil at Sais?"

Moby-Dictionary

Judgmatic, adj.
Characterized by good practical judgement; judicious, discerning; judicial.

"...though once broiled, judiciously buttered, and judgmatically salted and peppered, there is no one who will speak more respectfully, not to say reverentially, of a broiled fowl than I will."

Moby-Dictionary

Hyperborean
A. adj.
1. Of, pertaining to, or characterizing the extreme north of the earth, or (colloq. or humorously) of a particular country; in ethnological use, cf. B.
b. Of or pertaining to the fabled Hyperboreans.
2. (nonce-use.) Surpassing that of the north wind.

B. n.
An inhabitant of the extreme north of the earth; in pl. members of an ethnological group of Arctic races. loosely and fig. One who lives in a northerly clime.

"Ever and anon a bright, but, alas, deceptive idea would dart you through. - It's the Black Sea in a midnight gale. - It's the unnatural combat of the four primal elements. - It's a blasted heath. - It's a Hyperborean winter scene. - It's the breaking- up of the ice-bound stream of Time."


Tips for modern usage:
"I like your new fur hat, guy. Very Hyperborean-chic."
"This Hyperborean weather is giving me a hypo."

Moby-Dictionary

hypo, n.
[Abbreviation of HYPOCHONDRIA: cf. hyp]
Morbid depression of spirits.

"Whenever I find myself growing grim about the mouth; whenever it is a damp, drizzly November in my soul; whenever I find myself involuntarily pausing before coffin warehouses, and bringing up the rear of every funeral I meet; and especially whenever my hypos get such an upper hand of me, that it requires a strong moral principle to prevent me from deliberately stepping into the street, and methodically knocking people's hats off - then, I account it high time to get to sea as soon as I can."