Barron 5.3

N. solemn wonder. The tourists gazed with awe at the tremendous expanse of the Grand Canyon.

ADV. distorted; crooked. He held his head awry, giving the impression that he had caught cold in his neck during the night. alsoADJ.

N. self-evident truth requiring no proof. Before a student can begin to think along the lines of Euclidean geometry, he must accept certain principles or axioms.

ADJ. sky blue. Azure skies are indicative of good weather.

V. chatter idly. The little girl babbled about her doll. also N.

ADJ. drunken. Emperor Nero attended the bacchanalian orgy.

V. pester; annoy. She was forced to change her telephone number because she was badgered by obscene phone calls.

N. teasing conversation. Her friends at work greeted the news of her engagement with cheerful badinage.

V. frustrate; perplex. The new code baffled the enemy agents.

V. harass; tease. The school bully baited the smaller children, terrorizing them.

ADJ. deadly; having a malign influence; ominous. The fortune teller made baleful predictions of terrible things to come.

V. foil or thwart; stop short; refuse to go on. When the warden learned that several inmates were planning to escape, he took steps to balk their attempt. However, he balked at punishing them by shackling them to the walls of their cells.

N. heavy substance used to add stability or weight. The ship was listing badly to one side; it was necessary to shift the ballast in the hold to get her back on an even keel. alsoV.

N. something that relieves pain. Friendship is the finest balm for the pangs of disappointed love.

ADJ. mild; fragrant. A balmy breeze refreshed us after the sultry blast.

ADJ. hackneyed; commonplace; trite; lacking originality. The hack writer's worn-out clich6s made his comic sketch seem banal. He even resorted to the banality of having someone slip on a banana peel!

V. discuss lightly or glibly; exchange (words) heatedly. While the president was happy to bandy patriotic generalizations with anyone who would listen to him, he refused to bandy words with unfriendly reporters at the press conference.

N. cause of ruin; curse. Lucy's little brother was the bane of her existence: his attempts to make her life miserable worked so well that she could have poisoned him with ratsbane for having such a baneful effect.

ADJ. good-natured ridiculing. They resented his bantering remarks because they thought he was being sarcastic.

N. sharp projection from fishhook, etc.; openly cutting remark. If you were a politician, which would you prefer, being caught on the barb of a fishhook or being subjected to malicious verbal barbs? Who can blame the president if he's happier fishing than back in the capitol listening to his critics' barbed remarks?