a gnashing of teeth a frequent New Testament image, found in Matthew 8:12,13:42, 22:13, 24:51, 25:30, and Luke 13:28.
abacuses counting frames composed of color-coded beads that are slid along rods or wires for quick hand calculation; still popular in Japan and other Eastern countries.
Acka Backa, Sody Cracka a typical jump rope rhyme, similar to "Rich man, poor man" and Angelou's mimetic poem "Harlem Hopscotch."
ad hoc makeshift; improvised.
adios goodbye.
Akim Tamiroff eccentric-looking Russian character actor (1899-1972) who earned an Oscar nomination for his portrayal of Pablo in For Whom the Bell Tolls.
Alley Oop the dinosaur-riding cave man and beau of Ooola, both characters in V. T. Hamlin's popular cartoon strip, which originated in 1933.
Amazon one of a race of female warriors mentioned in Homer's Iliad.
aphorisms short statements of wisdom, such as "God helps those who help themselves."
arabesque an elegant ballet pose in which one arm extends forward and the other arm or a leg extends gracefully to the rear.
Ashes to ashes and dust to dust from the burial service in the Book of Common Prayer.
Axis agent a spy for the combined enemy, consisting of Germany, Italy, and Japan, the Axis powers.
backsliders a common fundamentalist pejorative for people who were once Christian, but who gradually return to faithlessness or immorality.
barrelhouse blues a pulsing, unmelodious jazz beat.
Basil Rathbone captivating British actor (1892-1967) who starred as Sherlock Holmes in The Hound of the Baskervilles and The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes and had major roles in Captain Blood, David Copperfield, The Last Days of Pompeii, and A Tale of Two Cities.
before one word of this changes, heaven and earth shall fall away a paraphrase of Jesus' promise in Matthew 5:18.
Bette Davis two-time Academy Award-winning American actress (1908-89) who starred in All This and Heaven Too, Jezebel, Dark Victory, The Little Foxes, and All About Eve.
"blows and scores" ago that is, after a protracted history of assaults and retaliations.
Bluebeards killers like the protagonist of Charles Perrault's French folktales, written in 1697.
bonita pretty.
"Borracho" drunk.
Brobdingnag a country in Swift's Gulliver's Travels that is inhabited by giants twelve times the size of humans.
brother would turn against brother an approximation of Mark 13:12.
Butler; Henley Samuel Butler (1835-1902), author of Erewhon and The Way of All Flesh, and William Ernest Henley (1849-1903), author of the poem "Invictus," which students often memorize for its bold espousal of self-determination and individualism.
C.C.C. a relief program initiated by President Franklin Roosevelt in 1933 which utilized two and a half million young men for conservation and reforestation projects.
C.M.E. Church Colored Methodist Episcopal Church.
c/o a postal abbreviation for "in care of."
cantina saloon.
Capistrano a city in Orange County, California, and the location of the ruins of Mission San Juan Capistrano, dedicated in 1776 by Father Junipero Serra, where legend declares the swallows nest each year from March 19 to October 23.
Captain Marvel a comic book character created by Carl Burgos and Bill Everett and first appearing in print in November 1939.
Carnera Primo Carnera, whom Joe Louis defeated on June 25, 1935.
cater-cornered diagonally.
cat-o'-nine-tails a whip fashioned from loose strands which end in knots that leave clawlike marks on a victim's body.
cat's face a wrinkled patch which is inadvertently ironed into freshly laundered clothes or linens.
cat's ladder an intricate web, like the finger games children play with a looped string.
Cheshire cat's smile continuing the image from Alice in Wonderland, a reference to the cat which disembodies itself, leaving only its smile behind.
chifforobe a combination chest of drawers and wardrobe.
chow-chow a piquant or hot pickled relish made from a variety of garden vegetables, particularly cucumber, cabbage, carrot, pepper, and onion, and served with blander foods, such as pinto, lima, or navy beans.
Cisco Kid dashing Mexican "Robin Hood" character in Western movies, radio, an early television series, and a 1950s comic strip.
clabbered milk curdled, or soured milk.
claque a person, or persons, hired to applaud a theater or opera performance or an actor.
Claude Rains, Herbert Marshall and George McCready three significant screen actors of the 1930s and 40s. Rains (1889-1967) earned fame early in his career for his performances in The Invisible Man, Notorious,Robin Hood, The Prince and the Pauper, and Casablanca. Herbert Marshall (1890-1966), an urbane British leading man who lost a leg in World War I, starred in I Was a Spy, The Dark Angel, A Bill of Divorcement, and The Little Foxes. George McCready (1909-73) left banking to act in Gilda, Paths of Glory, and Commandos Strike at Dawn.
Colored Methodist Episcopal Church an African-American offshoot of the Southern Methodist Church, which withdrew from the parent church in 1870 as a separate entity devoted to the evangelizing of Africa's non-Christians. In May 1954, members voted to rename it the Christian Methodist Episcopal Church.
"Cómo está usted?" How are you?
coq au vin chicken in wine sauce.
cotelette Milanese chicken breast cutlets dredged in egg, grated Parmesan cheese, and crumbs and braised in butter.
cotton bolls the hard, prickly, taloned, fibrous pod which encases a growing fluff of cotton and thwarts the picker's efforts.
Count Basie, Cab Calloway, Duke Ellington major black musicians of the Big Band era.
crabs body lice that live in the pubic area.
cracker a disparaging, derogatory slang term for a white, bigoted, violent Southerner.
crocus sack a burlap bag, often called a "croker sack" or a "gunny sack."
crushed aspirins or oil of cloves home remedies applied to an aching tooth or gum.
cyclopean eye In Greek mythology, the cyclopes were a race of one-eyed giants.
