Wondrous Words Wednesday!

Wondrous Words Wednesday is a weekly meme hosted by Bermudaonion's Weblog where we share words we’ve encountered in our reading.  Join in the fun and be sure to leave a link to your post over at Bermudaonion.

I came across these words while reading The Passing Bells by Phillip Rock:

"Only mufti could be worn when off duty, except for certain social functions, and mufti of the most stylish and expensive cut."

Mufti:   ordinary clothing  worn by someone who usually wears some type of military uniform.  Also called "civvies", it's essentially slang for "civilian attire".


"Roger and Charles were in some sort of conversation about prosody, and Roger said that in his opinion the Georgians were on the proper track..so I put in my oar after sinking the five ball with a perfect bank shot and agreed that Childe Harold was still a damn fine bit of poetry even if its author was a self-confessed bugger."

Prosody: 

The patterns of rhythm and sound used in poetry.

The theory or study of these patterns, or the rules governing them

 

 

"The adjutant needs me back."

 

Adjutant:

1.    A military officer who acts as an administrative assistant to a senior officer.

2.    A person's assistant or deputy.

 

 

"He was about to add that the archduke's morganatic wife had been déclassé, no better than a housekeeper, but thought better of it."

 

Morganatic:

of, relating to, or being a marriage between a member of a royal or noble family and a person of inferior rank in which the rank of the inferior partner remains unchanged and the children of the marriage do not succeed to the titles, fiefs, or entailed property of the parent of higher rank