I have just read The Silver City (First edition, 1956) and noted some of the specialised or archaic language used by Idriess in this book (see also Idriess's Vocabulary, January 27 in this Forum). Or it may just be me having a limited vocab.! I think there only two Idriess books (Prospecting for Gold and The Desert Column) that actually have glossaries.

Furbelows ("Don't you remember the bonnets and furbelows those women wore?" p.7) = pleated trim on a woman's dress.

Durance vile (p.9) = an old term meaning loathsome duration and thus a long prison sentence.

Fantods ("spotted fantods . . . But there are fantods in Australia!" p.36) = believed to be N. American in origin and is a state of extreme nervousness or restlessness; the willies; the fidgets - or perhaps in the context equivalent to the horrors - but the context also implies not just a state, but actual beings: "spotted fantods!".

Thoroughbrace ("Their two-horse thoroughbrace loaded with gear" p.71) = from the days of horse and carts - strong leather straps supporting a horse-drawn coach or carriage, and hence, apparently, the type of coach (a "thoroughbrace").

Scatched/ Scutched ("scatched flat the soft lumps of stone" p.73) = To separate the valuable fibres of (flax, for example) from the woody parts by beating, combing, or scraping. My first edition has scatched, but scutched seems to be the word Idriess wanted: originally from ridding impurities from fibres like cotton by beating, scraping, etc; here ridding the dross from opal and potch. My Ion Idriess's Greatest Stories of Miners and Soldiers (1993) has "scutched" (p.71).

Puggaree (p.64) = Pagri, a turban. Here, perhaps, "a thin muslin scarf tied round a sun helmet so as to hang down over the wearer's neck and shield it from the sun."

Plat (p.175) = a plot of land.

Prad (p.191) = colloquial (Australian) for horse.

Gilgai (hole) (p. 141) = a hollow where rainwater collects (perhaps equivalent to a gnamma hole).

Carney lizards (p.158) = a type of lizard? Not sure what.

Kopi-painted (p.84) = Powdered gypsum, used in ritual Aboriginal mourning.

Cocky's joy (p.77) = Australian slang for golden syrup (also in other Idriess books).

Silver glance/ dyscasite/ lodyrite/ Yellow bromyrite (p.154) = technical terms for various silver ores.