Adjective

(en adjective)

Lasting for a short period of time.

* Vicesimus Knox

Esteem, lasting esteem, the esteem of good men, like himself, will be his reward, when the gale of ephemeral popularity shall have gradually subsided.

* Sir J. Stephen

sentences not of ephemeral , but of eternal, efficacy

* '>citation

It was during an access of this kind that I suddenly left my home, and bending my steps towards the near Alpine valleys, sought in the magnificence, the eternity of such scenes, to forget myself and my ephemeral , because human, sorrows.

(biology) Existing for only one day, as with some flowers, insects, and diseases.

(geology, of a body of water) Usually dry, but filling with water for brief periods during and after precipitation.

* 1986 , W.H. Raymond, "Clinoptilolite Deposit in the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, South Dakota, U.S.A.", in Y?ichi Murakami et al. (editors), New Developments in Zeolite Science and Technology (conference proceedings), Elsevier, ISBN 978-0-444-98981-9, page 80:

The graben constitutes a depositional basin and a topographic low, underlain by Cretaceous shales, in which volcanic debris accumulated in ephemeral lakes and streams in Oligocene and early Miocene time.

Adjective

(en adjective)

Evading capture, comprehension or remembrance.

The elusive criminal was arrested

* {{quote-book

, year=1910 , author=Jack London , title=Lost Face , chapter=6 citation , passage=Charley chased the elusive idea through all the nooks and crannies of his drowning consciousness.}}

Rarely seen.

*

Difficult to describe.

A precise definition of diarrhea is elusive (Robbin's pathology, 8th ed)