Comments on: Guardian 24,647 (Sat 14 Mar)/Araucaria – Twin pity

By: rightback

rightback — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 23:51:58 +0000

Thanks to all commenters (and especially for the other Ruthless Rhymes) – good to hear that I wasn’t alone in struggling with this!

Shirley: Yes, in 23ac the crop is the harvest in the cryptic reading, but I was referring to the surface reading.

By: Mr Beaver

Mr Beaver — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 09:29:55 +0000

Geoff – we also wondered if Harry Graham might perhaps be Araucaria’s grandfather. If so, the sense of humour might be inherited !

By: muck

muck — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 02:46:48 +0000

I found the long clues impossible from the wordplay, but not difficult once I Googled ‘ruthless rhymes rugged mountains’. Nice to see my pseudonym at 2dn though.

By: liz

liz — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 17:35:42 +0000

I Googled to get the quotation when I was reasonably sure of ‘rugged mountain’s brow’. It rang a faint bell when I found it. 16dn stumped me all week and now I’m kicking myself! Thanks for the blog.

By: Barnaby Page

Barnaby Page — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 16:56:11 +0000

I had heard of Ruthless Rhymes, though actually I thought they were the Belloc poems properly called Cautionary Tales for Children – I was surprised to find that it is an entirely separate body of work by a different poet.

By: Geoff

Geoff — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 13:13:33 +0000

I suspect there were few solvers who were familiar with this quotation. I had certainly never come across the ‘Ruthless Rhymes’ or their author. I didn’t even try to parse the clues, but guessed ‘rugged/ragged mountain’s brow’ from the crossing letters and relied on the Oxford Dictionary of Quotations to do the business.

Perhaps these verses were better known when Araucaria (aka Rev John Graham) was a lad – perhaps he is even a relative of Harry Graham?

Fortunately, the rest of the puzzle was reasonably straightforward.

By: Dave Ellison

Dave Ellison — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 10:04:12 +0000

I had the same problems, and had to google once I had got “oer the” and “mountains” and probably “rugged”. But I had never heard of this doggerel nor of its author, so I don’t regard it as cheating, as it was impossible to get it from the word play.

Araucaria continues to be very variable.

By: Colin H

Colin H — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 09:56:43 +0000

Took me 20 minutes to solve the rest of it, and another hour to get the Harry Graham quote. Like Shirely, I solved the first half from the construction, got “Clara threw”, and Googled it to get the rest.

Would this count as cheating? I don’t care .

By: cholecyst

cholecyst — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 09:27:46 +0000

Well, I enjoyed this puzzle. Solving it encouraged me to read some more of Harry Graham’s sick verse (I especially like the last two here appended):

Weep not for little Leonie
Abducted by a French Marquis!
Though loss of honour was a wrench
Just think how it’s improved her French.
More Ruthless Rhymes for Heartless Homes (1930) “Compensation”

Aunt Jane observed, the second time
She tumbled off a bus,
“The step is short from the Sublime
To the Ridiculous.”
Ruthless Rhymes for Heartless Homes (1899) “Equanimity”

Billy, in one of his nice new sashes,
Fell in the fire and was burnt to ashes;
Now, although the room grows chilly,
I haven’t the heart to poke poor Billy.
Ruthless Rhymes for Heartless Homes (1899) “Tender-Heartedness”

“There’s been an accident,” they said,
“Your servant’s cut in half; he’s dead!”
“Indeed!” said Mr Jones, “and please,
Send me the half that’s got my keys.”
Ruthless Rhymes for Heartless Homes (1899) “Mr Jones” (poem attributed to
“G.W.”)

By: Andrew

Andrew — Sat, 21 Mar 2009 09:08:58 +0000

Thanks Rightback. In 14dn I thought answer specifically referred to the feature on digital TV where you can press the red button to get more information about the current programme, or some such. The “still” seems redundant though.