Comments on: Financial Times 13,687 by Mudd

By: Bryan

Bryan — Thu, 19 May 2011 07:21:16 +0000

Many thanks Pete – this was very enjoyable and, in my view, rather more challenging than the Paul which appeared in The Grauniad the same day.

Like you, I recall Beef Tea from my childhood.

By: Pete Maclean

Pete Maclean — Thu, 19 May 2011 03:25:23 +0000

Hi Sil, I agree about the weakness of 1A; I had been considering saying something to that effect. The clue strikes me as hardly cryptic.

Thanks for the information about Pieter van der Faes. You would be the one to know, of course!

And I do know the etymology of NB; I was just careless in my write-up.

By: Sil van den Hoek

Sil van den Hoek — Wed, 18 May 2011 23:45:59 +0000

Thanks Pete, not sure whether I found this a typically strong Mudd. There were too many cheapish (or at least throwaway) clues to my taste, like for example 26ac (EXPORT), 6d (LEAVE) and 1ac (OKLAHOMA) [which is hardly a dd].

All in all, enjoyable enough though.
I share your admiration for HEADSTONE (3d), and I particularly liked the ‘silly men’ that were ‘unable to see’ in 10ac.

The real name of the artist in 2d is Pieter van der Faes, who came to the UK when he was 23 years old. He is famous for his court portraits. Charles I and Oliver Cromwell are amongst the ones that sat for him. Later he became court painter to Charles II (as indeed Sir Peter Lely).

Finally, the ONB bit in our friend the bear (9d) is slightly different from your parsing. O is, I would say of course, ‘old’ but NB is the abbreviation for ‘nota bene’ (translated from latin as ‘note well’ which is to be found in the clue).