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Bertandjoyce are away & without internet access; so I am subbing in this midweek spot. Dac, as usual, served up a varied potpourri of very fair clues. I particularly like his efforts to make the surface of so many clues smooth and apt in the context … indeed a workman proud of his craftsmanship.
Across
1 Hymn perhaps sung as late Mass starts (5) PSALM
&littish acrostic – first letters of Perhaps Sung As Late Mass
4 Expand farm during busy spell? (6,3) BRANCH OUT
Ins of RANCH (farm) in BOUT (busy spell)
9 Bombs residence near Niagara? (5,4) FALLS FLAT
FALLS (Niagara) FLAT (residence) Bomb is an American slang for a failure especially in the film industry
10 Who’ll make name in Japanese art, first and foremost? (5) NINJA
N (name) IN J A (first letters of Japanese art)
11 Asian citizen, one arrested crossing western border of Afghanistan (7) IRANIAN
I (one) + ins of A (western border of Afghanistan) in RAN IN (arrested)
12 Carefully examine injured spine before scan (7) INSPECT
*(SPINE) + CT (Computerised Tomography, scan) What a lovely surface
13 Speech backing firm Lib-Lab partnership (13) COLLABORATION
CO (company, firm) L (Liberal) LAB + ORATION (speech)
16 Enraged, I stamp about showing contempt (13) DISPARAGEMENT
*(ENRAGED I STAMP)
20 Warlike officer given hearing (7) MARTIAL
Sounds like MARSHAL (officer)
22 Plain tune introduced by priest? No way (7)
PRAIRIE Ins of AIR (tune) in PRIEST minus ST (no STREET, no way)
23 Work in Middle Eastern (not British) marketplace (5) AGORA
Ins of GO (work) in ARAB (Middle Eastern) minus B (British) In ancient Greece, an assembly, place of assembly or marketplace.
24 Soldiers dispatched to Italy without feeling (9) SENTIMENT
Ins of MEN (soldiers) in SENT (dispatched) & IT (Italy)
25 Imperfect tense – term used in French course (9) ENTREMETS
*(TENSE TERM) for a light dish served between the chief courses of a meal – I learn a new word which I will probably forget tomorrow 🙂
26 Either way, it’s unacceptable (3,2)
NOT ON The same when spelt backwards
Down
1 Diver breathin’ quickly (6)
PUFFIN PUFFING (breathing quickly) minus G. Am I the only one who used to think this is the young of the Penguin?
2 Every single prospective husband’s wanting female to form partnerships (9)
ALLIANCES ALL (Every single) FIANCE’S (prospective husband’s) minus F (female) – superb surface
3 Call wrong number, having placed phone card the wrong way (7) MISDIAL
Rev of LAID (placed) SIM (Subscriber Identification Module, phone card)
4 Singer performing nicer ballad with Lindisfarne, maybe (7,8) BELINDA CARLISLE
E *(NICER BALLAD) + ISLE (Lindisfarne) and another apt surface involving one of my favourite bands. Who can forget their Lady Eleanor , Fog on the Tyne , etc? As a student in Newcastle in the 70’s, I attended one of their concerts.
5 Among identical groups of workers, pension arrangement is a source of agitation (4,2,4,5) ANTS IN ONES PANTS
Ins of *(PENSION) in ANTS ANTS (identical groups of workers)
6 Card game players holding an ace (7) CANASTA
Ins of AN in CAST (players + A) a card game similar to rummy, played with two full packs of cards, in which up to six players amass points by declaring sets of cards of the same rank
7 Wild cat not born in spring (5) OUNCE
BOUNCE (spring) minus B (born)
8 Raising one’s glass to active supporter of human rights? (8)
TOASTING Cha of TO A STING (Gordon Matthew Thomas Sumner, better known as STING has been a human right activist since 1981 through Amnesty International)
14 Cross, in short, when brought to court (9) INTERSECT
IN TERSE (short) CT (court)
15 A barrier to seal off water (5,3) ADAMS ALE
A DAM (barrier) SALE *(SEAL)
17 Soldiers breaking into a French property cause trouble (7)
AGITATE Ins of TA (Territorial Army, soldiers) in A GITE (A gîte is a specific type of French holiday accommodation which is available for rent)
18 There’s great joy in some relationships (7) ELATION
ha
19 Groom consumed with passion ultimately (6) NEATEN
N (last letter of passion) EATEN (consumed)
21 Current resting place? (5) ROOST
dd a bird’s resting place and the tidal wave (Oakney & Shetland)
Key to abbreviations
dd = double definition
dud = duplicate definition
tichy = tongue-in-cheek type
cd = cryptic definition
rev = reversed or reversal
ins = insertion
cha = charade
ha = hidden answer
*(FODDER) = anagram
yfyap88 at gmail.com = in case anyone wants to contact me in private about some typo
Could it be that dac cheated a bit with 22ac (surely PRIE(st) surrounds AIR rather than introducing it?) , 24ac (why is IT around MEN?), & 8d (where did the A come from? )? Just asking!
Either I was very much on Dac’s wavelength today or it was one of his easier ones. My only unknown was ENTREMETS and it seemed the most likely answer from the anagram fodder once all the checkers were in place.
For chris&helen@1; in 22ac ‘introduced’ is used in the clue to denote the insertion of AIR into PRIE(ST), in 24ac the definition is ‘feeling’ and ‘without’ is used to denote that IT should go around MEN, and in 8dn ‘active’ is one of the many words that the letter ‘a’ on its own can mean (in my copy of Chambers it is in definition a3), so the wordplay in the clue is to=to, active=a, supporter of human rights=Sting.
Strangely, unlike Andy B I struggled a bit with this Dac. But as I’ve said before, if you hold his hand tightly enough he will get you over the finishing line and lose gracefully.
Brilliant surfaces as always, and a nice reminder of Lindisfarne with BELINDA CARLISLE (who I’d vaguely heard of). And that AGORA is the root for AGORAPHOBIA, which I learned through a crossword.
To answer your question in 1dn, Uncle Yap: er, yes. Thanks for standing in to blog.
A nice one from Dac with, as you say, some superb surfaces. Difficult to pick out a CoD but I think INSPECT has it by a short head.
I can see where you were coming from, Uncle Yap, about puffins and penguins. Penguin Books publish books for children (sorry, younger readers) under the Puffin imprint.
Thanks, Dac and UY.
Usual dac smoothness. Thanks UY for the roost def I didn’t know.
Thanks Dac, and Uncl Yap.
Managed this more quickly than usual for a Dac puzzle though I had to guess ENTREMETS (I could just have easily written in ENTRETEMS as I didn’t know the word) and ROOST (didn’t know it was a current). I thought SENTIMENT was beautifully disguised but there were plenty of others to enjoy. Great fun.
Thanks Uncle Yap for standing in for us today. We are now back in the UK and have internet access so decided to get up-to-date with our crossword solving before we sleep!
An enjoyable solve and thankfully fairly quick as it is almost 3:00am where we came from this (sorry – yesterday!) morning!
Thanks for explaining roost and Dac – we smiled when we solved 5D – many thanks to you too!
In Australia, this appeared yesterday. Thank you so much for making muddied water clearer!