Mephisto 2710 by Tim Moorey – Meet Alfie at the Ritz

Author   dorsetjimboPosted on Categories Mephisto
Good Mephisto of average difficulty. I was intrigued by trigamist, believing wrongly that bigamist applied to any number of multiple marriages – personally I find one wife quite enough to cope with! Also by the combination of Amy Johnson and Les Dawson. Why not Amy Winehouse and Les Dawson or Amy Johnson and Les Holden?

Across
1 PAEONY – (open day – d=dutch)*;
7 YUPS – Y-UPS; we had UPS=United Parcel Service recently;
10 MATELASSE – MAT(E-LASS)E; china (plate)=MATE; stitching that gives a quilted appearance; any ideas how Private Eye Crossword might have clued this word?;
11 RITZ – sounds like “writs”; Afternoon Tea in the Palm Court at the London Ritz is a must do experience (wearing a tie, naturally);
13 ROWDON – ROW-DOW; the sound of a drum apparently;
14 BREARE – B-REARE(d); bishop=B (chess); old word for briar;
16 IPOH – HOPI reversed; capital of Perat State, Malaysia;
18 SEMMIT – TIM(M)ES reversed; Monsiuer=M; a vest in Sutherland;
20 COPATAINE – C(O-PAT)AINE; ref Michael Caine; oscar=O (phonetic alphabet); old high crowned hat (not a lot of people know that);
21 SARATOGAS – SAGAS reversed contains (a=australian + tor)*; tor from tor(n); travelling trunks which must have something to do with Saratoga in NY where the battles of 1777 were the turning point in American War of Independence;
24 TSOTSI – T(SOTS)I; A book and a film about a thug;
25 IDEM – plan=idea then replace a=one by m=Malta; familiar to insurance people from consensus ad idem that can only arise if uberima fides exists through full disclosure by the propsed insured;
28 SCAPUS – S(CAP)US; see scape-1; without foliage;
30 LADINO – LAD-IN-O; Romance language Judeo-(Castilion) Spanish;
31 GLEN – G(L)EN;
32 TRIGAMIST – anagram of (s)A(y)-(ja)SMI(ne)-(le)TIT(ia)-(in)GR(id); Captain Cad, Ian Gillon, no doubt;
33 SENA – SEN-A; without=SEN; parliamentary army;
34 GEISHA – (age)* surrounds ISH=issue; Japanese professional flirts;
 
Down
1 PERSICOT – PER-SI(CO)T; apricot cordial;
2 ABIB – BIBA reversed; British Insurance Brokers Association;
3 ECTROPION – (notice)* surrounds OP=operation; deformity of the lower eyelid;
4 NATANT – N-A-TAN(ker)-T; navy=N;
5 HERESIARCH – HERE’S-I-ARCH; Luther in Catholic eyes;
6 SLOVEN – S(LOVE)N; hospital=san then change a=one to LOVE=nothing;
7 YAWS – sounds like “yours”;
8 PSOCIDAE – (diascope)*; book lice for example;
9 SEWN – S-E-W-N;
12 DREARISOME – D(REAR-IS)OME;
15 AMYGDULES – AMY-(dug)*-LES; referency Amy Johnson (aviator) and Les Dawson (entertainer); lava containing pockets of say calcite or quartz;
17 POTSHARE – (a poets h)* surrounds R=right; h from (whic)h; Spencer’s potsherd;
19 TASMANIA – (it as)* surrounds (Isle of) MAN then A=Australian;
22 ASANAS – AS(AN-A)S; sitting still in yoga;
23 TRANSE – (astern)*; a passage in Perth;
26 ELTS – ST(y)LE reversed;
27 BIGA – BI(t)-GA(y);
29 SETH – sounds like “saith”; reference Vikram Seth;

6 comments on “Mephisto 2710 by Tim Moorey – Meet Alfie at the Ritz”

  1. I had a few more problems with this, and I have one incorrect answer – I had YAWY for the disease at 7 thinking that “letter” had to indicate something. Very much taken by the clue for SLOVEN
  2. Well I found this very hard indeed. I got there eventually but had to cheat a few times. Several I didn’t understand so thanks for the explanations.
    15dn was one of the ones I had to cheat for. I’d figured out the middle GDU but hadn’t a clue what I was looking for with _M_L_S. Les might have occurred to me eventually but Amy wouldn’t be in my Johnson top twenty!
    1. Not sure what you mean by “cheat”.

      When I was first doing these circa 1960 there was no opportunity to use a computer to help the solving. When really stuck it was a matter of sitting down with Chambers and “dictionary hunting” – so looking up all possible permutations of -M-GDUL-S (starting with the most likely) until the solution was found. This was valuable because reading the dictionary broadened ones vocab. We never thought of that as “cheating” – it was an accepted part of the process that diminished as one gained in experience.

      1. I have Chambers on my iPhone and iPad, and the app allows you to search for words that fit ?M?GDUL?S (of which there aren’t many!) When I say I’ve cheated it means I’ve resorted to this rather than the kind of “legitimate” alphabetic search you describe. This normally happens when I’m completely stuck and don’t have a clue about the first letters of any of the clues, which would at least give me some idea of where I should be looking.
        In my book any technique that enables me to get the answer when I wouldn’t have got it with a paper copy of Chambers is cheating. This includes Bradfords.
  3. Apologies for the delay – I’ve only just got round to looking at this blog. I found this one quite tough – certainly tougher than last week’s and next week’s – but managed to finish it correctly without recourse to Chambers or any other solving aids.

    When I first started tackling Ximenes, I had no hesitation in using Chambers; but nowadays, for plain cryptics like this, I enjoy the challenge of solving unaided. So, for me, using Chambers would be cheating, but I accept that you have to be fairly experienced for this to be practicable.

  4. Just remembered:

    There was an old person of Lyme,
    Who married three wives at one time.
    When asked, “Why the third?”
    He replied, “One’s absurd,
    And bigamy, sir, is a crime!”

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