ST 4388 (Sun 4 Jul) – Into the breech

Author   talbinhoPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic

Solving time: 10:35

I got bogged down in this, struggling with ASTERN/TITMOUSE and CALICO/BREECH-LOADING. This was much a better puzzle than usual – there were some excellent clues with very good surface readings, as well as some subtle cryptic definitions.

* = anagram, “X” = sounds like ‘X’.

Across
1 ELECTIONEER (cryptic def)
10 HOSTA; HOST (= ‘anchorman’) + A
11 TOWN CRIER; (CROWN)* with TIER (= ‘rank’) outside
12 URSA MINOR (cryptic def) – the ‘Little Bear’ constellation, hence ‘Bear up’. Very clever.
13 O + LIVE – ‘but’ is an awkward link word.
14 ASTERN; A + STERN (= ‘grave’) – the definition is ‘The wake is’, referring to the wake of a ship. Pretty tough, and a slightly stilted cryptic reading (‘by a grave’ meaning ‘by A, grave’) but an excellent surface reading.
16 FEVERISH; FISH around (EVE (= ‘first mate’) + [tanke]R) – a troll is a type of fish, so the clue should really say something like ‘troll perhaps’.
18 INTRIGUE (cryptic def)
20 CALICO (2 defs) – my last entry, and it took me a while. It’s a good job I was sure about the A of AIRMAIL or I’d probably have stuck in ‘domino’.
23 AGORA; OR (= ‘gold’) + A (= ‘article’) after AG (= ‘silver’)
24 PORT + RAY + ED
26 LUSTINESS; (U.S. TIN) in LESS (= ‘reduced’)
27 A + GAIN
28 ENCAPSULATE; (PEACE + SULTAN)*

Down
2 LISTS (2 defs) – the ‘lists’ were the boundaries of a jousting area, which I didn’t know.
3 CHARMER (def + allusion)
4 IN TENT
5 N,E,W,S + REEL (= ‘Spin’)
6 ENCLOSE; [op]EN + CLOSE
7 RHEUMATICALLY; “ROOM ATTIC” + ALLY
8 DIVI-DIVI; (I’D VIVID)* around I – one of these.
9 BREECH-LOADING; BRING around (“EACH” + LOAD) – very smooth surface for a fairly complex wordplay. For some reason I had to persuade myself that ‘prime’ could give LOAD.
15 TITMOUSE; TIT (= ‘worn-out nag’) + MOUSE (= ‘vermin’) – I wasted time here looking for something ending in ‘horse’.
17 SUBPOENA; (UPON BASE)* – an intransitive anagram indicator (‘cook’).
19 I(RANI)AN
21 AIRMAIL (cryptic def)
22 CRISIS; CR[edit] + IS,IS
25 YEAST; (AS YET)*

4 comments on “ST 4388 (Sun 4 Jul) – Into the breech”

  1. I assumed you were going to thrash me again at this one, but perhaps my 7:03 wasn’t quite as bad as I’d thought. Clearly I was helped by getting BREECH-LOADING and TITMOUSE first time through (and possibly ASTERN as well – I don’t remember).

    I’ve come across CALICO (as a horse) before, though perhaps only in crosswords, and I’m pretty sure this wasn’t the first time I’d seen “bear up” for URSA MAJOR/MINOR. But, all in all, a very pleasant puzzle.

  2. This one delayed me for 50 minutes. I thought it was excellent for the ST (as is this week’s).

    I didn’t know the clapped-out horse.

    I think we also had the first mate/first lady thing in one of last week’s daily puzzles.

  3. I think troll was meant as a verb: to fish rather than a fish. Just as prime was meant as the verb to prime as in load.

    As always, really appreciate this blog.
    Thanks

  4. Calico horses are wild horses that live in the calico mountains. Not necessarily spotted

    maybe the clue should have been “spotted cat”

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