Times 24314

Author   petebiddlecombePosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
Solving time: 8:43

A fairly straightforward puzzle – some novel words, but no clue really held me up. 27 and 7 assisted by a visit to Kew Gardens yesterday with a nephew. Jimbo will be delighted to know that today we’re off to the Science Museum.

Across
1 PA=old man,RIS=rev. of Sir
4 VI(V,A)CIOUS
9 IMPART,fInAlLy – “just” is the first of quite a few well-hidden defs
10 VI(C)A,(doo)R
11 IN DEE,D
12 FAR THING – for the first six months or so of my life, the farthing was still in use
14 IRIS=flag,HWO=who*,MAN=soldier
16 LIST – 2 defs
19 EX,PO(e) – wondered briefly about MART = MAR(k) T(wain) but that’s a bit too much cutting
22 MOO=low,RINGS – cat = catamaran
23 C.E.,LT.,sICk
26 T,WIST – wist = I knew, as in “There came men unto me, but I wist not whence they were” – a bit of alliterative fun from some old Bible translators
27 AP(POINTE(e))E
28 F=following,RE(tEaM)ASON – clever disguise here, with following not being a charade-ordering instruction
29 FOLLY – hidden reversed in “idyll offhand”
 
Down
1 PRIM,IT.,I’VE=”this writer’s”
2 R,AP(h)ID – you need to know that aphids suck here, but I guess that’s fairly basic.
3 SCREE,CH.,(pathwa)Y – “making harsh noise” is another well-disguised def., as “{wordplay} making {def}” is a possible wordplay+linkword+def clue structure
4 VAIN = “vein” = tubular vessel
5 VAL,PAR(A)IS,O – I’m sure others wondered about a French word for harem from “Woman’s area in 1 ac”
6 CAV(IT)Y – cavy = an old word for guinea pig, or any member of a larger family of rodents
7 ORCHIDIST – chid = reprimanded in RIOTS*
8 SPRI(n)G
13 COR ANGLAIS = (sing a carol)*
15 IMROV(1’S)E – feels like wordplay I’ve seen many times before, but I don’t remember this exact clue which does it very well
17 T(R)EACHER,(histor)Y
18 U.N.,BE=remain,LIEF
21 V(I,CT.)IM
22 MO,TIF=rev. of fit = an archaism for a section of a poem, used specifically in Carroll’s Hunting of the Snark – “an agony in eight fits”
24 TOTAL = unqualified – T.A. = soldiers in rev. of LOT=”piece of land in America”. Another well-hidden def as “unqualified soldiers” might describe the T.A.
25 OPEN – 2 defs, one effectively “a kind of verdict”

23 comments on “Times 24314”

  1. Third day running 2 hour slog.
    Solid fare with not much to amuse or amaze.
    Off to Lords now for the day where The Ashes abide for once unashamed.
  2. This one started out as what would be my worst nightmare if it were my day to write the blog. I was unable to focus on any clue properly and it was 15 minutes before I wrote in my first answer ORCHIDIST at 7dn. I had spotted the anagram fodder at 13dn and 20ac but without any checking letters in place I was unable to unravel them.

    However, having solved 7dn things started to flow and I got through the rest of it 40 minutes. Then I went back to check all the wordplay and discovered two errors “void” for VAIN at 4dn and “tilt” for LIST at 16ac. I didn’t know LIST = “border”.

    I’m not sure I’m completely happy with 11ac and 14ac with their assumptions of nationality.

    1. Re 11ac and 14ac: I have no problem with an Irishwoman being a Dubliner; but could agree with you that a swimming Scot would not necessarily be the only one “in Dee”. The Dee is the other river that makes the Wirral a peninsula, so it might be swum in (that is when it has any water) by a Welshman, a woolly-back soi-disant Scouser or a denizen of, say, Chester.
      1. I’m a bit puzzled by the fuss about Dee – there must be dozens of words here for which the indication is one of several possibilities. Why does this suddenly matter when all the possibilities are rivers? (Seven according to Wikipedia if we include two Aussie and one Irish Dees.)
  3. Quite straightforward except for the 24/29 intersection which held me up a while. So 16 mins in all. Only a vague background in Anglo-Saxon English and having a dressmaker for a mother saved the day at 16ac. My COD to 14ac for some very tidy cluing.
  4. About 30 mins today, but without VALPARAISO, which I’d never coma across before and just couldn’t get my head around the wordplay.
  5. Off to a flier in the top half and then a gradual slowing in the bottom half for 40 mins in total. I remember farthings quite well, although I don’t think you could actually buy anything with just one in my day. I liked INDEED & MOTIF but COD to IRISHWOMAN, which I penned hastily from definition before realising the clever wordplay. And as for Valparaiso…
  6. An easy top half but more difficult below the equator where I struggled to get the wordplay for TOTAL and FREEMASON. 25 minutes to solve.

    I agree with the quibble about INDEED (which Dee and why a Scot particularly) and would prefer “Dubliner perhaps” for IRISHWOMAN.

    As a boy I used to go shopping for my mother and a hot freshly baked roll at the bakers cost one farthing. I used to buy 4 (which cost one penny) and the baker used to give me a broken one to eat on the way home.

    I hope the trip goes well Peter. Do they have first and second generation computers in the museum these days?

    1. Successful trip – had a quick look at the computing section – reconstructions of Babbage’s difference engine (zeroth generation!), and a rather splendid Ferranti that took up a whole room, and an old PDP mini, but not much from the 60s or 70s like the card-printing desk/typewriter I’d been hoping to talk about. And I failed to find any of the old wooden cases with handles to turn, though there was other interactive stuff.
    2. I am amazed to find that the farthing continued to be legal tender until 1960 by which time I was 13. I have no recollection of anything being sold at a price involving a farthing, though “four for a penny” was common enough in the sweet shops.
  7. 38 min, but with rampant cheating towards the end. Not helped by stupid misspellings on my part. Also (probably not alone), had put VOID in 4 dn, and did not pick up the error until re-checking. Very grumpy about the whole puzzle, but not from any fault on the setters part. Probably the Chilean red.
  8. One mistake in my 19:33. I failed with LIST, the ‘border’ definition of which I didn’t know. I guessed at ’tilt’.

    I share the dissatisfaction with the Irishwoman, but found compensation with 22a MOORINGS, my favourite of the day.

  9. This brought an end to my recent run of success as I went for Void at 4D, going on the definition without being able to justify it. Up to then I was quite pleased to get unusual words such as list (for border), wist, fit (for poem) and lief.

    I don’t think I was aware that fit was an archaic word for a division of a poem. I just knew it from The Hunting of the Snark and thought it was a bit of Carroll’s whimsy.

  10. 10.15. Steady progress for the most part with nothing eyecatching. IRISHWOMAN has raised some comment but the Dubliner/flag immediately put IRIS(H) in my mind (clues in the dim, if not distant, past)so no real problems in practice.
    Came to a bit of a wall in the SW corner. I guessed at MOTIF despite fit=verse being unknown to me 21,28 and 26 all took a bit of time before falling in that order
  11. 24 minutes but with one error (void). Slowed by my own, um, slowness in unravelling the anagrams at 13 & 20 and by wanting 1d to begin with PERT.

    Guesses for LIST, WIST, LIEF and FIT, although I should have known the latter from H2G2.

    Despite the reservations expressed above my COD is indeed, which I think is rescued by the QM.

  12. As a relative novice to the Times cryptic – I’ve been solving it daily since 1 January – I think beginners will learn a lot from reviewing this puzzle alongside the explanations. Thanks to Peter for the clear and comprehensive analysis. I didn’t do well today, solving only 13 of the clues – mainly in the NW and SE corners – before I had to resort to computer help…but I didn’t admit defeat until I’d found the hidden word (FOLLY)!

    Several devices were new to me, e.g.:

    door at rear = R
    cats = catamarans
    heartily sick = IC, and officer = LT

    plus several new words like CAVY, ORCHIDIST, VALPARAISO and WIST.

  13. Wow, I found this one a real slog, another half-hour plus effort (needed to take a break) but got there. Had question marks next to TWIST and LIST, not knowing the WIST and thinking that the might be a better answer. Spent forever thinking there was a bit of South America called YATAL before realising TOTAL. Great clueing of IRISHWOMAN, and know VALPARAISO as a college.
  14. Steady progress after a slowish start. Lots of good clues. No complaint from me about Dubliner=IRISHWOMAN at 14ac. If I’d remembered that whiskery old setter’s device – flag=IRIS – a bit quicker, it wouldn’t have held me up for as long as it did. About 30 mins in all, but timing irrelevant as, like some others, I too had VOID (I knew it was almost certainly wrong but stupidly couldn’t think of anything else. Can I borrow your dunce’s cap, Peter?)instead of the obviously correct VAIN at 4dn. Silly. Easy clue really.
  15. About 40 minutes but I also went for VOID instead of VAIN. Didn’t understand CELTIC either til arriving here. Held up across the lower half, and like others didn’t really know all the little word bits: fit, wist, lief. COD to the well hidden FOLLY. Regards.
  16. aside from the one letter difference, I really wanted this to be MEME – second section of poem, set up, repeated = idea.
  17. Not too hard except 11ac, where I spent too long trying to use “swimming” as an anagram indicator. My only query is 6d – I can’t quite see how “exactly what’s needed” = “it”.
    1. Chambers says “the ne plus ultra, that which answers exactly what is needed” As in Yes-that’s IT!!!

Comments are closed.