Times 25,402 Jim Whitman Meets Francis Drake

Author   dorsetjimboPosted on Categories Daily Cryptic
Solving time 20 minutes

Nothing too difficult here but a range of GK required. I’m not sure for example quite how well known either the countertenor or the castaway are let alone the Norse tree.

Across
1 COFFER – sounds like “cougher”; box is the definition;
4 OPPONENT – OP-P(ON)ENT;
10 SPOONBILL – SPOON-BILL; wading ibis that became extinct in UK but was reintroduced to Norfolk in 2010;
11 FLEET – two meanings 1=fast 2=armada intercepted by Drake after playing bowls on Plymouth Hoe;
12 ANARCHISTIC – AN(ARCH-I’S)TIC;
14 ASH – two meanings; Yggdrasil is the norse ash;
15 ARSENAL – AR(S)ENA-L; consistently under-performing North London football team;
17 STASIS – two meanings 1=reference East German secret police “the Stasi’s” 2=lack of activity;
19 FABRIC – FAB-(majo)R-IC; drill is a cloth;
21 CADENCE – straight definition almost, reference “perfect cadence”;
23 COB – CO-B; b=black (on pencils to indicate softness);
24 FORGET-ME-NOT – FORGE(T)MEN-(TO reversed);
26 TWANG – TWA-N(ew)-G(uinea);
27 COUNTLESS – COUNT(L)ESS; L from L(ucullus);
29 YODELLER – YO-DELLER; YO=US greeting; reference Alfred Deller 1912-79 famous countertenor;
30 CRAYON – C-RAYON; cape=C;
 
Down
1 CASTAWAY – CAST-AWAY; reference Alexander Selkirk who inspired Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe;
2 FIONA – F-IONA;
3 EON – single=”one” then move e=european to give EON;
5 PILATES – P(IL)ATES; sehr gut in angemessenheit;
6 OFFICIALDOM – OFF(ICI)AL-(MOD reversed); target for the 12A;
7 ELEVATION – two meanings 1=diagram 2=height;
8 TITCHY – T(errier)-ITCHY;
9 FINIAL – FIN(I)AL;
13 CENTRIFUGAL – (carting fuel)*;
16 STARBOARD – STAR-BOARD; “right” on board ship is STARBOARD;
18 JETTISON – JETTI(E)S-ON; mole=jetty; E from (espionag)E;
20 CORACLE – CO(RA-C)LE; RA=painter (Royal Academy); C from C(anal); reference iconic composer Cole Porter;
21 CHEQUE – sounds like “Czech”;
22 SCATTY – S(CAT)TY;
25 NEEDY – NEE-D(ieppe)-Y;
28 TAR – RAT reversed;

25 comments on “Times 25,402 Jim Whitman Meets Francis Drake”

  1. 23 min for this enjoyable puzzle after a moment of madness and complete lack of analysis when putting in Boothe for 1ac. Lincoln etc! Not even sure if Wilkes had an ‘e’. Oh well.
  2. Went fairly well but hit the wall on 26 minutes at the last one, finial, the more annoying as I kind of knew it. Maybe in an alternative universe there’s a gable ornament known as a firill. Enjoyable up to then, a neat turn of wit throughout.
  3. Sailed round anti-clockwise quite easily then becalmed in the top right with OPPONENT, ELEVATION and FLEET. The last of these has to be COD. Great lift-and-separate; as were “theatre box”, “one’s flouting”, “noble setting”, “Selkirk players” and “right people”.

    I took it there were two meanings at 21ac: one to do with the quality of the spoken voice (tonal inflection) and the other musical. I read “perfect” in its literal sense (over, finished) since a cadence is the “sequence of notes or chords comprising the close of a musical phrase” (NOAD).

  4. Well, this was a lively one! I thought I might be on for a rare sub-30 minute job but in the end I was delayed in the NW by the 1s, 12ac and 9dn and this took my time to 42 minutes. 11ac was pretty good, wasn’t it?

    Alfred Deller was well known to me and he had a famous son, Mark, also a countertenor, who fortunately does not yet qualify for reference in a daily puzzle.

    I agree CADENCE is a double definition. From memory the musical cadences used in ABRSM aural tests were called Perfect, Imperfect, Plagal and Interrupted but there are many other terms and subdivisions in use.

    Edited at 2013-02-19 09:19 am (UTC)

  5. 15 minutes, all good fun,except for kicking myself over the complete failure to recognise the bowler in 11 (was Jellicoe at Jutland famous for his hat? Nelson played cricket?).
    Didn’t know (shame!) Deller either – plays darts, doesn’t he, and still alive. Positive CADENCE rang a faint bell, so that’s two musical references I shouldn’t be ignorant about.
    I usually spell ARSENAL with a sprinkling of asterisks (a Lane man myself) but wonder whether there was mischief in setting it next to STASIS.
    I would have given CoD to FLEET had I understood it, but liked CASTAWAY just as much – neat surface, tricky separation..
  6. By the by, I looked up “sehr gut in angemessenheit”, being unfamiliar with the phrase. Google translate has “very good in adequacy” so “good in small doses”(?) What amazed me (as it always does) is that Google also has Jim’s entry as the top two hits. How does it do that?

    Edited at 2013-02-19 09:45 am (UTC)

    1. Yes, good in small doses if my memory serves me right – a long time since I had to do business in Germany. PILATES of course was invented by a German.

      Google algorithms are simply very good!!

  7. Took me 40 minutes. Had a senior moment with ANARCHISTIC: I identified “antic” and “is”, but couldn’t find the entrance.

    ASH was a complete guess; I did wonder if Ash Yggdrasil might be a famous Welsh bard.

  8. 22m. I liked this. I didn’t know perfect CADENCE, drill, Deller, the ash or mole, but the other bits of the clue were clear. Actually thinking about it now I’ve a feeling I’ve come across mole before.
    I like most offal so I’m always a bit thrown when it’s called “rubbish”.
    I only know about Selkirk because of these crosswords: one of those things you just have to know.

    Edited at 2013-02-19 12:44 pm (UTC)

  9. Agree re CADENCE. Nothing too hostile today, and I stumbled across the line in 38 minutes. There appears to be no correlation between perceived, or even actual, difficulty, and my solving times.

    Many thanks for your blog.
    Chris.


  10. Managed all but two: CASTAWAY (hadn’t come across Mr Selkirk, but got the first bit, so should have worked it out), and ANARCHISTIC (which I also should have worked out, despite not knowing that ANTIC=grotesque).

    Other unknowns were the Norse ASH and the singer at 29ac. Didn’t manage to parse EON, and the historical reference of FLEET was totally lost on me.

    An enjoyable, though for me at least, quite tricky one. Many thanks to setter and to Jim.

  11. A pleasant 25.18 for me with no serious hold ups but a bit of stuttering around the NE until ELEVATION fell. My COD also to FLEET the more so because it reminded me of my favourite ‘howler’ from a time when I was teaching lower school history. Asked to retell the story of the Spanish Armada one sweet little girl informed me that as the servant ran up the hill shouting to Sir Francis to come quick as the Spanish were here, Sir Francis replied: Never mind the Spanish; they can wait but my bowels can’t! Changes the way you see things for ever. I shared this with the Times Educational Supplement and still have the amusing little cartoon somewhere with which the tale was illustrated. The little girl was called Michelle – one of 7 Michelles in a first year secondary class of 33 pupils. But then it was 1976. Thank you Sir Paul!
    1. If there was a ‘Recommend this Comment’ button I would click it. Thank you for making me smile – twice!
      1. I fully endorse this comment. Grestyman has ruined Sir Francis for me for ever! We often seem to find humour in the same things. By a strange coincidence my sister-inlaw has just sent me an amusing link on Facebook featuring Alfred Deller. I’d share the link with you except that I’m no good at this sort of thing. So suggest you Google it yourself. It’s a lute song by Thomas Morley called “Will you buy a fine dog” (second line: “with a hole in his head”) You’ll find it on youtube under “Alfred Deller sings Robert Morley”.
        1. “Will you buy a fine dog” is a great favourite of mine. I think this link is preferable to the one you cited as it only has the wrong words, whereas the other one has the wrong music as well! (It’s a “poting stick” for heaven’s sake – don’t these people speak English?)
          1. I’ve never heard it before so wouldn’t know whether or not the words and/or music are correct. The Youtube version is enhanced by the dry comment of the radio announcer. The body of the song reminds me a bit of “Fine Knacks for Ladies” which I’ve sung with a group. But the “fine dog” is more droll. Do you think the hole in the head was meant to be a selling point, adding to the dog’s value in some way? And what’s a “poting stick”. I guess at something like a poss stick but am almost certainly wrong. Great stuff, whatever. Ann
            1. Just looked up “poting stick” and found it to be a ruff-stiffener. I also found that Shakespeare uses it metaphorically for something rude! Maybe I shouldn’t be surprised that you would know this…
            2. The words and music are wrong in the sense that they don’t match what Deller is singing or (even more) what the lutenist is playing, making their presence pretty pointless.

              I’d no idea what a poting stick was until I looked it up (the online OED defines it as “a wooden, iron, or bone tool for crimping linen”). It’s pretty clear that that’s what Deller’s singing rather than a “potting stick”.

  12. No problems today 20 minutes, all correct, although didn’t see why JETTISON was so and never heard of Mr Deller, so thanks Jim for blog.
  13. Did this early (during breaks in pub trivia) and finished late. Things fell into place pretty well as it went along. JETTISON and YODELLER from definition, but they couldn’t really be anything else. SPOONBILL with a shrug but it was correct so woohoo.
  14. I loved this puzzle. It ticked all the boxes for me. LOI was 11a. I was so sure it was going to be another damnable cricket clue that I almost gave up on it. I had a good laugh when the penny finally dropped. A fun-filled 25 minutes. Ann
  15. A delightful puzzle, which I made rather heavy weather of (10:23), no doubt still under the influence of a visit to a gin distillery (with tastings 🙂 this afternoon.

    I wasted what seemed like ages: trying to work LOGE into 1ac (COFFER); bunging in SWIFT for 11ac (FLEET), remembering the story of some cricketer who caught a small bird imagining it was the ball; carelessly bunging in RAT for 28dn (TAR).

  16. I’m catching up with last week’s puzzles after my holiday last week.
    31/32 today with Fabric missing. Guessed the Yggdrasil Ash from the checking letters. Enjoyed the clues for Coffer and Countless in particular.

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