A masterful QC from the great man. A few obscure bits of vocab but the clues are generous and (as always) scrupulously fair. I enjoyed it, and also enjoyed learning a new word for essential oil (which I intend to deploy in casual conversation as soon as possible). All done in 08:10 which is slightly below my average, so I hope this will go down well.
Definitions underlined in bold.
| Across | |
| 7 | Report of way travelled on horseback? (4) |
| RODE – sounds like [report of] “road” [way]. Since you could ride other things (e.g. a bicycle), we get a ? to indicate that this is a definition by example. | |
| 8 | University officer, one friend best of all? (8) |
| ULTIMATE – U [university] + LT [officer – abbreviation for “Lieutenant”) + I [one] + MATE [friend]. | |
| 9 | Unruffled debate, quiet all round (6) |
| SMOOTH – MOOT [debate] with SH [quiet] around it [all round]. | |
| 10 | Gave a speech — nothing highly thought of (6) |
| ORATED – O [nothing] + RATED [highly thought of]. | |
| 11 | Insect seen in spring, naturally (4) |
| GNAT – hidden [seen in] inside “spring naturally”. This is the first of three hiddens today, so if you suffer from hidden-blindness then it may have slowed you down! | |
| 12 | Island frenzy after job’s unfinished (8) |
| TASMANIA – MANIA [frenzy] coming after [after] TAS [job’s unfinished – job is “task”, remove the last letter]. | |
| 15 | One who moralizes quietly about a dear Parisian (8) |
| PREACHER – P [quietly] + RE [about] + A [a] + CHER [dear Parisian, “cher” being “dear” in French]. | |
| 17 | Food course (4) |
| TACK – double definition. Took me a while to see this since “tack” for “food” did not leap to mind and even when I thought of it I wasn’t sure. I put it in in the end because I thought it was a sort of hard biscuit used on old sailing vessels, though I now find that that’s “hardtack”. Anyway, TACK does indeed mean “food, esp when regarded as inferior or distasteful” (Collins: C19, unknown origin). | |
| 18 | Took a chance, heading off, and walked slowly (6) |
| AMBLED – {g}AMBLED. | |
| 21 | Ointment possibly manufactured by Italian river (6) |
| POMADE – MADE [manufactured] after [by] PO [Italian river]. Very decent of Izetti to specify “Italian”, to stop us cycling through the long list of three letter rivers. POMADE is “a perfumed oil or ointment put on the hair” (Collins); because it could be an oil, Izetti says “ointment possibly“. I remembered the word from Agatha Christie – there was a running gag about whether Poirot used POMADE on his moustache (he denied it). | |
| 22 | First-class job consumed disloyal individual (8) |
| APOSTATE – my POI. A [first class – I was looking for AI or ACE or even IST] + POST [job] + ATE [consumed]. I had never encountered this word until Salman Rushdie wrote The Satanic Verses and was declared an APOSTATE; then it was everywhere. | |
| 23 | Carol provided by choristers in Germany (4) |
| SING – our second hidden, inside “choristers in Germany”. | |
| Down | |
| 1 | Person without title not so rare (8) |
| COMMONER – double definition, the second one slightly whimsical. | |
| 2 | Response from rotter being devious (6) |
| RETORT – anagram [being devious] of “rotter”. RIP Rotter, my illustrious predecessor in this blog-slot. | |
| 3 | Bird Greek character found on roofing material (8) |
| NUTHATCH – NU [Greek character] + THATCH [roofing material]. Very good; it takes a setter’s eye to spot the “thatch” in “nuthatch”. They are charming little birds . I arrived at this by thinking of “thatch” first and then cycling through the incomplete jumble of Greek letters which mills around in my mind. | |
| 4 | Essential oil obtained through trampling olives originally (4) |
| OTTO – first letters [originally] of “obtained through trampling olives”. NHO but generously clued. Collins says that this is another word for “attar” (or “ottar”) and that “attar” is “an essential oil from flowers, esp the damask rose, used pure or as a base for perfume”. So now we know. Makes a change from OTTO being a German chap. | |
| 5 | This writer’s chum, a beast (6) |
| IMPALA – I’M [this writer’s] + PAL [chum] + A [a]. IMPALAs are beautiful antelopes: they are two a penny if you are ever lucky enough to go on safari, but I never tire of looking at them. | |
| 6 | Nasty eye — what contributes to it? (4) |
| STYE – our third hidden, inside “nasty eye”. Could this be an &Lit? I think so, but the Clue Police will tell us. | |
| 13 | Small amount for each fighter (8) |
| SCRAPPER – I thought of SCRAPPER early on but since I was breaking it down as S for small, I was rather baffled as to how CRAPPER meant “amount for each”. Stop sniggering at the back. Eventually I realised that it’s SCRAP [small amount] + PER [for each]. | |
| 14 | Damage follows popular Channel Islands event (8) |
| INCIDENT – this also held me up because I thought “damage” was going to be “mar”. It isn’t: it’s DENT, which comes after [follows] IN [popular] + CI [Channel Islands]. | |
| 16 | Book on time, finally (2,4) |
| AT LAST – ATLAS [book] + T [time]. What an elegant clue. | |
| 17 | Most uninspiring teams playing — last thing cricket needs (6) |
| TAMEST – anagram [playing] of “teams”, + T [last thing cricket needs]. I hesitated here because I wondered if the definition was going to be “thing that cricket needs”, like “wicket”. | |
| 19 | Look gloomy as the first person appearing outside work (4) |
| MOPE – ME [the first person] going round [appearing outside] OP [work, abbreviation of the Latin opus]. | |
| 20 | Daughter and guy go slowly (4) |
| DRAG – my first stab at this was “drib”, which means “to flow or let flow in small drops or amounts” (Collins). My logic was D for daughter and “rib” for “guy” (as in “tease” – if you haven’t logged “guy” for “tease” before then make a mental note, because setters love to confuse us with the double meaning). Right idea but wrong word: in fact it’s D [daughter] + RAG [guy, as in tease]. | |
Thought I was so clever with friend for 5d way off the mark fiendishly so you might say!
Thanks, Izetti and Templar. 8.09 but nuances of parsing still emerged from the blog.
DNF
A 50:50 toss up between TUCK meaning food or TACK meaning course. Couldn’t see how either fit the other definition. Guessed wrong.
I applied my rose otto oil body butter this morning, and finished this well before Winchester. I thought Tack was more likely to be a word for food than Tuck was to be a word for course, so chose Tack rather than Tuck.
I got all but the final two in under 12 minutes! I got all but two of the acrosses right off the bat! Astonishing start for an Izetti. And then I spent another four and a half minutes on SCRAPPER and APOSTATE.
Oh well, close to my average at 16:25. Thank you for the blog!
15 mins
Enjoyed this puzzle except the SE section.