Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 26241
A full review by Gnomethang
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BD Rating – Difficulty ** – Enjoyment **
Morning All!
Our usual Saturday setter has given us a bit of a mixed bag. There were a few very pleasant clues (2d and 22a for example) but some others I felt were slightly below par, or at least slightly well worn.
Across
1a Server receives tip in exchange (9)
BARTENDER – END (tip) in BARTER (exchange) leads to a server in a pub. This appears slightly the wrong way round for me unless you remove ‘receives’. Shirley in the clue above the server is receiving the tip, not the exchange?.
6a Fabulous writer having a retrogressive attitude (5)
AESOP – A Greek famous for his moral fables. A with the reversal of POSE (attitude retrogressively). Interesting (or not) to note that the word ‘fable’ comes from the Latin, not Greek, ‘fabula’ which is simply a story. We get ‘Fabulous’ and ‘Fabrication’ from the same stem – I’m made up!.
9a Lily’s American fortune comes first (5)
LOTUS –Lily is the definition. Add US (American) to the end of LOT (fortune or fate)
10a Endless good fortune with four in charge moneymaking (9)
LUCRATIVE – LUC(k) followed by IV (four) inserted (in) RATE (charge) gives a synonym of moneymaking or profitable.
11a According to notice put at risk by chance (12)
PERADVENTURE – This was a bit tortuous for me but now I can’t see why!. PER (according to) with AD(vertisement) and VENTURE (put at risk) gives a slightly Victorian word for ‘by chance’.
14a A learner with students accepted word of hesitation from old boy (7)
ALUMNUS – An alumnus is a former pupil. This Latin word is derived from A L(earner) and the National Union of Students accepting UM (a word of hesitation)
16a Made new impression in pool? (2-5)
RE-TYPED – The pool in question is the typing pool.
17a Cut most of the reference lines (3)
AXE – your x,y,z references on a graph are your axes (plural of axis). Take the last letter off to get cut. My introduction to Cryptic Crosswords when I was about 11 was:
X = 0, Y = 0. How’s that for a start? (6)
18a Knock official dispatch (4,3)
BUMP OFF – A synonym for ‘knock’ and an abbreviation of OFFicial leads to a phrase for kill/dispatch
20a More wonderful soothsayer (7)
DIVINER – “Most divine, Darling, tell me what you see!”
22a Biblical statement (3,9)
NEW TESTAMENT – A nice All-In-One (&Lit) but one that some solvers may have seen before. The word for one section of the Bible, TESTAMENT, is an anagram of STATEMENT so statement could be referred to as a ‘new’ testament.
26a Out with Latin, I challenged, it’s to do with teaching (9)
TUITIONAL – An anagram (challenged) of OUT with LATIN I.
27a Second one of four in working party (5)
SQUAD – S with QUAD (one of four). ‘Working party’ as a definition might have thrown some people but it is in Chambers at #2!
28a Spotted being slightly crazy (5)
DOTTY – We all have a relation like this double definition. Usually an Aunt!.
29a Soldiers protected natural revolutionary predator (9)
TARANTULA – One of the clues that I was least happy with. The definition is ‘predator’ which is a bit non-specific. Take TA (soldiers, or more commonly reserves in Crosswordland as they are the Territorial Army) and insert an anagram (revolutionary) of NATURAL to get a specific predator which happens to be a spider.
Down
1d Go off booklet at regular intervals (4)
BOLT – Take the regular, in this case even, of booklet to give a word meaning to run away quickly, which happens to be the surname of the current men’s 100m and 200m sprint champion Usain.
2d Hotel documents for auditor (4)
RITZ – The famous hotel on Piccadilly is a homophone of the type of documents that a poor man might be served with (if he couldn’t pay his bill there!).
3d Pleased inside to have bird from the Orient (7)
EASTERN – An old chestnut with a slightly new outlook. The insides of plEASed, when added to a TERN leads to a word meaning ‘from the Orient’
4d Character inside citadel talking (5)
DELTA – Hidden Greek Character inside citadel talking
5d Well now (9)
RECOVERED – Cryptic definition of someone who was ill but has gotten better.
6d Opposed to a profit over the way (7)
AGAINST – A GAIN (a profit) over (this is a down clue) ST (one of the usual RoaD, StreeT, AVenuE abbreviations) for ‘way’
7d In jug skimp exercising for winter sport (3,7)
SKI JUMPING – An anagram (exercising) of IN JUG SKIMP gives a type of winter sport favoured by men with no fear. Ugh! I know that Cephas likes the pangram (all the letters of the alphabet in the puzzle) but cramming most of the mid scoring Scrabble letters into one anagram clue makes it a bit obvious!
8d Clergyman appears before a railway goes round corner (10)
PREBENDARY – I was nicely caught out on this as I was looking for one of the standard crosswordland clergymen. Instead we have PRE (before) and A RY (a railway) going around BEND. The definition is a canon, or a resident clergyman who enjoys a prebend. I’m saying nothing!
12d Fizzy element consumed by daughter (10)
CARBONATED – A simple charade of the 6th element in the periodic table with ATE and D(aughter).
13d Unreal game of cards? (5,5)
DUMMY WHIST – We have a Cryptic Definition here for a game of cards, normally played with four people, with one hand sitting out. I was aware of the ‘dummy’ from the game of bridge but had to wait for the checking letters to complete. I suspect there were a few ‘Rummy’ entries among our solvers!.
15d Type of PIN on the web provides means of protection (6,3)
SAFETY NET – Cephas is pushing us towards an Internet based security program but we have seen through the obfuscation (I hope!). The pin is the SAFETY pin and web is the ‘NET (World Wide Web = Internet broadbandly speaking)
19d Bulk order, it’s arranged before end of day (7)
OBESITY – Bulk or excess weight is derived from the Order of the British Empire with SIT (ITS arranged) followed by the end of (da)Y
21d Archdeacon is operating game (7)
VENISON – As Prolixic points out (and Barrie hates!) the abbreviated term of address (venerable) for an Archdeacon should be added to IS and ON to get a game meat which is quite tasty.
23d Back gnasher (5)
MOLAR – A barely cryptic definition of one’s rear grinding teeth.
24d Bantu-speaker’s shed’s acceptable (4)
HUTU – The Hutu /ˈhuːtuː/ are a Central African ethnic group, living mainly in Rwanda and Burundi. Add U – socially acceptable, to HUT (shed).
25d Not entirely perfect notion (4)
IDEA – We need a moratorium on this clue, and quickly!. IDEA(L), not entirely, gives you the idea!
Well, I have indicated my favourites but please let us know what you thought.
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