DT 25956

Daily Telegraph Cryptic No 25956

Hints and tips by Gazza

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BD Rating – Difficulty **** – Enjoyment ***

After last Tuesday’s disappointing puzzle it is good to get a really solid one with some excellent surface readings. In terms of difficulty I would rate this half way between a standard cryptic and a Toughie, so newcomers should not be discouraged if they cannot finish it without assistance.
As usual the answers can be revealed, if required, by selecting the white space between the curly brackets.

Across Clues

1a  Hard cheese? Far from it! (10)
{MASCARPONE} – the setter is trying to misdirect us into thinking that hard cheese here means tough luck, whereas actually we need to take it literally. “Far from it” indicates that we need the opposite of hard, so what we want is a soft cheese, in this case a mild Italian variety.

6a  Made return call (4)
{LAID} – a synonym for made (as in made a plan or a trap) means to initiate a telephone call when it is reversed (return).

9a  Scales see ‘lardy’ perhaps put on stone (10)
{STEELYARDS} – an anagram (perhaps) of SEE ‘LARDY’ is put after ST (stone) to get weighing apparatuses with a long graduated arm on which a weight is moved until it balances.

10a  Stagger back getting unbalanced (4)
{NUTS} – to stagger somebody is to STUN them – reverse this (back) to get a slang term for unbalanced or crazy.

12a  Fast time after finish (4)
{DIET} – finish is DIE – add T(ime) to get a verb meaning to restrict your food intake, hence to fast.

13a  Doctor endearing and cordial (9)
{GRENADINE} – an anagram (doctor) of ENDEARING gives us a sweet cordial traditionally made from pomegranates. The word is derived from “grenade” (the French word for pomegranate).

15a  Profanity following socialist leader’s taxing (8 )
{SWEARING} – start with S (socialist leader) and add WEARING (physically or mentally demanding, taxing) to get a synonym for profanity.

16a  Old actor’s unsteady walk, losing heart (6)
{STAGER} – an archaic term for an actor is found by taking STAGGER (unsteady walk) and removing the middle letter (losing heart).

18a  Arouse former wife with advance (6)
{EXCITE} – put together EX (former wife) and CITE (put forward as proof, advance) to get a verb meaning to arouse.

20a  Copper with detectives, English agree (8 )
{COINCIDE} – a charade of COIN (copper), CID (detectives) and E(nglish) produces a verb meaning to match or agree.

23a  Look in newspaper for a tedious bore (9)
{PERFORATE} – a brilliantly hidden (look in) verb in newspaPER FOR A TEdious is a synonym for bore. I spent some time trying to think of a word with LO inside a newspaper!

24a  Leave a lasting impression? (4)
{ETCH} – a cryptic definition of making a design on metal or glass by eating out the lines with an acid.

26a  Bird starts to talk excitedly about love (4)
{TEAL} – the first letters (starts to) of the last four words reveal a small freshwater duck.

27a  Hospital is on trauma scramble (10)
{SANATORIUM} – an anagram (scramble) of IS ON TRAUMA gives us a type of hospital often used for convalescents.

28a  Squawk from chicken losing tail (4)
{YELL} – take YELLOW (cowardly, chicken) and remove the last two letters (losing tail) to get a shout or squawk.

29a  Minor trouble with the French cologne (10)
{ADOLESCENT} – a charade of ADO (trouble), LES (the, in French) and SCENT (cologne) produces a term for a young person or minor.

Down Clues

1d  Bulk idiot male put on top (4)
{MASS} – put M(ale) in front of (on top of, in a down clue) another term for silly idiot to get a synonym for a large amount or bulk.

2d  Heart of minister I learnt is clean (7)
{STERILE} – another well-hidden word, signalled by heart of, is to be found inside miniSTER I LEarnt to give a word for clean.

3d  This is what William Wordsworth wrote (12)
{ALLITERATION} – this is a figure of speech signifying the recurrence of the same initial sound in words in close succession, as in What William Wordsworth Wrote. About a month ago in DT 25934 we had the same word (the verb rather than the noun that time) when the clue was Start soundly, saving some salary? (10) – then my hint was obviously not good enough because we had a few queries about it in the comments!

4d  Ringing man after proposal (8 )
{PLANGENT} – put GENT (man) after PLAN (proposal) to get an adjective meaning loud and resonant (ringing).

5d  Naked women possessing grand butts! (6)
{NUDGES} – an amusing clue where NUDES (naked women) have (possessing) G (grand, thousand dollars) inside to form a word meaning butts (pushes or strikes with the head). As Eric Idle used to say in Monty Python “……, ……, wink, wink – say no more!”.

7d  Jolly smug in a dicky (7)
{AMUSING} – an anagram (dicky) of SMUG IN A gets a word meaning entertaining or jolly, though not, reputedly, to Queen Victoria.

8d  He’s ardent, I fancy, revealing crush (10)
{DISHEARTEN} – an anagram (fancy) of HE’S ARDENT I reveals a verb meaning to cause someone to lose confidence or crush them.

11d  Cross endless river on tin ship (12)
{CANTANKEROUS} – a lovely charade of CAN (tin), TANKER (ship) and OUSe (river without the final letter) gives us a word meaning bad-tempered, argumentative or cross.

14d  Practice rolling joints, perhaps (10)
{OSTEOPATHY} – a cryptic definition of the practice of a form of complementary medicine which involves the treatment of medical disorders by massage and manipulation.

17d  A ship’s propeller? (8 )
{FORESAIL} – a cryptic definition of the thing that propels a sailing ship along when the wind is blowing – the principal sail on the foremast.

19d  Rein in dog chasing another dog (7)
{CURTAIL} – a synonym for rein in is formed from TAIL (to dog or follow) which comes after (chasing) another word for a dog.

21d  It’s cold queuing outside bank (7)
{INCLINE} – take C (cold) and put outside it IN LINE (queuing) to get another word for a slope or bank. A very neat clue!

22d  Ace artist in clay getting loot (6)
{MARAUD} – put A (ace in bridge notation) and RA (artist, Royal Academician) inside MUD (clay) to get a verb meaning to raid, plunder or loot.

25d  Obscene material turning stomachs (4)
{SMUT} – reverse a childish word for stomachs to get lascivious or obscene material.

I liked 23a, 29a and 3d, but my clue of the day, for its excellent surface reading is 21d. What do you think? – leave us a comment.