The Spectator: 1775

[endanger]

9a Operation at sea involving pressure for salt 910)
1d Fair lavener bottles matron's arranged and left (13)
12d One engaged in variety of mild duties is making differences
24a Part of tissue, soft, ending in garbage, covering rejected cherry (7)

Many thanks

[kayakamina]

Endanger How many letters in 12d? Is 9a 10 letters and do you have any letters in place ? k

[crofter]

24a is PLEROME (tissue) = P (soft) + MOREL (cherry reversed) then E (ending of garbage)

[kayakamina]

Morning Crofter. Good answer. K

[crofter]

Hi k ... 9a is PROPIONATE (a salt) = anag of "Operation + P(ressure)"

[crofter]

Not quite there for 1d I am lookking for a word containing the sequence of letters ***MONSTRA*** (being an anagram of MATRONS)

[kayakamina]

And i've been looking for something Astronom.... also from matrons. I've downloaded the puzzle as it's always better to have the whole thing in front of you and see what the surrounding letters are. K

[kayakamina]

Crofter second letter P in the 'matron' one.

[kayakamina]

12d Dissimilitude

[crofter]

1d is SPORTSMANLIKE = Fair

SPIKE = lavender - around ANAG of MATRONS + L

Thanks for the help kayakamina!

[kayakamina]

endanger As I was saying earlier on another post about very qualified candidates for the Times crossword championship, our fellow ABer Crofter is one of four I had in mind- and you can see why!! Cheers K

[crofter]

Thanks k! Much appreciated :-))

[endanger]

thanks Crofter and K - I've been out the office for a while and just received these posts...I do hope both of you will enter the Times comp and bring home the trophy for us!