CRYPTIC CROSSWORD

ACROSS

1. Has to sin in order to amaze one (8) 4. Heavenly body to head the bill (4) 8. May do some damage with broken arm (3) 9. Bid for a chest lacking only its top (5) 10. In a house cellar the wine is dry (3) 11. Discounts are to be put back in old local taxes (7) 12. He’s the best a politician can be, following the church (5) 13. It automatically got one off without need of cranking (4-7) 17. Insurance protection for company, very curtailed (5) 18. Didn’t go on with the aitch being unvoiced (7) 20. One to go on a trip east will depart (3) 21. See about Virginia backing part of the house (5) 22. Forty winks taken for a game of cards (3) 23. Sliding frame leading speculator has to change (4) 24. Staplers may be used to apply them to wounds (8)

DOWN

1. Think highly of one in a sort of dream (6) 2. Making broth from pulse? (5) 3. Closely examines the South if the street is up (5) 5. Have to climb the ladder in due proportion (2,5) 6. It may tell one how to prepare one’s course (6) 7. How one curses PR, or those who came before (10) 9. It’s not according to the rules if it isn’t working (3,2,5) 14. Wanting what another has, Venus perhaps gave one nothing (7) 15. How one practises extortion on prison warders (6) 16. Skilled people exchange dates quietly (6) 18. Old Nick would cook it with hot spices (5) 19. Some happen certainly to hold their coins (5)

YESTERDAY’S SOLUTION

Across: 1. Coltsfoot 5. Pub 7. Into 8. Advisors 10. Portrait 11. Morn 13. Endows 15. Career 18. Brim 19. Swindled 22. Godchild 23. Hale 24. Eye 25. Presented Down: 1. Cripple 2. Later 3. Ordain 4. Tail 5. Promote 6. Basin 9. Growl 12. Pains 14. Dwindle 16. Red lead 17. Twelve 18. Bugle 20. Least 21. Ship