daily double

the easy way ACROSS

1 Celebrate riotously (5,2,2) 8 Traditional maxim (5) 9 Royal power (7) 10 Large gateway (6) 11 Madhouse (6) 12 In a manner of speaking (2,2,4) 15 In the sky (8) 18 Leave out (6) 20 Small restaurant (6) 21 Metropolis (7) 22 A troublesome thing (5) 23 On the wane (9)

DOWN

2 Lift with great effort (5) 3 Excessively (6) 4 Make known (8) 5 Expend (3,3) 6 Leopard with black fur (7) 7 Having good intentions (4-5) 11 A massacre (9) 13 With full particulars (2,6) 14 Earthshaking (7) 16 Usher in (6) 17 Combat in war (6) 19 Straightforward (5)

the hard way ACROSS

1 Container for spread (5,4) 8 Gun is out of order in practice (5) 9 Butler’s narrow point of view? (7) 10 Accounts book with margin going from left to right (6) 11 Corrupt passage (6) 12 Sovereign is underweight considering (8) 15 The extent to which diets can vary (8) 18 It has a certain current value (6) 20 At some distance from Rodney (6) 21 Murder makes a monarch sick at heart (7) 22 That is as Julius Caesar wrote it (2,3) 23 Tradesman bursts into tears (9)

DOWN

2 Thread rope through some of the centre evenly (5) 3 Racial extraction of Elizabeth Nicholson (6) 4 Ammunition in the news (8) 5 It holds soup for two Orientals in turn (6) 6 He’s bound to seek a religious goal (7) 7 A concrete addition to the total (9) 11 Lady dines out showing gluttony perhaps? (6,3) 13 Visionary details I put out (8) 14 Apart and sure to play around (7) 16 They don’t mind their own business (6) 17 Olympian master of arts (6) 19 The scope of a mountain chain (5)