THE PRIZE CROSSWORD
There’s an amazing €2,000 prize for the first correct solution drawn at random in our general knowledge Prize Crossword. Entries must arrive by Friday, February 22 (photocopies not accepted). Today’s solution will appear next week and the winner’s name on Sunday, March 10. You must complete the iSpy box to enter. SEE BELOW THE GRID for details on how to enter – and good luck!
Across
10 Flaps on helmets, pulled down to protect the face (6) 11 Sport in which contestants race on foot over a course punctuated by checkpoints, using a map and compass (12) 12 Large, fast-running, flightless bird inhabiting the open plains of southern South America (4) 13 Village in West Yorkshire, home of the Brontë sisters (7) 14 Juliet’s cousin and Romeo’s rival in Shakespeare’s Romeo And Juliet (6) 15 An ancient North African port on the Mediterranean (7) 16 Italian opera composer whose most famous work was Pagliacci (11) 20 A unit of speed used by ships and aircraft, being one nautical mile per hour (4) 21 Novel by E.M. Forster published in 1971, after his death (7) 22 To keep or be concealed or quiet (3,3) 23 A domesticated form of the polecat, bred for hunting (6) 25 Large baskets, usually with covers (7) 27 A cut of meat from the lower back or side of an animal (4) 28 A black tasselled academic cap with a flat square top (11) 29 Major city on Lake Michigan, nicknamed the Windy City (7) 32 Lengths of hair, the sections of which have been intertwined in a pattern (6) 35 Violent tropical storm or cyclone (7) 36 ––– Trent, heroine of Charles Dickens’s The Old Curiosity Shop (4) 37 Sport in which participants wear a parachute and become airborne by being towed by a vehicle into the wind (12) 38 A town in Umbria, central Italy, the birthplace of Saint Francis (6)
Down
1 Italian Renaissance painter and sculptor whose works include frescos in the Sistine Chapel (12) 2 A singer, especially one who regularly appears with a band or pop group (8) 3 A book of the Old Testament, about a Hebrew girl who became the queen of Persia (6) 4 Market town on the North coast of Wales, home to the smallest house in Great Britain (5) 5 Benjamin – – –, Conservative Prime Minister of the United Kingdom 1874-1880 (8) 6 The 1st Earl of Avon and Prime Minister of the United Kingdom 1955-1957 (7,4) 7 The peel or skin of a citrus fruit (4) 8 A game of cards for two to four, in which players try to win a set number of points before their opponents (8) 9 ––– Kumble, former Indian cricket captain who took more than 600 Test wickets in his career (4) 17 A collection of maps, usually in book form (5) 18 Through The ––– –––, the sequel to Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland (7-5) 19 British author who created the character of Doctor Dolittle (4,7) 21 A device that measures and records something (5) 24 Terence –––, 20th Century British dramatist whose plays included The Winslow Boy and The Browning Version (8) 26 A mixture of diced, sautéed vegetables to provide flavour to sauces (8) 27 Lake in the Great Glen of North Scotland (4,4) 30 Large building for storing and maintaining aircraft (6) 31 A rare striped antelope of Central African forests (5) 33 A feast of Hawaiian food (4) 34 A mixture of soul and calypso music typical of the East Caribbean (4)