THE SKELETON CROSSWORD – £325 in prizes

There is a £100 prize for the first correct solution drawn; nine runners-up receive £25.

Send your completed crossword to the address shown in the box below left. In the skeleton crossword, the black squares and clue numbers have to be filled in as well as the words. Four black squares and four clue numbers have been inserted to give you a start. The black squares form a symmetrical pattern; the top half matches the bottom, and the two sides correspond. You can fill in 12 more squares at once to correspond with those given.

ACROSS

2 Marks produced in glass? 7 Machine passed getting hot 8 Witty remark about hard

drink

10 Trail dividing awful

settlement

11 Sweetener a follower added

to cheese

12 Material not containing a

variable line

13 Budding mountaineer’s

fourth climb 15 Never-ending days?

Madness!

16 Delay travellers face

entering state

17 Image quiet boy located in

time

21 Something fine

agriculturalist drove back 22 Beliefs first codified by

Rufus meaning nothing 23 House many detest a little

gaudy?

24 Italian lady put on notice

angered leaders

25 Very small shirt extremely

natty 26 Greeting some venal expert

curtailed

DOWN

1 Run forward, fool! (2 words) 2 Number noted divided by five 3 Festivities sadly going

beyond midnight

4 Silver and lead either side of

turquoise gemstone

5 Used records back on top of

books

6 Neat kinsman shortened

spoke

7 Freethinking lady one told off 9 Dishy swimmer? Fine

(Hyphenated)

14 Lettuce price reduced by

25%

17 Nut beginning to pout with

no one around

18 Actual centre of famed

kingdom

19 Round-faced writers making

starts

20 Assegais initially pretty sharp