Solving time: 45 mins


A frustrating one, because I was nearly done after 18 minutes, but I am very slow to get the last bits sometimes. There were a few tough clues in this otherwise simple Monday puzzle. It took me a while to see 'NIGELLA', 'LINCTUS", and 'DROGHEDA'


Some of the clues were almost too easy, such as the two long ones and BOSWELL at 7 down. With all the checking letters, good solvers should have been able to get the hard ones pretty quickly...unlike me.

Across
10	MANCHURIA (CHINA + AMUR)* An anagram can't be hard if the anagram words are also the definition!
12	NIGELLA rev of ALLEGIN(G) Evidently, the two men in 17 down were enough for one puzzle.
14	SOLTI, SOL + TI, which isn't quite the thing if you pronounce the maestro's name correctly.
18	DROGHEDA, (DOG HEARD)*, not that hard if you've heard of Drogheda. My problem was stupidly not recognizing the anagram indicator.
20	OMBRE, (H)OMBRE. Easy if you know 18-century card games, this was the one in Pope's Rape of the Lock.
23	LINCTUS, sounds like LINKED US. My last in, but I have trouble with 'sounds like' clues.
25	ROE DEER, Spoonerism of DOE REER, which sounds like DOUGH REAR. A bit laboured.
27	ALL THE WAY, Sinatra song. Those without this sort of knowledge can guess readily enough.
Down
2	SENEGAL, LA GENES upside down.
3	SCHILLING, S(TRAUSS) + CHILLING, nicely disguised with a musical theme.
7	LAP UP, PAL (rev) + UP. This is quite hard if you think you're looking for a 5-letter word, but easy once you read the clue again. Why they didn't use a California dog, I cannot say.
9	EGRESS. I put this in as obvious, not bothering with the cryptic, but I don't quite see it, unless it's E.G. + RE + S.S. But it is obvious!
16	STONECHAT, STONE + CHAT, an old favorite beginners may need to take note of. The bird that pot smokers discuss.
17	BETRAYED, BET + RAY + ED, the same two fellows who have been appearing in puzzles for years, along with their buddies Ron and Don.
21	BOER WAR, BO(X)ER + RAW reversed. Another common sort of clue.