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Saturday, March 26, 2011
Puzzle by Brad Wilber, edited by Will Shortz
I found this Saturday puzzle one of the best, both entertaining and enlightening. A real dream!
Across — 1. Goat cheese, CHÈVRE; 7. Office roll, FAX PAPER; 15. Ancient “Works and Days” poet, HESIOD; 16. Thought one can’t shake, IDEE FIXE; 17. Using a large case?, IN CAPS; 18. Building that goes up easily, FIRETRAP; 19. Constellation next to Pavo, ARA; 20. Broadway role for Bea Arthur, YENTE; 22. Milton’s “Areopagitica,” e.g., TRACT; 23. Cagney’s employer, briefly, NYPD; 25. Rank achieved by 49-Across: Abbr., LIEUT; 27. Opposition leader?, ANTI; 28. Hillside landscaping effects, TIERS; 30. Harries, VEXES; 32. Film villain who sings “Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer, do!”, HAL; 33. Response to “Should we order food?”, I’VE EATEN; 35. It may be turned on a soapbox, PHRASE; 37. Org. with the Sun and Sky, WNBA; 387. First man featured on the cover of the U.S. edition of Vogue, GERE; 39. No relative, KABUKI; 42. She “gallops o’er a courtier’s nose,” in Shakespeare, QUEEN MAB; 46. Good thing to keep low on a diamond, ERA; 47. Diane with a camera, ARBUS; 49. Biden’s successor on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, KERRY; 50. Chisel, maybe, ETCH; 52. Tries to halt expansion?, DIETS; 54. Ending with fluor-, ESCE; 55. Tightwad, PIKER; 57. Part of a bar line, STOOL; 59. One might cover lemons, LAW; 60. Goo, SCHMALTZ; 62. Salon supply, POMADE; 64. So-called “wand of heaven”, ALOE VERA; 65. Render helpless, HOGTIE; 66. Minor celebrity?, TEEN IDOL; 67. Barely risk being arrested?, STREAK.
Down — 1. Italian red, CHIANTI; 2. John of Gaunt’s son, HENRY IV; 3. Gone con, ESCAPEE; 4. Using, VIA; 5. Like thick vines, ROPY; 6. Ranger, for one, EDSEL; 7. Badminton goal, FIFTEEN; 8. They may evoke tristesse, ADIEUX; 9. Disco-era kid, XER; 10. Amanda of “Syriana”, PEET; 11. Performers’ union, AFTRA; 12. One in a dangerous school, PIRANHA; 13. One-two track options, EXACTAS; 14. Scaled-back thing, REPTILE; 21. Big name in skin care, NIVEA; 24. Sch. In Madison, N.J., DREW U; 29. Kraft Foods brand, SANKA; 31. 2009 Best Musical nominee, SHREK; 34. 6-Down’s far more successful contemporary, T-BIRD; 36. French actress Saint-Cyr, RENEE; 38. Relish, GUSTO; 39. Doesn’t stop, KEEPS AT; 40. Time unit, ARTICLE; 41. It has a big bucket, BACK HOE; 42. Creature revered by the Mayans, QUETZAL; 43. Quarry boss of cartoons, MR SLATE; 44. Pan’s place, ARCADIA; 45. Idle stretch for an N.F.L. team, BYE WEEK; 48. Champs-Élysées sight, BISTRO; 51. Typical bouncers, HE-MEN; 53. Some J.V. players, SOPHS; 56. Beatle George studied under him, RAVI; 58. Swag, LOOT; 61. Opened, LED; 63. Bus. driver?, MGR.
O, then, I see Queen Mab hath been with you.
She is the fairies’ midwife, and she comes
In shape no bigger than an agate-stone
On the fore-finger of an alderman,
Drawn with a team of little atomies
Athwart men's noses as they lie asleep;
Her wagon-spokes made of long spinners’ legs,
The cover of the wings of grasshoppers,
The traces of the smallest spider's web,
The collars of the moonshine's wat'ry beams,
Her whip of cricket's bone; the lash of film;
Her waggoner a small grey-coated gnat,
Not half so big as a round little worm
Pricked from the lazy finger of a maid:
Her chariot is an empty hazelnut
Made by the joiner squirrel or old grub,
Time out o’ mind the fairies’ coachmakers.
And in this state she gallops night by night
Through lovers’ brains, and then they dream of love;
O’er courtiers’ knees, that dream on court'sies straight,
O’er lawyers’ fingers, who straight dream on fees,
O’er ladies ‘ lips, who straight on kisses dream,
Which oft the angry Mab with blisters plagues,
Because their breaths with sweetmeats tainted are:
Sometime she gallops o’er a courtier's nose,
And then dreams he of smelling out a suit;
And sometime comes she with a tithe-pig's tail
Tickling a parson's nose as a’ lies asleep,
Then dreams, he of another benefice:
Sometime she driveth o’er a soldier's neck,
And then dreams he of cutting foreign throats,
Of breaches, ambuscadoes, Spanish blades,
Of healths five-fathom deep; and then anon
Drums in his ear, at which he starts and wakes,
And being thus frighted swears a prayer or two
And sleeps again. This is that very Mab
That plaits the manes of horses in the night,
And bakes the elflocks in foul sluttish hairs,
Which once untangled, much misfortune bodes:
This is the hag, when maids lie on their backs,
That presses them and learns them first to bear,
Making them women of good carriage:
This is she—
~ Mercutio in Romeo and Juliet, Act I, scene iv
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