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NB This is early as I have things to do, people to see this afternoon.

I found this hard going at first, then everything fell into place, with a nice final touch in the endgame.

Yes, it was a bit heavy going to begin with until it became possible to start placing the down clues then gridfill went a bit quicker. I went down a couple of blind alleys with the unclueds until I saw the light. And the endgame was fun.

Clues all done, except 17ac and Settle stake in game. I don't understand the parsing for 3ac and Old race fuels.....

Are the unclued entries words in Chambers? - I'm not making much sense of them.

Thanks

Dylan - The unclued entries do not have entries in Chambers.

17a - parses as you probably expect to give an obscure (to me) French river

Settle stake is a double def for a very common word, just both unknown to me

Old race is 3 letters for old race, 2 letters for fuels contents, all around 2 letters for as

No idea on the country

Six letter word for suit, in the sense of set, end letters removed; reversed.

that’s interesting HW, I thought that was the parsing but I never once put that word and “suit”together

Thanks

Thanks, cd and hw7, for prompt and helpful replies! Now to ponder....

I have a full grid and the 4 words, but am fearing another long grid stare...........