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Finished without help from the forum and only small amounts of googling, but still one I can’t parse: the city in Eire. Where does the boat come in?

The boat is six letters and you take two letters (the French) away from it

Ah, thanks a lot. There was me thinking ‘the French left’ was ‘G’ as in gauche!

Thank you, Davids and jono: I'd forgotten that I couldn't parse that one, and it now makes sense. I too was thinking of G for Gauche and baffled by the rest of it, but the crossers and definition seemed convincing.

Long time lurker here. Just got around to actually registering.

It was an excellent puzzle to solve (as always) and I believe Maskarade is a worthy successor to Araucaria.

BUT every single time there are clues which make me complain! Araucaria (and others as far back as I remember) played fair and always stated if there were words not in Chambers (or Collins). F, N and L were particularly egregious in this respect.

I didn’t intend my first post to be a moan but rather a constructive criticism. I get that the lack of spoon-feeding is part of the challenge but fair’s fair!

My first post too. I'm stuck on the few last ones and think I may have mis-placed some.
The lengthen out present doctorate one eludes me - any clues?
Also I have three 6 letter answers with 'A' in second position and three places they could go! Any help appreciated!

Alsnru,
Present has a two letter abbreviation in Chambers. The other bit is alternate letters

Ah, thanks. I'd tried the now and then but in the wrong place.

Hi Alsnru
Hopefully now that you’ve got the ‘lengthen out’ clue, that will have helped you with placing the 6-letter answers with A in second position (though by my reckoning there are 4 such in the downs, not 3). Let us know if you are still struggling!

I have finally finished/given up on this fabulous crossword. My grid is full except for one of the four letter answers, the small price for boat answer I have doesn't fit the only space left! Everything else is in and works. The available space is the down clue space in the south west corner, where it crosses the Merseyside bird and unending dance answers.