Times Saturday 24987

[Timessolver]

19a Sort of Latin not seen in, say, Homer's times (4). I think the answer is 'EONS' which fits with 'times', but how does the rest work? 21d Light gas after slicing vegetable close to oven bird (6). Answer must be 'PEAHEN' which fits the 'vegetable' and the 'oven bird' parts of the clue, but where does the 'Light gas after slicing' come in? 25d Maiden has no universal sense of gratitude (4) - E - T. Is it 'DEBT'? Might be a 'deb', but why the 't'? Help please! What am I missing?

[bigbadmarty]

light gas helium atomic symbol He near n ?

[bulliver]

25d deb(u)t - maiden/debut minus 'u' (universal)

[ulysses100]

21d light gas = Helium = He
vegetable = pea
close to oven = last letter of oven = n

[dacortin]

(pig)eons = homers. pig-latin = childrens secret language, subtract pig (I think)

[genius1933]

bird=peahen. slice=peal minus L, HE+ N

[Timessolver]

Thanks to all. 'Maiden' was an adjective, as was 'debut' - thanks bulliver. 'he' was slicing (i.e. separating the 2 parts of) the vegetable and the 'close' to 'oven' - thanks bigbadmarty and ulysses. The pig Latin etc was brilliant dacortin. Clearly I must do better! Genius, you seem to think peeling veg is the same as slicing them, but even then that wouldn't be 'pealing'. Thanks anyway.

[RussLaw]

I still can't work out the 'slicing' bit for 21D...

[RussLaw]

I still don't get the 'slicing' bit for 21d... Is there another vegetable beginning with PEA?

[Lie-in King]

Peahen - He(lium) (slicing - going into) 'pea' +'(ove)n' (close to)