1: Cooped up in Essex: pelicans, it would turn out (5)

5: More stable, or slide around (7)

9: Reliable noise (5)

10: Kept definitely in step (9)

11: Do as I say in short retreat (5)

12: Form of denial mistaken as yin/yang (9)

13: Decision tree's unusual goal: mirth? (9)

16: Control escape (3)

17: Thumb Drum? (3)

18: Shun use of sinful carnival attractions (9)

19: Wyatt sharpens up listening devices (9)

21: A revolutionary New England state or an Indian state (5)

23: Fruit taken in in inn (9)

24: Neil Armstrong, first to return from another world? (5)

25: Lament the first person heard in good judgment (4,3)

26: Gnomelike feature of parallel fingers (5)

2: Quietly pulls electrical connectors (5)

3: Many sound prospects for prospectors (5)

4: Stranger, in turn, had an accident (3-3-3)

5: Shabby but virile? (5)

6: Nunn completes more circuits than Gore coming around Canary Island seaport (3,6)

7: Heard songs about milk and cheese and buns? (9)

8: Uncouth chaps met Engel under stress. (4,9)

9: Guess what the benighted marksman did? (4,2,3,4)

13: Praiseworthy naval officer, English, found around boat's prow (9)

14: An oral examination is not advised if one has this sort of foresight (4,5)

15: Bride's outfit - a sort of shirt by Jean-Jacques? (9)

20: The sound of a piano is excruciating (5)

21: A complex surprise (5)

22: Corpse apt to turn up in science fiction (5)