Dearest Gentle Reader,
The mid-March air carries with it the unmistakable scent of scandal, desperation, and – if This Author’s nose does not deceive – the faint whiff of kerosene. For as we find ourselves well into the month, the affairs of this Kingdom grow ever more deliciously absurd.
Let us begin with the purse strings. Lady Reeves, our esteemed Chancellor, has declared with considerable triumph that she has “found the money” to assist those poor souls whose heating oil bills have doubled since the outbreak of hostilities in Persia. One does wonder, Gentle Reader, where precisely this money was hiding. Behind the sofa cushions of the Royal Exchequer? Tucked inside a forgotten reticule? Some 1.7 million households across the Southern Kingdom and the Principality rely upon kerosene for warmth, and nearly two-thirds of the Northern Province besides. Lady Reeves assures us that “different options” are being considered, which is the sort of reassuring vagueness at which politicians have always excelled.
Meanwhile, the Conservatives demanded that the independent ethics adviser, Sir Laurie Magnus, investigate Lord Starmer over his appointment of Lord Mandelson as ambassador to the American Colonies. They cried “cover-up!” with the breathless enthusiasm of a debutante spotting a duke at her first ball. Alas, Sir Laurie examined the documents and found the relevant process had been followed, declining to investigate. The blank comment sections which so inflamed Tory suspicions were, it transpires, simply… blank. Not redacted. Merely empty. Rather like the opposition’s argument. Lord Starmer has already confessed he “made a mistake” regarding Lord Mandelson‘s association with the late and thoroughly disgraced Lord Epstein, which is the political equivalent of shutting the stable door after the horse has not only bolted but taken up residence in another county.
Speaking of horses and bolting, the hereditary peers of the Upper Chamber find themselves facing extinction, their ancient seats to be stripped when the current session of the Grand Assembly ends, likely in May. Yet some enterprising souls have spotted what one outgoing peer delightfully termed a “hereditary lifeboat” – a compromise permitting fifteen Conservative hereditaries to be reborn as life peers. The Earl of Devon, whose family title dates to the year 1142 – This Author pauses to let that sink in – has declared he shall not be among those scrambling aboard. “I don’t think it’s appropriate,” quoth he, with the magnificent dignity of a man whose lineage predates the Magna Carta. One cannot help but admire a gentleman who refuses to haggle over what he considers a birthright, even as the birthright itself is being snatched away.
In more spiritual matters, the newly appointed Archbishop of Canterbury, Dame Mullally, shall undertake a six-day, eighty-seven-mile pilgrimage from St Paul’s Cathedral in the Capital to Canterbury Cathedral before her installation on the twenty-fifth of this month. It is the first time in modern history an Archbishop has walked to their own enthronement. This Author finds it rather charming – and notes that in an age of carriages, trains, and motor cars, choosing to walk eighty-seven miles is either an act of profound devotion or a very strong opinion about the state of Southern Kingdom railways.
From devotion to devastation. The Cheltenham Festival concluded its final day with the deaths of two more horses, bringing the grim tally to four this year and eighty-two since the turn of the millennium. The great Envoi Allen, a three-time Cheltenham winner at the venerable age of twelve, collapsed moments after completing what was to be his final race before a well-earned retirement. This Author finds no wit here, only sorrow – for a magnificent creature denied his peaceful ending by the cruellest of fates.
Across the Atlantic waters, Mr Bennett of Folkestone has journeyed to Washington to plead for the release of his mother Lady Lindsay Foreman and her partner Mr Craig Foreman, imprisoned in Persia following what the family calls a “sham trial.” Mr Bennett did not spare Lord Starmer his censure, observing acidly that the Prime Minister “will be on the tarmac when they come home to shake their hand” yet “has never once said their name.” A devastating remark, and one that suggests Lord Starmer‘s talent for appearing at moments of triumph far exceeds his appetite for the messy business of securing them.
And now for something truly extravagant. The famed “Black Strat” – a 1969 Fender Stratocaster wielded by Lord Gilmour of Pink Floyd across six albums – has sold at Christie’s Auction House in New York for a staggering fourteen point six million dollars, making it the most expensive guitar in the history of civilisation. Twenty-one minutes of bidding! For a single instrument! A Lord Lennon piano fetched a further three point two million. This Author can only marvel at a world in which a gentleman’s guitar commands more coin than most country estates, and wonders whether the unnamed buyer intends to play it or simply display it behind glass like a very expensive butterfly.
Finally, the most delightful news to grace This Author’s desk in some time. Hertfordshire Zoological Gardens has celebrated the birth of the first-ever Kingdom-born black and rufous sengi – creatures formerly known as elephant shrews, though they are in fact more closely related to actual elephants. Each newborn weighs roughly thirty grams, which is to say, the weight of a standard AA battery. The keepers initially missed the births entirely and only discovered the tiny arrivals upon reviewing overnight surveillance footage. One imagines the scene: a bleary-eyed zookeeper squinting at a grainy image and exclaiming, “Good heavens, there are two more of them!” Congratulations to all parties involved, especially the parents, who evidently value their privacy.
I am, as ever, your most devoted observer – Lady Whistledown.