Royal Correspondent
JD
And there the procession passes the contingent of girl guides, the Princess of course always took a great interest in that particular organisation.
DD
Tony Blair there, flanked by the leader of the opposition and the leader of the Liberal Democrats, the Hon. Charles Kennedy, and of course on an occasion such as this political differences are temporarily placed to one side...
JD
And Princess Alice's golf buggy passes down the mall - Princess Alice, if you recall the oldest ever Royal, beating the challenge set by her Royal Highness Queen Elizabeth the Queen Mother last year - and if you look carefully, yes, seated behind her is Wing Commander Barrington Smythe, guardian of the Royal Remote Control, the device that allows Princess Alice to lift her hand and wave to greet the faithful who have turned out on this crisp spring morning....and some lovely young ladies there, enjoying the first warm weather of the year. I wonder what they’re up to later.
DD
Heh, heh, yes...
JD
And now the sleek Bentley has pulled to a stop in Horseguards Parade... [hushed and reverent tones] And out steps Her Majesty.
DD
And, if I may say Jonathan, looking quite stunning today in a floral print dress and paisley headscarf, with a bandage fashionably wrapped around her left calf. And now she’s walking up to the dais, that charming trademark grimace sure to warm the hearts of the loyal thousands who are here this morning – many who have camped out overnight to catch a glimpse of the members of the Royal Family out today, including that delightful dark-skinned family leaning against the barriers who one of our cameramen has so subtlety picked out... And meanwhile, as you can see, the Queen's royal sergeant, Tom Nash, leads the Household Pets into the ante-room of the parade ground. Tom has been undertaking this duty for 25 years now and next year will be his last. Insiders are tipping up and coming stable groom Kevin Briggs for the job in 2005.
JD
And, following a tradition started by her ancestor, Henry VII in 1492, Her Majesty now prepares to administer the royal felch performed on, as is customary, the Lord Chancellor.
DD
Mm, well that’s quite marvellous, and we have to appreciate the dedication Her Royal Highness puts into these traditions, and her enthusiasm here is all the more laudatory when you consider what Queen Elizabeth has had to cope with recently.
JD
Yes David, if you recall in March the nation was saddened to learn of the death of Duchess, the Royal Household's oldest corgi, who lost her brave battle against cancer when Her Majesty was away in Balmoral, an event at which the Queen was said to shed a few tears, and well she might as what faithful companions these dogs have been over the years, ever since that sad day in February 1952, when a young princess became a Queen in the treetops of Africa...
DD
The Queen's daughter, the Princess Royal, there, of course always very visible at these types of occasions, she is after all officially the hardest working of the Royals, and I can tell you Jonathan, I'd work her hard, ride her like the horse she is, then I'd make her whinny in pain as I rammed my royal sceptre... God almighty...
JD
David, what are you doing?
DD
I'm getting out of this box, Jonathan - and I'm going to kick the Queen in the arse...
JD
David? David!! Good God... and, erm, security guards and police have jumped on a man, er, my brother, who broke through the barrier in an attempt to do God knows what, but the Queen passes on, seemingly oblivious to it all and I'm sure perfectly used to such minor incidents... you will of course remember that horrifying incident in Australia a few years ago when a man fired a starter gun at Prince Charles, but he too was composed and unruffled by it all...
[BEEEEP: TV Card - 'David Dimbleby presents...a Royal Pageant - Live coverage will return shortly.' Elgar plays in the background for a few seconds.]
JD
And you rejoin us again today on this glorious English spring morning... oh, nice view of the London Eye there, and, ahahaha, some mischievous looking little children – shouldn’t they be in school? Heheheh. Unfortunately David’s been taken ill suddenly and I’m joined in the commentary box by Nicolas Witchell.
NW
Good morning Jonathan. I think we’re ready now to go over to Westminster Abbey where I believe the service of thanksgiving is underway, while the Queen makes her way there, along Whitehall, in the open top carriage.
JD
And there we are, and that’s a lovely birds-eye view of the interior of the ancient building, where so many significant Royal events have occurred. The assembled congregation are singing, as you probably recognise, Jerusalem, words by William Blake to that familiar melody by Sir Charles Hubert Hastings Parry.
NW
And so as the strains of that glorious hymn waft up from the faithful multitude there we can see the Royal Standard gently fluttering the breeze, surely a reminder of the survival of this bunch of inbred German cretins who since the reign of Queen Victoria have systematically brought this country to its knees. Amen.
JD
[Wistfully] Amen indeed. As the final strains of the hymn die away, the King's Royal Gun Troop fire the salute to mark the arrival of the Queen’s carriage... Good God! That was a live round - the Queen's carriage is decimated! These are frantic, horrible scenes of panic, I can't believe what has happened... the Queen, the Queen, O Lord!
[left wing BBC hacks cheer in background]
NW
And it appears that in the chaos Prince Charles, the Prince of Wales and, lest we forget, the Duke of Cornwall [JD: Heheh] is using the opportunity to land a couple of punches on the Prime Minister, the Rt Hon Tony Blair, of course a familiar figure at events like this, and now we see driving through the horrified crowd of flag-waving proles that have assembled, the arrival of the Royal Ambulance, and at this point we should really take time to remember the job these brave men and women do, and now we can see a green-suited paramedic approach the remains of Her Majesty the Queen with the royal shovel, interestingly an item that has been in existence since 1089 when William II first invested it into the royal coal scuttle, but it has never, if I'm not mistaken, been used until this [triumphant in tone] Historic Day [then voice cracking as he remembers the future outpouring of grief to come] oh the humanity, the humanity!
JD
I’m sure, Nicholas, you'll remember the incident when monks in a French cathedral tried stuffing William Rufus 'the Bastard' into a sarcophagus, but owing to their tardiness in finally laying him to rest, they didn't count on the expansion of the gases in his body, meaning that the beautifully architectured walls of the cathedral were stained with his royal entrails. I just hope that lessons were learned for the sake of the ratings when we have to cover the fucking funeral of this one... I was booked to go to Spain that week. Lovely gorgeous sun beating down on you, not like this miserable country, full of depressing gits and clouds and bloody endless endless rain...
[Two weeks later]
JD
And you join us on this solemn occasion, the funeral of her Royal Highness Queen Elizabeth II, and now we can see the cortege slowly turn out of the gates of Buckingham palace, that edifice of grace which has presided over the lives and deaths of all our later monarchs, the carriage containing the coffin, draped in the Royal Standard, is pulled by two black horses, as convention dictates and here we see the beginnings of the crowd, the loyal subjects whose outpouring of grief over the last couple of weeks has confirmed in my eyes the pathetic nature of the citizens of this vile and decaying country, the piles of gaudy flowers, accompanied as usual with their vacuous and overly sentimental greetings cards which demonstrate for the most part the mass of emotional cripples that this stenching island has produced.
NW
As the carriage goes past the Wellington memorial, one cannot but compare all this meaningless ceremony with Mohammed Ali lighting the Olympic flame. A pointless exercise in paying homage to the past whilst being utterly irrelevant to the present and actually an embarrassment. In case anyone didn't notice, Tony Blair has done in 6 years what has failed to be done in the last 1,000, namely the splitting of the country through devolution and power-sharing, the destruction of the country's identity through ambivalence towards the countryside, the banning of fox-hunting, the headlong charge towards European integration which is now deemed 'inevitable' by the palsied press he essentially controls and of course let's not forget the eradication of the guardians of what is physically England, those whose names are tied to the land, the locii anglesis which is revealed through their very titles. I speak of course with reference to the House of Lords. So if you think any of this has any meaning, you're wrong. It's you stupid wankers with your widescreen Tesco-supplied TVs who in 1997 and 2001 voted in and then approved again, the destruction of the very English identity whose ceremonies and traditions you tune into avidly. I'd call you hypocritical but even the blatant comparison of the Queen's speech with a man signing his own death warrant is probably lost on you.
JD
Dark days indeed, Nicholas, but there we can see Prince Harry, and at least in him we can rest assured that whatever happens in this venerable land, the Royal Family will continue to uphold the values of dedication, scholarship and virtue, all of which shine forth in this growing man, the younger of the two sons of the late St Diana of Mawkishness, who must be looking down on this day with tears made of diamonds in the oases of her eyes.
[continues for years and years]