A sharp-eyed, realistic royalist

He was visited only by his children and grandchildren and one or two very old friends, complained Tommy Lascelles a few years before he died; apart from that, ‘I only see some of the young scribes, who, poor boys, think my opinion of their writing is worth getting, e.g. Philip Ziegler and C. Douglas-Home.’ Lascelles delighted in tantalising this now elderly scribe by extracting from a locked chest a volume of his diaries, reading a few sentences aloud, and then returning it to its repository. ‘That won’t be seen by anyone for 50 years,’ he would pronounce with some relish. ‘It is the duty of the private secretary to be private.’

That was some 30 years ago. If he knows today about the publication of this admirably edited selection from his diaries he has probably had mixed reactions. Some part of him may wonder whether they have appeared too soon: was 50 years a serious figure? How long must a private secretary remain private? There would certainly be pride of authorship.