BRITAIN: The death of Princess Margaret has inevitably cast a shadow over Queen Elizabeth's Golden Jubilee. As Buckingham Palace posted the official confirmation of her "beloved" sister's passing, the queen was deluged with messages of sympathy from Britain's political, religious, cultural and charitable establishments.
The thoughts of many, however, turned to Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother. It is a particular tragedy for any parent to be pre-deceased by one of their children. In this instance the surviving parent is 101 years old, battling against a virus which has kept her from the public eye since before Christmas. The death of her youngest daughter - at 71, after a series of strokes - comes just days after the 50th anniversary of the death of her husband, King George VI. Yesterday's headline in the Sunday People captured the public sentiment and anxiety on a dark weekend for the House of Windsor: "Anguish could finish Queen Mother." At this writing it is unclear whether she will be able to attend her daughter's "royal private funeral" at St George's Chapel, Windsor on Friday.
It is also reported that the queen will proceed with planned engagements in the days preceding the funeral. Strange as that appears to ordinary mortals, it is unquestionably the royal way. It is almost certainly as Princess Margaret would have wished it. She was first, last and always a royal princess, and everybody knew it. Indeed, the most talked about issue in her glamorous but sad life - her love affair with the divorced Group Captain Peter Townsend - resolved itself around the question of royal duty.
Born the second daughter of a Duke and Duchess, Princess Margaret Rose of York was originally destined for a life of relative obscurity on the outer fringes of royalty. The crisis which saw Edward VIII abdicate for the love of Mrs Wallis Simpson changed all that, leaving her the daughter of one monarch and the sister of another. Ironically the same issue would find Margaret provoking a similar constitutional drama in June 1953 with rumours that she wished to marry Group Captain Townsend. To have done so she would have had to renounce her right to the succession and in the end she decided to put royal duty - critics would say privilege - first.
The consequence of that decision filled acres of newsprint yesterday as commentators pored over her subsequent, seemingly fruitlesssearch for true love and happiness.Years later Princess Margaret would write to Diana, Princess of Wales and "Fergie" - Sarah, Duchess of York - blasting both for bringing disrepute to the Palace doors. But of course it was Margaret - who, as the Archbishop of Canterbury confirmed, remained all her life a committed Christian and devotee of the Church of England - who became the first high-profile royal divorcee.
Nor was there any shortage of tabloid titillation before her husband, photographer Anthony Armstrong Jones (now Lord Snowdon) - confronted with the very public evidence of her affair with Roddy Llewellyn, then an out-of-work gardener and 17 years her junior - finally accepted that separation and divorce were inevitable.
The father of their two children, Viscount Linley and Lady Sarah Chatto, Lord Snowdon remained steadfastly loyal and discreet, while Mr Llewellyn yesterday spoke of his sadness at the loss of "a very special, darling friend".
Prince Charles, likewise, spoke of his "darling aunt" in an address delivered to the BBC cameras on Saturday.
And there were many lining-up to pay handsome tribute to the wit and vivacity of a former beauty, ravaged by illness, now granted what the prince and all her family felt was a "merciful release".
The photographs published this weekend were a reminder of Princess Margaret's stunning good looks. One press photographer, hailing from an era before the word "paparazzi" had been heard of, told how she competed only with Elizabeth Taylor for the attention of the lens.
The references to "a life lived to the full" spoke of a good-time girl who smoked and drank more than was considered good for her, a party animal whom Prince Charles fondly recalled playing the piano with an "elegant" cigarette holder in her mouth.
By all accounts the princess had a fine brain. And for all that she was drawn moth-like to the world of showbiz and celebrity, experts claimed her knowledge of dance, theatre and opera was "second to none". Inevitably too, perhaps, rather less attention was lavished on her charity work: her concern for vulnerable children reflected in half-a-century's involvement with the NSPCC.
Elegant and conscientious, Princess Margaret was also apparently capable of astonishing arrogance and rudeness. Some who attended her were asked to do so in virtual silence.
It was considered thoroughly bad form to arrive after her or to think of retiring before she called an end to the night's proceedings. Imperious of manner, her daughter-in-law was required to curtsy before having breakfast in the privacy of their shared apartments in Kensington Palace.
Such vanities and absurdities may have helped inform one writer yesterday who - commenting on the absence of any crowd scenes outside Buckingham Palace - reflected that the times Margaret represented had in a sense died before her.
Certainly it was striking on Saturday night to talk to a group of highly intelligent, university-bound 19-year-olds some of whom could not quite place her. That would not have been the case with Diana, Princess of Wales.
Among the older generation there is a feeling that the royal family did not do right by Margaret over the Townsend affair. Generally, too, there is sympathy for Queen Elizabeth and concern as well for the Queen Mother. But this was not Diana. And this time the nation did not weep.