WHAT ABOUT THE PAPERWORK?
There will be two registers to sign
behind the High Altar: the regular one and the royal-marriage register.
Of course, members of the royal family also have to seek the
Queen’s official permission—which is given “in
Council,” at a meeting of the Privy Council, the Queen’s
assembly of judges, clergy, and politicians—even if the engagement
was announced on Twitter.
WHAT COULD GO WRONG?
Anything is possible: Diana muddled
Prince Charles’s many names, causing experts to wonder if she had
married Charles or, inadvertently, his father. (To show his support,
Prince Charles then deliberately muddled some words himself.) And at the
rehearsal for the Queen’s wedding
to Prince Philip in 1947,
Prince Michael of Kent punched Prince William of Gloucester “in
the kisser,” as one guest put it. (In defense
of the two cousins:
They were five and six years old, respectively.) Prince Michael
“received a good talking-to from Granny [Queen Mary],” the
guest continued, “who, with parasol in hand, was prepared for
action should it occur again.”
The wedding itself was free of
such fisticuffs.
