Letters: Slimming down the monarchy will only hasten its decline

Royal travails

Sir: The travails of the royal family outlined by Penny Junor (‘In check’, 18 January) may be public theatre but that does not make the suggestion to ‘slim down’ the monarchy any less dangerous. It might be farce now but it could turn to tragedy.

Remember King Lear, where Goneril and Regan use Lear’s rowdy night in the castle as a pretext to begin robbing him of his knights and independence, leaving him destitute and mad. ‘What need you five and 20, or ten, or five, to follow in a house where twice so many have a command to tend you? What need one?’

An embarrassing time for royals in the media prompts calls to retrench the monarchy, but once you take something you set up the trend of taking more, to the end of leaving the institution wholly at the mercy of a greater number of insincere politicians who see bleating to the press about royal economy as a cynical way of advancing their own careers.

Robert Frazer

Salford, Greater Manchester

An absent Earl

Sir: Charles Moore laments the limited time the Duke and Duchess of Sussex have spent in their titular county (Notes, 18 January), reporting they have spent fewer than six hours there. Spare a thought then for his Scottish confrères, who will presumably never now welcome the Earl and Countess of Dumbarton to our hallowed shores.

Edward Thomas

Say boo to Booking.com

Sir: I have occasionally subverted the practices of the monopolistic booking sites outlined by Mary Wakefield in her excellent article on B&Bs (18 January). I simply use the booking conglomerate website to find a B&B for the nights in question, telephone the owner, suggest we compromise on, say, a 5 per cent discount, and pay over the phone.