BRITAIN:What was supposed to be an occasion for quiet national recollection and memorial has become - as so often with events planned by the Windsors - the culmination of perhaps the worst week for the royal family since the event they are gathering to commemorate.
As he takes his seat in the front pew of the Guards Chapel at Wellington barracks near Buckingham Palace in central London this morning during the service to commemorate the 10th anniversary of his former wife Diana's death, it is just possible that the prince of Wales may reflect lugubriously that his plans for the event have turned once more to dust and ashes.
In the last few days Charles has seen his wife Camilla decide, following public criticism, to defy his clear wishes and withdraw from attending the service - she'll be watching instead from her private home in Wiltshire, 100 miles west of London.
And there has been an undignified dispute about the guest list for the service, the undying hostility of the ageing Diana loyalists outside the barracks gates, and even the order of a service which little reflects the princess's life or interests.
As the arrangements have been largely in the hands of the prince and his advisers at Clarence House, most of the criticism transfers to him. Princes William and Harry have been only nominally in charge of the arrangements. There was a similar series of mistakes over the prince's wedding to the duchess of Cornwall two years ago. Talleyrand famously said of the doomed Bourbon dynasty that they had forgotten nothing and learned nothing, and similar criticisms have been levelled at Charles this week.
"It is organised not according to what Diana would have wanted, but according to what her ex-husband wants," wrote Rosa Monckton, the princess's close friend, in a devastating article in the Mail on Sunday newspaper, credited with persuading Camilla to decide later the same day not to attend. More than 30 members of the royal family, including the queen, the duke of Edinburgh and the princess royal, will be attending the service, which is being held in the Guards Chapel because her sons both now serve in the household division.
They will be joined by some, but not all, of the princess's friends and acquaintances, including Elton John, Cliff Richard and the photographer Mario Testino, but not those held to have slighted her memory, such as her former butler Paul Burrell, who has published two contentious books about her. Mohamed Al Fayed, father of her final companion Dodi, who has accused the royal family of assassinating her, will also not be present, though his two daughters have been invited. Mr Fayed will hold his own two-minute silence at Harrods, though his shop will remain open.
Among the 500 other guests for the service, which will be broadcast live by the BBC with commentary by its royal correspondent Nicholas Witchell, famously once described by the prince through gritted teeth as "awful", will be the prime minister and his predecessors Tony Blair and John Major. Rowan Williams, the archbishop of Canterbury, has composed two prayers for the service - issued by the Church of England on its website in both contemporary and archaic language with thees and thous - and William and Harry and Diana's sisters Sarah McCorquodale and Jane Fellows will give readings.
The bishop of London, Richard Chartres, who according to Ms Monckton scarcely knew the princess, will give the address. The hour-long service will conclude with one hymn at least that Diana might have chosen: I Vow to Thee My Country.