In an article in today’s Mail on Sunday, Katie Nicholl reports that friends of Prince William and Kate Middleton believe that an engagement announcement is planned for “just before or just after Christmas,” and that a wedding could be in May or June.

If an earlier story is true that Kate will not be at Sandringham until Boxing Day (December 26), it will clearly be just after, which seems like perfect timing to catch the world’s headlines.

The article, however, maintains the Mail’s new policy of acknowledging the Kate-hating crowd of spitting and cursing opponents of her match with the world’s most eligible batchelor. A section of the piece reprints some of the vituperative comments from the paper’s website.

A careful reading of the article reveals it’s in two parts. The first reflecting opinions of some Buckingham Palace courtiers, while the second part concentrates on the view from Clarence House.

These two courts have been at loggerheads with each other since the days of Diana, Princess of Wales. It seems the dogs of war have been unleashed again on the subject of the entirely innocent and inexperienced figure of Kate Middleton.

As Royal Anecdotes reported some months ago, there appears to be a growing faction of “courtiers” at the Palace who oppose the wedding of the two young people. They freely quote the Queen as insisting Kate should get a job and that “she’s not proactive enough.”

I believe there may be some noises of disquiet, particularly from Prince Philip, at the lack of a firm decision on this match. One can imagine him stating that Kate really should be doing something else while she waits. The aim, though, may be to prompt William into “marrying the girl, or letting her go” — a statement attributed to Prince Philip two years ago.

The anti-Kate faction in the Palace has picked up on this theme and translated it as the Queen’s wish that Kate “got a job.” This then becomes “work for a charity.” Have they forgotten that Kate was involved with a charity cross-Channel dragon-boat race last year but was asked to pull out for safety reasons by Clarence House? A dig at Prince Charles’s press team, perhaps?

The article ends with extensive quotes from the Clarence House viewpoint which show the truth at the heart of this story:

Despite this reluctance to co-operate with the Press, Kate’s friends say she has access to Press officers and senior aides at Clarence House, where she is free to come and go at her leisure.

“Kate has a hotline to Clarence House and she listens to everything the Royal aides tell her to do,” said a friend. “When they advised her to pull out of the cross-Channel dragon boat race last summer, she did it immediately. Kate is approached about doing lots of things but the Clarence House staff are often against her taking part because they think it’s too high-profile and they want to keep Kate out of the limelight. She’s in a bit of a Catch 22 situation.”

Royal Anecdotes believes that what is happening to Kate Middleton is very close to persecution. The wave of teenage angst she has had to face from many downmarket websites, including the Mail’s (which is moderated), is almost beyond belief since very few of the trolls will ever have met her. To quote the Kate-haters as proof of anything rational is tantamount to giving up on moderate and accurate journalism.

We’ve long stated that only a quick resolution by Prince William will spare his long-time girlfriend this avalanche of mindless criticism.

We are delighted that an announcement looks possible from Sandringham at Christmas.

BBC Radio played a journalist’s tape recording of an interview with the Prince of Wales this morning in which he is heard getting very angry over genetically-modified crops (GM).

Jeff Randall of the Telegraph, and formerly the BBC’s Business Editor, interviewed the Prince at the Castle of Mey in Caithness where Charles and Camilla are holidaying.

At one stage Randall asked him why he objects to “large corporations” making the running on GM, since only they can afford the investment for research and development.

Charles replied that large companies are conducting a “gigantic experiment with nature and the whole of humanity which has gone seriously wrong. Why else are we facing all these challenges, climate change and everything? That would be the absolute destruction of everything, and the classic way of ensuring there is no food in the future.”

The Prince believes food security should be put above an unregulated race for food production.

He continued with considerable passion, “And if they think it’s somehow going to work because they are going to have one form of clever genetic engineering after another then again count me out, because that will be guaranteed to cause the biggest environmental disaster of all time.”

The phrase “Count me out!” is used at least twice to hammer home his point. Commentators are today speculating precisely what he meant by it.

My personal interpretation is that he means to go on as he has for 40 years, making his case strongly and, as he sees it, non-politically. However, currently he is boycotting the Olympic Games because of China’s activities in Tibet. He also refused to attend a State banquet for the Chinese President in London and met the Dalai Lama openly, flaunting political advice.

Clearly Charles is treading a fine line on these issues now that food and climate change have become hot political topics around the world.

His position could become serious once he is King. Going against the Government of the day on policy would create not just an unseemly row but a major constitutional crisis. Already the usual crew of grumbly Labour backbenchers are feigning outrage at his remarks.

With the phrase “Count me out!” could Charles be signalling that he will not preside over a country that has relinquished its control in these crucial areas to the European Union, which has significantly softened its attitudes to GM crops and research in recent years?

Might he be saying, I just can’t do this job, it would be against all my principles and life’s work?

Or was it just a rush of blood to the head in response to some shoot-from-the-hip questioning?

Jeff Randall’s background to the interview can be read here.

In an interview with Majesty magazine, Zara Phillips reveals she curtseys every time she meets her grandmother, Queen Elizabeth II.

Zara collecting her MBE from the Queen in 2006.

“The thing with my grandmother is she is still my grandmother and she’s very approachable, but she’s also from an era where that was how it was done. But there aren’t many people who know how it’s done. I know because I have grown up with it.”

Like many aspects of British life, which traditionally operates on convention rather than prescriptive law, there are disputes and misunderstandings about the proper way to address the Queen and other members of the Royal Family.

Jo Bryant, an etiquette advisor for Debrett’s says a curtsey for a woman and a bow for a man is still the correct way to greet the Queen. The delightful Zara clearly agrees.

However, Joe Little of Majesty magazine says, “Things are quite a bit more relaxed these days. At one time it was the ‘done thing’ whereas nowadays it is really left to individual discretion.”

The wife of the present Prime Minister, Sarah Brown, reversed the practice of her predecessor — rebel with many causes, Cherie Blair — when she was pointedly seen to curtsey to the Duchess of Cornwall at an international conference.

Men are lucky — bowing is the easy part. The curtsey is the more tricky manoeuvre. Some older women have been known to topple over completely. It really does need some practice.

Method: Put the right foot behind the left foot. Bend the knees maintaining a straight back. It’s probably easier with a loose skirt or gown than a in tight mini.

To see how it’s done by experts, actresses in TV costume dramas are always impeccable. In the BBC’s Wives and Daughters, by Mrs Gaskell, set in Victorian times, the two younger women give deep curtseys to every older person they meet. It’s difficult to imagine modern youngsters having that sort of respect for their elders.

Another great exponent of the curstey is the Welsh opera diva, Katherine Jenkins, who almost sat on the stage with her spectacularly low, slow curtsey to the Queen at the Remembrance concert in the Royal Albert Hall.

Is it possible to revive the practice in the 21st century?