In which the pond stands with our Henry for King Chuck ...

(here for more Bell).

What a disappointing bunch the reptiles are during the summer silliness, almost as bad as the invisible ABC.

The best they've got this Friday? Why it's 'hole in the bucket' Henry standing up for Prince Chuck, and naturally it's such a novelty that our Henry zoomed to the top of the digital splash ...

Oh sure on the treekiller edition, the Bishop was having a word with a minor prelate ... while the race-baiter was having a quiet sob about bullying ...

But Concetta Fierravanti-Wells has always flapped like a dunny door in a Tamworth gale, or like an onion muncher on steroids, and there's no fun in that game ... and after all, our Henry was only urging a good think ...

Henry for King Chuck?

It doesn't have much of a ring to it, and so the pond's business plan goes down the tubes with the lizards of Oz, but the pond must do its duty and take a squizz and perhaps have a think ...

Indeed, indeed, and yet only a month ago, the Currish Snail was preaching outrageous, shocking treason ...

There's a lot more, easily googled for those bored on a Friday, but that barely leaves time for the pond to mention the "black spider" memos and all the fuss and fury that has surrounded them over the years ...

Everybody has had a go, from the UK Terror's Why the Prince of Wales cannot stop being an 'interfering busybody'  to Nick Cohen sounding off in the Graudian, Prince Charles, we'll not stomach a meddling monarch ...

Fortunately none of this troubles our Henry as he serenely sails by, talking of apolitical, impartial symbols of unity ...

In a desperate bid to add to the distraction, the reptiles provide our Henry with hope for the future ...

Perhaps it might not be King Chuck. Perhaps there'll be some babe in arms who'll take up the throne ...

But forget the talk of Prince Willy or his son Prince George or all the other Willys and Charlottes and sundry princes and princesses ...

If Chuck has inherited the genes, he'll be around long enough to score the gig ... and then we'll see where our Henry's tut-tutting and clucking about Quentin Bryce has got him ...

Letters to Irvine in June 2001 had complained about the Human Rights Act and were critical of the "degree to which our lives are becoming ruled by a truly absurd degree of politically correct interference". Charles also complained to Irvine that the United Kingdom was "sliding inexorably down the slope of ever increasing, petty-minded litigiousness" and wrote in 2002 about "ever-more prescriptive laws - for example, health and safety at work legislation, the blame culture...and the bureaucratic red tape which accompanies new rules"... (more comedy here for Cumbrian farmers)

Stand down, Quentin, Chuck is in town ...

But our Henry has an ace up his sleeve. The emperor Donald ...

Say what? Is that perhaps the most comprehensive mis-reading of the American presidency ever yet penned? Is it possible to so confuse an executive presidency with a ceremonial presidency?

Perhaps our Henry should take a trawl through the New Republic's question Have we ever had a President like Donald Trump?

Spoiler alert: "Yes, we have - but you have to go back to the nineteenth century."

Avoid hitting the door on your way to the time machine, dear Henry ...you might learn a little more about the founders of the American republic, as royal a bunch of loons as King George III himself.

The pond can feel a cartoon coming on ...

Now to be fair to our Henry, he hasn't yet led with the notion of a crowned republic ... let's see if he manages the feat in his final gobbet ...

Indeed, indeed. It may be that there are sensible solutions to hapless Henry's dilemmas ...

And it may be that his preferred solution, King Chuck, comes to pass.

Naturally the pond stands solidly behind our Henry and King Chuck, because we can never have enough comedy ...

If the ancients teach us anything, it's that there are more important things than prudence ...

“... I say and maintain, that of all torcheculs, arsewisps, bumfodders, tail-napkins, bunghole cleansers, and wipe-breeches, there is none in the world comparable to the neck of a goose ...”

And so King Chuck it will be, King Chuck it must be ...

And so to a few cartoons ... in the hope that in due course King Chuck will prove a worthy rival to the current emperor attracting all the attention and the glory ...