B> Why have we read so little about David Blunkett in recent days? </B><BR> Rightly or wrongly, many newspapers have taken the view that Blunkett and his latest crime-busting initiative are of less immediate interest to their readers than the scandal which now threatens to engulf the royal family - for another week, at least.  <B> What scandal is that? </B> <BR>To summarise, one which depicts many members of the royal family, both nuclear and extended, as callous, feuding, screwed-up and, more interestingly, as potential perverters of the course of justice. Their servants, warring cliques of voracious, sometimes vicious sycophants who hail from an impressively wide range of the sexual spectrum, are also no better than they should be.   <B> Says who? </B><BR> Everyone, really. Paul Burrell, the butler, who was generally acclaimed, before he became the country's most reviled tittle-tattler, as "the man Diana called her rock", insists that the Spencers, who wanted to "crush the rock", are grasping hypocrites. His - possibly former - friend, Rosa Monckton, added that they had cheated Diana's godchildren out of their inheritance. Meanwhile, his own enemies, who include a former (male) Australian lover and the divorced gay comedian, Michael Barrymore, insist that the butler - who is married, with two children - is himself untrustworthy, having airbrushed a strenuous-sounding gay past from his CV.   <B> Is homosexuality compulsory for royal servants? </B><BR> On the contrary. In the Kensington closets the princess's cast-off clothes competed for space with happily married fathers of two.   <B> What has the royal yacht Britannia got to do with it? </B><BR> According to some uncharitable reports, Burrell was aboard during an incident involving a number of crew members, royal staff and a quantity of gay pornography. It was after this that the queen reportedly advised him that he might find himself a wife.   <B> And how is that remotely relevant to the truth or otherwise of Burrel's disclosures? </B> <BR>Beats me.   <B> Worse things happen at sea, don't they? </B> <BR>And on land too. This weekend George Smith, a former colleague of the butler (divorced, two children) joined in the general unburdening, confiding to the Mail on Sunday that he was the victim of a homosexual rape, allegedly enacted by a trusted royal servant (married, two children) of Prince Charles (divorced, two children). Snaking out of these accusations and counter accusations is another rumour of a sexual encounter said to be so compromising that it could jeopardise the future of the royal family. Then again, they were saying that 10 years ago, after the Camilla tape, but even the Italians no longer call Charles Tamponcino.   <B> How did it start? </B> <BR>With a police raid in January 2001. Officers led by the top vertigo-sufferer, Maxine de Brunner, knocked up Burrell at dawn, reportedly demanding to know the whereabouts of "the crown jewels".   <B> Was there any evidence Burrell had profited from theft? </B> <BR>The police, unaware of his work as a media etiquette expert, believed his earnings were dishonestly acquired.    <B> How could they be so stupid? </B><BR> Or determined. We must surmise, like the queen, that there are powers at work in this country about which we have no knowledge.   <B> When were the crown jewels moved to Runcorn? </B><BR> Don't be obtuse. It can't have escaped even Guardian readers that the "crown jewels" we are talking about here are the contents of an initialled box in which Diana had hidden a variety of potentially incriminating treasures, including letters from Prince Philip calling her a "trollop", ex-lover James Hewitt's signet ring and a tape she had recorded (apparently, after plying him with drink), of one servant recalling his alleged rape by another. This box, which seems to have been almost as magically accommodating as Pandora's, may also have contained video diaries of the princess making more unflattering accusations about her in-laws.  <B> Who filmed her? </B><BR> Possibly Martin Bashir, who served the Princesss for a while in a junior-rock-like capacity. This apparently ended after he vouchsafed, somewhat incautiously, to Burrell, that he would "like to give her one".  <B> Regina v Burrell: </B><BR> When Burrell appeared at the high court, charged with the theft of 342 comically disparate objects, the judge, Mrs Justice Rafferty, did her utmost to safeguard the reputation of Regina and Co by censoring documents in court, but the case immediately offered treasurable, if pitiable glimpses of the sort of relationship Princess Diana had enjoyed with her family. Her brother, hero of the funeral, who has made the dead Diana into a successful tourist attraction, had previously refused her use of a house on his land, fearing invasion of his privacy. There might have been more, but the case against Burrell collapsed just before he was due to give evidence, Regina having suddenly recalled a conversation with Burrell, in which he had told her he would remove papers for safe-keeping.  <B> Why didn't she intervene earlier? </B><BR> Odd, isn't it? Perhaps there are powers at work in this country about which we have no knowledge.  <B> And the Spencers? </B><BR> One possible explanation for both the royals and the Spencers's carelessness in allowing that gossip-seeking missile, Burrell the chance to detonate in court, was that all the parties involved were engaged, in what, thanks to the concluding scene of Quentin Tarantino's film, Reservoir Dogs, we recognise as a Mexican Standoff. Both the royals and the Spencers, presumably aware of his gay past, may have hoped that Burrell's own sense of self-preservation would deter him from revealing unpalatable truths about them. But it didn't, and all have now had their reputations battered.   <B> Why? </B><BR> Partly because Burrell, who may not, after all, be terribly bright, failed to grasp that discretion (though less cathartic than a 300,000 deal with the Mirror) would be both safer and more lucrative than confession. Partly because it was too late. As well as the revelations about the Spencers offered in open court, a signed legal statement by Burrell written to prove his rock-like status with the princess, had already been leaked to the press, disclosing that his extensive duties included smuggling her lovers, such as Dr Hasnat Khan, in and out of the palace, as well as buying pornography for her son and conveying her donations to prostitutes at Paddington Station.  <B> What very discreet prostitutes. </B> <BR>Absolutely. At a time when even royal servants seem to have forgotten their sacred duty of silence, how reassuring to find that in some professions at least, there is still some regard for decency and discretion. They are an example to us all.  <B> Who was Dr Armani? </B><BR> This mystery American, who used often to interrupt Hasnat Khan as he laboured over an open heart, turns out to be have been the Princess of Wales, using one of her amusing aliases. It was another trick of the fun-loving princess's to tease the public by buying pregnancy tests in Boots. Burrell further disclosed that "Dr Armani" once went out to see Khan wearing only her jewellery and a fur coat. He did not disclose whether it was the same evening that Diana threw an unwanted fur coat out of her car-window, aiming it at another of those immensely discreet beggar-women who inhabit the streets of London, but we must hope not. As Bagehot says, it is not good to let daylight in on magic. Especially on a chilly evening. At home, the adaptable Burrell would also prepare easily regurgitated food such as custard and rice pudding for his mistress. Khan appears to have preferred Kentucky Fried Chicken, so much so that Burrell would often find him hiding - vainly, for Diana was nothing if not persistent - in the Colonel's Fulham outlet.   <B> Is that what rocks do? </B><BR> There seems to be no precise job description. In court, Frances Shand Kydd claimed that her daughter had a quite a collection of rocks - so many, you gathered, that if she had only scattered a few hardy alpines between them and placed them on a south-facing terrace, they might have taken a prize at the Chelsea Flower Show. Since then, a positive avalanche of self-styled rocks has suggested that if Burrell was principal boulder, he was surrounded by some very prominent pebbles.  <B> Still, hardly a constitutional crisis. </B><BR> If you believe Tony Blair. But Burrell also confirmed that there was, indeed, a "rape tape" in existence, ditto a victim, and possibly evidence of a palace cover-up. Not to mention a perpetrator.  <B> Charges presumably nullified by the butler's own economy with the truth? </B><BR> Not necessarily. His principal challenger is Michael Barrymore, who claimed, "Paul Burrell seduced me as Diana lay dead."  <B> Every seduction since September 1 1997 has taken place with Diana lying dead. </B><BR> True, and it should be remembered that Barrymore, whose own reputation has yet to recover from the mysterious death of a young man in his swimming pool, is not generally renowned for the peerless quality of his testimony. His ex-wife, recording her suffering in a new book, recalled "He was out of his head on drugs at Di's funeral."  <B> What part did Daniella Westbrook play in all this? </B><BR> Due to some tabloid oversight, there are still a few celebrity names missing from What the Butler Saw, but this is sure to have been corrected by the end of the week.  <B> Why are some newspapers suddenly so interested an obscure royal servant called Michael Fawcett? </B><BR> Apparently because of concerns over his role in selling unwanted gifts received by the Prince of Wales. "Fawcett the Fence", as he is reportedly refered to by some colleagues, appears in a much used photograph of the Prince of Wales taken while shooting at Sandringham.  <B> Do people really still wear trousers like that? </B><BR> Apparently.  <B> This doesn't quite explain the intensity of their interest in him does it? </B><BR> Possibly not.  <B> Does any of this actually matter? </B><BR> There are three schools of thought.  <B> 1 The long view. </B><BR> Endorsed by none other than royal biographer, Ben Pimlott, who has dismissed the whole thing as "boring, frankly", this school thinks we should all grow up. The Butler-fest only tells us something we already knew: we are abjectly in thrall to celebrity gossip. As for constitutional significance: how, the long-viewers say, can this little of bit palace unpleasantness possibly compare with the sexual and fiscal vagaries of Charles II, the trials of Queen Caroline, the deeply felt hostility towards that goody goody, Queen Victoria? Besides, if you want a royal family, why complain that they're not like decent ordinary folk? Plotting, bossing and showing-off is what they are for.  <B> 2 The short view. </B><BR> Endorsed by almost everyone else, this school holds it to be self-evident that the whole Burrell affair, having multiplied our knowledge of the private life of the royal family by about 1,000 times in two weeks, is necessarily fascinating. And where are the tapes?  <B> 3 The exalted view. </B><BR> Goes "I'm not interested in the individuals, so much as the institution. If only we could put all this infantilising, prurient rubbish behind us, and engage in a really exciting debate about what a detailed constitution for a republic might look like ...Did she really go out in fur coat with nothing under it?"  <B> When was that glorious jubilee? </B><BR> June 5 was the day of the flypast. Remember? Many republicans and doubters, among them Ros Wynne Jones of the Mirror, accepted that, whatever you might say about them, the royal family truly is for ever. "My republican dream was shattered", wrote Ros. Watching the flypast, she thought, the queen must have realised "that the celebrations were not just for the last 50 years but for the next 50, during which her family were now guaranteed to remain at the heart of public life". Only a few months later, it looks as if Ros's arithmetic might have been a bit out. "It is not Paul Burrell whose reputation is seriously under attack", the Mirror wrote yesterday, "but that of the Royal Family and their advisors". Maybe it was the sight of the planes, rather than the royals, that misted up our eyes.  <B> So how about another flypast? </B><BR> Assuming that the queen, Charles, and Philip were actually on board the planes, it might just work. But best wait, perhaps, until Princess Anne has appeared in court to answer for Eglantyne Jebb, her devil dog, to save her having to catch up later.   <B> Are there any winners? </B><BR> Kentucky Fried Chicken? After all, if top heart surgeons eat it, it can't be all that bad.   <B> And the biggest losers? </B><BR> Last week, by common consent, it was the man whose sense of duty drove him to hold Prince Charles's specimen bottle. Only now is it dawning that according to the arcane, below-stairs rituals of the royal household, such a task might be considered a privilege. So it's the bottle I feel for. And those poor little princes.