In Blandings Castle and Elsewhere, PG Wodehouse recorded the sterling response of Beach, the butler, on discovering Lord Emsworth's son in a drawing room with a sack of rats in his hand. "With a murmured apology, he secured the sack and started to withdraw. It was not strictly his duty to carry rats, but a good butler is always ready to give and take. Only so can the amenities of a large country house be preserved." Anyone who has marvelled, in recent days, at the duties routinely performed by Paul Burrell in his days of butling for the Prince and Princess of Wales may find that the Wodehouse passage has lost some of its old impact. They may feel that in comparison with the demands on Burrell's give and take, Beach's was barely tested. For a man, like Burrell, who might, at any time, be ordered to retrieve one of Diana's unwilling lovers from his hiding place in a Kentucky Fried Chicken outlet, or have a book thrown at him by Prince Charles as a punishment for second-rate lying, or be despatched to Paddington to stand proxy for the Princess as the saviour of deserving prostitutes, or be sent out by his mistress to buy pornography for her teenage son, the efficient disposal of a sack of rats would probably have presented a nice break from routine. For Burrell's unfortunate colleague, the valet who had to hold Prince Charles's hospital specimen pot while the royal membrum virile pissed into it, rat-securing could only have offered a glimpse of a better, more beautiful life. Of the many unanswered questions currently stacking-up, Sherlock Holmes-fashion, in the wake of the Burrell trial, the most fascinating is not, surely, the issue of why the Queen dallied so long before springing Burrell from the witness box, nor why our senior police investigators are so spectacularly thick, nor what possessed Burrell to remove boxes of old pop CDs, as well as letters, from proximity to those beastly shredding Spencers, but the far more intriguing subject of the Windsors' execrable treatment of their servants. How have they got away with it for so long?  Naturally, confidentiality agreements and the official secrets act have been helpful to the feudal tradition. Had it not been for Burrell's trial, Prince Charles must have felt quite confident that no one would find out that fibbing to his wife formed part of the Highgrove butler's job description. Wendy Berry, who wrote an engrossing account of her servitude at Highgrove (and one which was rather kinder, though otherwise consistent with the subsequently published recollections of Ken Wharfe, the detective, and Patrick Jephson, Diana's secretary) had to flee to America after Prince Charles took out an injunction on her book, one which remains in place, ensuring that no part of it can be quoted. But even with this legal deterrent to gossip, it is remarkable how little, until now, has been disclosed by their servants about the preposterous expectations and demands of members of the royal family.  Most people will have waited until the Burrell trial to discover that Prince Charles is notorious not only for temper tantrums but for the ludicrous and time-wasting requirement, like a child who cannot leave the house without her comfort blanket, that his personal arrangements, even in hospital, should replicate those at Highgrove. Thanks to Burrell, we now know that for the heir to the throne, there can be no disruption without a van-load of transitional objects. Also that this ardent believer in the dignity of mankind prefers, when at home, to recreate the social arrangements of Altman's satire, Gosford Park - a film, incidentally, which Charles has screened for guests at Sandringham: quality in the comfy chairs, servants in the hard ones at the back. Perhaps they were lucky. The Queen, by Burrell's account, prefers the lower orders to stand in her presence, even when, as in his own, notorious case, their encounter lasts for three hours.  As for these bullied butlers and dressers, valets and housemaids, only proximity to power - and, of course, the free accommodation - can explain why so many are content to indulge their masters, remaining mutely loyal, infinitely discreet. For Burrell, Diana's intimacy and trust must have compensated for the dignity he forfeited when she appointed him Rock of the Bedchamber, a sort of gentleman-procurer responsible for delivering her lovers, stowed in a car boot, in and out of Kensington Palace. Similarly, his sovereign's abrupt recollection of their chat - "the Queen came through for me" - seems instantly to have made up for her two years of forgetfulness. Those who now condemn Burrell for telling his story should perhaps marvel instead at his forbearance during the many years of being pelted with books by the heir apparent and besieged by out-of-hours calls from the moody princess while unwanted presents from colonial visitors stoked the Highgrove bonfires. Moreover, even as they add to the gaiety of nations, the Burrell confessions may effect some improvement in palace working conditions. Next time some troublesome Helot has him reaching for the nearest, book-shaped missile, the Prince of Wales may want to think twice, and send for a rat sack instead.