Mike O’Connor: Harry joins the ranks of long history of royal fools

Prince Harry’s problems may have begun when he went to the bathroom one day to be confronted by an empty toilet-roll holder with not a servant in sight, writes Mike O’Connor.

You don’t realise how lucky you have been in life until you hear of the misfortunes that have befallen others.

I had a beer with my brother over the weekend.

It occurred to me when I got home that neither of us had ever yelled at each other, which made me feel for Prince Harry, who had to endure, as he has revealed, not only yelling but also screaming from his sibling William.

This realisation caused me to call my brother and inquire as to whether he had ever, as Harry alleges Bro William did to him, push me over so I landed on the dog’s bowl and cut myself.

“I don’t believe so,” he said.

“I saw you fall over a couple of times when we were sharing a bedroom at Mum and Dad’s place but that was late at night and I think you might have had a few.

“And there was definitely no dog’s bowl involved.

“If you recall our dog ran away from home and went to live with the people in the next street so there was no chance of you landing on his bowl.”

Princes Harry and William. Picture: AFP

“That’s right,” I recalled. “Do you think that might have been because Dad yelled at him when he bit the milkman?”

“Could have been,” he said. “As Prince Harry has revealed, some people are very sensitive to a raised voice. Maybe our dog had the Harry syndrome.”

“And no screaming or yelling?” I asked.

“Not from me, but you screamed one night after coming in late.

“It turned out you woke up and saw the eerie green glow emanating from the illuminated statue of the Virgin Mary which Mum had put in our room to protect us.

“Being in a somewhat tired and emotional state, you thought you were seeing a ghost.”

My wife is also fortunate to have survived her childhood with suffering Harry-like emotional scars as a result of the treatment she received at the hands of her elder brother, who was in the habit, when she was playing happily, of taking her toys off her!

On another occasion when she had hung her budgie’s cage on the rotary clothesline, he waited until her back was turned and spun the clothesline around like a roulette wheel.

Then Prince Charles with William and Harry at Princess Diana’s funeral in 1997. Picture: AFP

The budgie survived but was never quite the same.

How lucky for Harry that he never had a budgie.

One wonders how he would have coped with wandering out to the backyard at Kensington Palace and seen Bertie the Budgie spinning around on the royal clothesline like a leaf in a whirlwind while his evil brother lurked in the shadows.

Life has indeed been cruel to the poor lad who, by his own admission, had to endure losing his virginity to a woman who plucked him from a pub and shagged him in the carpark.

Apparently no dog bowls were broken in the process that was more equine than canine, Harry modestly describing his part in this romantic interlude as akin to that of a stallion.

I did a ring-around of my mates to see if anyone of them had ever suffered a similar trauma.

“Never,” said my good mate Shane, “and it wasn’t without trying.

“ My personal best as a young bloke was 16 knock-backs in a night. I should have said I was a prince.”

Catherine and Princes William and Harry at the Diamond Jubilee Concert outside Buckingham Palace in 2011. Picture: AFP

What we don’t know, of course, is the emotional toll taken on poor Harry by any number of other crises, which, not wishing to attract undo public sympathy, he has left unreported.

It may be that he went to the bathroom one day to be confronted by an empty toilet-roll holder with not a servant in sight to heed the royal summons.

Perhaps he burnt the toast or tried to put two legs into one leg of his undies.

Don’t laugh, ladies. I’ve done this. Fortunately, there were no dog bowls lying around at the time.

There is a long history of royal fools, among them the court jester to Henry II, the delightfully titled Roland the Farter, who is recorded as entertaining the court with his ability to leap, whistle and pass wind simultaneously.

Harry has now joined their ranks, a sulking, self-obsessed, foolish man with a heart the size of a pea.

Given the choice between reading Harry’s book and an evening with Roland, I’d go with the Farter every time.

It would be a lot more entertaining.