Never Decapitate a Posh Liar

Royal weddings, and the extravagant displays of clothing that accompany them, have been a little out of fashion since the Queen Gawblesser's grandson took up with that Negress; so the Museum of London has decided to merry up the monarchy a bit by displaying the sartorial relics of one of the realm's more worthless rulers. Like his father, Charles I believed in the divine right of kings; unlike his father, who had received some harsh lessons in the political realities at a very early age, Charles was neither shrewd nor discreet, believing along with luminaries such as Richard Nixon and Boris Johnson that laws are for little people. He lived down to the precept by repeatedly breaking his word to Parliament and eventually waging war against his own people; for which he was tried and executed as a tyrant, traitor and murderer. The undergarment which he wore for the occasion is to be displayed at the museum in commemoration of the good old days when Britons made their own entertainment: when riot and cruelty to animals lost their charm, there was often a public execution. The exhibition covers the the period from the end of the twelfth century to 1868, but Britain's leading liberal newspaper has found no other executions worthy of mention; least of all those of the men who signed the warrant for Charles, who were subjected to far slower and less humane deaths than the king's upon the restoration of his vindictive heir.