‘It’s the moment I have been dreading,” the new King said to the new prime minister on Friday, “but you do try to keep things going.” This morning, in the ancient courtyard of St James’s Palace, and among 200 assembled privy counsellors, the inevitability of that fact became law: the reign of King Charles III was formally proclaimed. While at one end of the Mall long lines of mourners clutching supermarket flowers were patiently queueing to leave their tribute at the gates of Buckingham Palace, in the upper rooms of its older Tudor neighbour constitutional cogs smoothly ratcheted the succession.
The ceremony of accession was witnessed for the first time by television cameras. Viewers across the world watched Penny Mordaunt, leader of the privy council since last Wednesday, preside over a ceremony unchanged for 300 years. The new King addressed an audience including six of the 14 former prime ministers who served under his mother, their heads bobbing allegiance like extras in a Holbein painting.
