Pss! A rant.

At Osbourne, Queen Victoria's estate on the Isle of Wight (nice exterior designed by Prince Albert; ghastly, narcissistic, and possibly even necrophiliac interior mostly ordered, I should imagine, by Queen Victoria) there's a Swiss Cottage that was built for the young princesses and princes to play in.

There's a pretend fort nearby, and garden plots where the poor children were required to raise vegetables. Not far from these vegetable plots are a collection of small green wheelbarrows, one for each of Queen Victoria's children, and each inscribed with a name.

Well, actually each not inscribed with a name.

Pss R, it says on one.

Here's the person I think must have been Pss R. (She's grown up in this picture, but I've chosen it because it's so lovely. Her name was Vickie.)



But, really, Pss R? I'm assuming that stands for Princess Royal, but it's a far-from-lovely abbreviation.

Poor Vickie.

Word Not To Abbreviate Today: princess. This word comes to us as a feminine form of prince, of course, which is from the Latin prīnceps which means first man, ruler or chief.