Another cracker from Simon Hoggart this weekend:

“I spoke at an Oldie lunch in London this week, about my book A Long Lunch – My Stories And I’m Sticking To Them, just out in paperback. After a somewhat rushed speech I realised I had left out one of my favourite stories, about someone many of the oldies present would remember. In my version, Harold Macmillan was in conversation with Lord Carrington some time in 1972.

Ed Muskie, a Democratic candidate for president, had apparently broken down and cried when a New Hampshire paper accused his wife of being a drunk. Though he insisted that the tears were actually melted snowflakes, the incident ruined his image as calm and measured, and he left the race.

“What an extraordinary reason,” said Macmillan. “I don’t know,” Carrington replied, “what would you have said if a newspaper claimed that Lady Dorothy was an alcoholic?”

“I would say,” said Macmillan, “‘you should have seen her mother’.”