The wedding took place at St-Paul cathedral on July 29, 1981. Nearly a million people demonstrated the joy in the streets and three quarters of them were from outside London an abroad. Diana looked calm and confident. As she made the daunting 3 1/2-minute progress up the aisle, it was she who seemed to be supporting her father, still weak from a near-fatal brain hemorrhage. Charles had always wanted a musical wedding and the music was supremely stirring and very English: Jeremiah Clarke's Trumpet Voluntary; I Vow to Thee My Country, set to music by Gustave Holst: Sir William Walton's Crown Imperial March; and Edward Elgar's haunting Pomp and Circumstance March No.4.

A champagne lunch was served. When the newlyweds left, a little behind schedule, for their honeymoon, out pranced the four greys pulling the stately landau but this time Charles's irrepressible brothers had left their marks. Behind the splendid postillions in their scarlet and gold a large bunch of blue and silver balloons. And on the back of the carriage Edward had tied a hand-lettered "Just Married" sign.

Boarding the train at Waterloo Station they headed to Romsey, Hampshire, where they spent the first two nights of their married life. At Broadlands, the majestic home owned by the late Lord Mountbatten, Charles and Diana  spent the next days quietly relaxing and fishing. Then it was off by the jet to Gibraltar for a cruise on board the royal yacht Britannia.

Diana 's chief responsibility, of course was the provision of an heir to the throne. On June 21,1982 at St-Mary's hospital, Paddington Diana's first child William was born. Diana said of the birth: " I felt the whole country was in labour with me. I felt enormous relief. But I had actually know William was going to be a boy, because the scan had shown it. So it caused no surprise." Nothing  must interfere with royal duties and in early 1983 Diana's duty was to tour Australia and  New Zealand with her husband. The royal family wanted her to go without William. But she would not think of it.

If she went, her new child had to go, too. Buckingham Palace did not like  the idea, but it worked. After landing in Australia, Diana installed William with nanny Barbara Barnes at a house in New South Wales and traveled there With Charles whenever they had a spare moment. In between, she carried out all her engagements and was triumph wherever she went. For Charles, though, it emphasized his second-billing status in public affection whenever he appeared with his wife. Crowds lining both sides of the street would groan when Charles was on their side. "You've got me", he'd tell them, "You'd better ask for your money back." But he felt surplus to requirements and didn't like it.

Nor did the Princess's progress from popular idol to semi-saint, achieved through her remarkable personal warmth as comforter of the sick, the dying and the needy, come easy for Charles. But she won worldwide acclaim for her espousal of the cause of AIDS victims, doing much to dispel the common belief that social contacts, such as shaking hands, could spread the disease. And the British Goverment, realizing that she was a major asset to the nation, could not wait to get her into a country to help boost goodwill and exports. The tour came in quick succession: to Spain, to France, a magnificent two-week visit to Italy, to Portugal, to America and later to Brazil, Japan and India.

Just over two years after the birth of William, on September 15, 1984 Prince Harry was born. Diana  admitted that it was in this same period that the marriage was  effectively over after the birth of Harry and she sank into the trough of bulimia.

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