This is a Blandings novel. As a peer of the realm Clarence Ninth Earl of Emsworth has an occasional duty to leave the Empress of Blandings surely the most considerable pig in the whole world & travel to London for the opening of parliament. It comes hard to him for he has a proper sense of the priorities in life which rate pigs & flowerbeds higher than politicians. But no sooner has he returned to Blandings than his real problems begin: the dastardly Duke of Dunstable is out to steal the Empress. His sister Lady Constance has inflicted on him a particularly nasty new secretary. & the Church Lads Brigade are camped all over his lawns. Thank God for the Earl of Ickenham better known as Uncle Fred whose own particularly devious brand of sweetness & light aims to banish blackmailers & pig-stealers & restore true love all over the castle grounds.