NEWTON'S LAW: THE BRITISH LIKE THEIR ROYALTY WITH `UPPER-CLASS DECADENCE'

Royalty is a nice career with a rub. Admittedly, the rub is a small one: the only thing standing between you and a lifetime of free lunches is a major foul-up.

What's so tough about that? You are born royal, breathe and that's it. The blood does all the work. From then until the day you die, it's a nice house, a nice trust fund and ladies curtsy at your presence.

You are even forgiven the minor indiscretions ... dancing at rock concerts, chumming with commoners, being rude at equestrian events and the like.

Still, saving face means a lot if a palace is your address and her majesty resides down the hall. No one asks you to abdicate for lesser errors in judgment; public relations problems are taken seriously all the same, those, along with fluctuating silver markets, being the scourge of imperial life.

You might have heard that Great Britain's royal family has taken a few lumps of late. London's tabloid press has been critical of regal behavior during the Persian Gulf war.

It is unbecoming of the empire's elite, claim the papers. The royals are carrying on their extravagant lifestyles without regard for British participation in the Middle East conflict.

The finger-pointing hasn't been demure. The incidents include:

Lord Linley's trip to Mustique, during which the queen's nephew donned lipstick and dressed in drag with a number of other male revelers.

The Duchess of York went on a skiing vacation on the eve of war.

Lord Althorp, the queen's godson and Princess Diana's brother, confessed to an adulterous fling in Paris.

Prince Edward, who washed out of the British military, owns a theatrical company but has yet to offer its services for entertaining the troops.

Prince Charles and his father Prince Phillip have taken up arms only to shoot pheasant, one newspaper sniffed.

This was just too much for the Sunday Times of London, which badgered the royal family for "parading a mixture of upper-class decadence and insensitivity which disgusts the public and demeans the monarchy."

So, life is not so enchanted in the House of Windsor. Outside the gates, the British rabble is getting roused.

Spin doctors in the press office at Buckingham Palace are said to have their lights burning late these days. The usually tight-lipped department regarded the reports as rubbish, saying the royal family is doing its utmost to support British troops and the allied war effort.

What they could have said, but what they would never say, is that British subjects are a bit arbitrary in their regard for the crown. They bow to the royal family, lift it onto a pedestal, then resent the aristocracy having taken them up on their admiration.

Given a choice between haughty behavior and the Queen Mother throwing paper-plate banquets for her royal cousins, the British will take haughtiness every time. In England, arrogance is held in the same reverence as tea time; the Brits won't go a day without either.

Big deal if the royal family is made up of cross-dressing, pheasant-shooting, vacation-loving philanderers ... the common folk would have it no other way.

So, the Sunday Times' suggestion that Queen Elizabeth call her clan in and knock some heads together should be dismissed.

Like the Americans, the British are fighting to keep their way of life intact. Besides, there has to be some defining force in upper-class decadence.