The Royals Huddle for a Cuddle

--Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip got their first chance to cuddle their new granddaughter during a family get-together at a Highlands castle. Buckingham Palace officials said they did not know whether a name had been chosen or when it would be released for the Princess of York, the first child of Prince Andrew and his wife, the former Sarah Ferguson. Hundreds of well-wishers lined the road leading to Balmoral Castle in Scotland and waved and cheered as the queen and her husband drove past. The royal couple arrived at Aberdeen aboard the royal yacht where they met with survivors, relatives and rescuers involved in the July explosion of a North Sea drilling platform that claimed 167 lives, a spokeswoman said.

--Singer Pearl Bailey is winning a new generation of fans. Bailey, who is in the Persian Gulf to entertain U.S. sailors, and a five-member band headed by her husband, jazz drummer Louie Bellson, performed for two days for audiences aboard the Coronado, the flagship of the Navy’s 27-ship regional task force. Bailey, 70, who starred in a Broadway production of “Hello, Dolly” in the 1960s, conceded that most of the sailors, whose average age is about 23, are not familiar with her career. But she won a standing ovation for her show, which featured “Chicago” and “The Battle Hymn of the Republic.” Afterward, she signed autographs for more than an hour. Bailey has been an entertainer on the United Service Organizations circuit since 1941. “I tell ‘em that nobody promised them the bright lights of Broadway out here, but one thing we did promise them is that we wouldn’t forget them--and that’s why I’m here,” she said. Earlier, Bailey performed aboard the aircraft carrier Carl M. Vinson and the submarine tender Emory S. Land in the Arabian Sea.

--House Speaker Jim Wright will combine a trip down memory lane with official business when he leads a congressional delegation to Australia to help celebrate its bicentennial, including the inauguration of the new Parliament House in Canberra. “For me it will be a sentimental journey,” Wright said, remembering flying from Fenton air strip in the Northern Territory in a stripped-down B-24 for a midnight bombing of refineries at Balikpapan, Borneo, where Japan produced aviation fuel in World War II. The Texas Democrat was a 19-year-old second lieutenant in the Army Air Corps when he and Capt. Gus Connery flew the lead plane in the 2,700-mile mission, at the time the longest bombing mission on record. He was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross.