"Cambridge is so high-profile," she said. "I definitely am attracted to [going to study] in the States for that reason." Sadly, Mandrake hears that the actress has discovered that it is impossible to escape Harry Potter fans.

At an American football match she attended between a team from Brown and one from Harvard, Watson, 19, had to be protected by security guards after she was besieged by students and other spectators. "She looked quite shaken," sighs one onlooker.

Tony Benn's unkempt front garden has long been regarded affectionately by his neighbours in Holland Park, west London, as reflecting the fact that he had more important "ishoos" on which to concentrate. Recently, however, it has been given a startling makeover, leading them to speculate that the son of a hereditary peer may put the expensive house on the market. Benn, 84, is keen to play down such chatter. "I bought this house in 1952 and I intend to be carried away in a box," he tells me. "Someone offered to tidy it up and I let them. It was a bit of a mess really."

Bamfords' match  When George Bamford, the son of Sir Anthony Bamford, the JCB tycoon, married Leonora Pearl, little did they realise that their wedding would set another pair up the aisle. One of the guests, Alexander Salkeld, a property finder, has now proposed to Arabella Sharples, a City caterer, after being seated next to her.

"Alex proposed by attaching a ring to the collar of my King Charles spaniel, Marty when we went for a walk in Fulham," says Arabella, 30, whose grandfather Sir Richard Sharples, the governor of Bermuda, was assassinated in 1973. "Unfortunately, I didn't notice, so he had to untie it and get down on one knee."  Her father, Christopher, a former boyfriend of the Princess Royal, left her mother, Sharon, after 29 years of marriage in 2005.