I'm still reeling from an article penned by smug newspaper columnist a few weeks back.

She wrote about Princess Beatrice, daughter of Sarah Ferguson and Prince Andrew, who seems to be spending a lot of her time partying, holidaying and generally enjoying life before she begins university.

The columnist wrote with such venom of young Bea, you'd think the red-headed Royal had just swiped her boyfriend and set alight to her shoe collection.

But no. The 19-year-old's biggest crime was to go swimming. In the sea. In a two piece costume.

Something about the pictures of Bea splashing about with her new beau, Dave Clarke, in the surf of St Barth's really got this woman's back up.

Was the idea of a teenager blossoming into an adult with - God forbid! - an hourglass figure, too much for her to stomach? Or was she merely jealous of her apparent carefree attitude?

There's something compelling for me about seeing members of the rich and famous enjoying the luxury of a tropical island, "frolicking" in the shallows, living the high life.

Maybe because I've never been anywhere exotic, maybe because I like to imagine being there too. Whatever the reason, the last thing that picture did for me was to send me into a fit of rage.

But this columnist went beserk: "Can't someone buy the poor girl a sarong?" she fumed. "...For her sake, as well as ours."

She then made the baffling suggestion that the royal might be better off "in the deep end at St Bart's the hospital" rather than the shallows of the Caribbean sea.

What? Is she postulating that Bea, who is gearing up to study art at Goldsmiths in London, should be turning her hand to surgery? I wouldn't want her operating on me, thanks.

The writer ends with a snide comment about things going "pear shaped". A cheap shot, I thought. 

My point is this: as the Duchess of York's first-born makes her first steps from the awkward, turbulent waters of teenhood towards calmer, less threatening shores, is there no way she can escape the scornful eye of her bitter, tut-tutting sisters?

It seems she's destined to the fate of her mother, The Duchess of York, who never seems to have recovered from the jibes she received as a "curvy" young woman marrying into royalty.

Indeed, only this week - and years after being the target of fattist abuse in the press - Fergie has been ranting about how much she abhors her own body and how "every single minute of the day" she thinks she's "fat, ugly and disgusting."

None of this can be particularly helpful to young Bea. But catty strangers speculating about the type of swimwear she chooses to wear on top of all this is like giving her a one-way ticket to The Priory.

When will women learn to drop the bitchiness and finally give this same-sex backstabbing a break?