Here is a little sampling of the Trooping of the Color. My mother would love this, all those magnificent horses. And that marching band is absolutely spectacular.
Behind the band is a Phaeton with Prince Phillip and some old lady wearing a bucket on her head. ; )
10 comments:
I'd say that the whole thing gets more quaintly 19th century with the passing of time, but those guns carried in this costume parade look very up to date and very serious.
oh it's all very serious, indeed! I thought the bucket very unassuming, all things considered.
PS --Happy Birthday! Since your BD is on a Holy Day --perhaps you should celebrate it in an octave.
When thousands are lining the street to see you and cheer you, then you can make such comments.
It is a splendid spectacle. We saw it in the early 1980s, when the queen still rode her horse - in a light rain, at that. It was quite a thrill even to me, anti-royalist that I am. Nothing personal against the Queen, who has conducted herself with common sense and dignity, unlike some of her offspring.
Doug, I know that I already said all that before here on your blog. I didn't mean to bore you to death with the repetition, but perhaps others haven't read the enthralling account.
Here's a link to a video of the parade from 1986, about three years after we were there, which shows the Queen still on horseback. It's not embeddable, or I'd put up a counterpost to Counterlight's post.
Grandmere, you NEVER bore me.
I have nothing personal against the Queen either. I'm just a Yank, a (small r) republican, and my knees bend and my head bows only for The Almighty.
If anything, as a head of state, I have a lot of respect for the Queen, and I think she's done a great job of it.
Mimi,
I enjoyed the video link very much, though I could have done without the Vivaldi soundtrack.
How lucky you were to be there that day, and with such perfect weather back when the Queen was not yet elderly and the Princes were still little.
I suppose the US Presidency will never have that same kind of sacral charisma as the British monarchy, despite the best efforts of the outgoing administration and their conservative evangelical supporters to create just such a sacred aura around The Decider.
We tend to save those sacral associations for our Flag, which I suppose is just as well. Our enemies who know us well realize the best way to offend us is to trample or burn our flag. A mob could burn the President, any President, in effigy, and no one here would care. But burning the flag will send people flocking to the recruitment offices ready to blast the bastards.
I confess that I wondered at the sound track, too - an odd juxtaposition.
I don't like pledging allegiance to a flag. A country, maybe, but not a flag.
Post a Comment