A FAIRY TALE COME TRUE

Hokitika Guardian, 25 August 1928, Page 4

A FAIRY TALE COME TRUE

DAZZLING TATTOO PANORAMA

ALDERSHOT, June 20.

In a still and fine night in June a panorama of blazing beauty was shown to a huge confetti-coloured crowd at Aldershot to-night, when the Aidershot Command Tattoo was completely and wonderfully produced. The setting was perfectly English, with a sweet green arena rimmed with trees and beyond the peaceful white plains in the dulling purple of fading day. Tlie searchlights playing on massed bands made a bold and dashing picture of scarlet, white, and green. It was like a page from Hans Andersen, a fairy tale come true. Away in the distance the headlights of .belated motor cars blinked casually nt fairyland. Tlie- searchlights played like sunlight on the magic ring, illuminating picture book" soldiers dischargng nursery tale guns. It was beautiful but it was not war, or rather it was war that seemed so splendid to 1 the child mind.

It was tho battle of tho picture books—a delightful dream war, with dazzling soldiers and splendid chargers and thrilling music. It times it was more than a fairy tale, it was a magnificent mediaeval picture, a tiling of shimmering beauty and haunting meloly. Rising out from the darkness of the trees came a glittering, sparkling troop of horses, a squadron of quicksilver, shimmering with light and glowing with colour. Scarlet and gold and silver white plumes, gleaming lances, the 101 l of drums and the challenge of the trumpets PLAY AT BEING REAL.

This was romance coming true. All the fairy tales of the world had come out of their covers to play at being real people. But this was only the beginning. Church hells chimed and knights in shining armour rode past a mediaeval castle. Crusaders they were and they rode like visions seen in a dream. The exquisite beauty of this scene brought a sob to the throat.

Tho first band played as a miglity organ and there was the sweet singing of a great multitude. The white knights were as still as ghosts and the light played on the Cross of Sacrifice. From the castle came the chanting of monks, and the silver voices of choirboys

GOLD, GREEN, AND CRIMSON. This .was not a scene. It was a page from the illuminated Book of tht Hours. It was one of the most beautiful and thrilling pieces of pageantry ever* produced. It was mediaeval romance made manifest. The colour ranged through gold and green to crimson and changed again to purple.

Softly and sweetly the choir sang, sedately moved the ghostly crowd, and all the time was "heard the chiming of church bells and the music of a

mighty organ. There was a solemn hush over the great crowd. Applause in this exquisite scene would have seemed like sacrilege. 'We were all under the spell of dreams, the dreams that only children know. SPLENDID NOISE AND RATTLE. Another page was turned of this delightful fairy tale and wo saw huntsmen and hounds chasing the fox in a dainty blush of animated colour. They went out of the picture and to the tap of the drums marched more fairytale troops doing fairy-tale drill. Theso were soldiers of the child mind. Splendid soldiers, so beautifully arranged that they resembled the glorious bulb fields of Holland. The assault on Badajoz, despite its (lame and fireworks and its moving of guns, was also a fairy tale, the sort of fairy tale that every hoy remembers. What a splendfd noise there was; what a jolly rattle; wliat a fine waving of flags; wliat a burning of powder, and wliat a stately entry of the victorious British infantry. What a splendid, beautiful fairy tale it all was, this wonderful Tattoo of the Aldershot Command.