ENTER THE KING

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 7871, 5 August 1911, Page 17

ENTER THE KING

Sounding the Imperial Note,

The entry of the King brought a fresh blaze of colour into the crowded scene. As yet h© wore no crown, and his dress was a crimson robe and short whit©

5 cape. But a glittering retinue passed up ; the church with him. Many of the i figures about him outshine his Majesty . in splendour of attlro. The Knights of ; th© Garter, the great officers of the . Royal household. Lord Kitchener and . Lord Roberts carrying the Royal Swords, and the Duke of Beaufort w*’th tho broken-pointed Sword of Mercy, were outstanding figures in the Royal train. ; "The Standards of India and +ho oversea dominions were borne by peers in tho procession. Lord Blanket carrying Zealand’s and Lord Northcote that of the Australian Commonwealth, These symbols of a great Empire extending beyond the seas were introduced for the first time in a British Coronation ceremony. They were among the 'characteristic features of th© crowning of th© Sailor King. It was touches Jitce these which gave to the ceremony ;ts broad Imperial not©. Of tho Coronation service on© need not speak in detail. .It lasted close upon three hours. Shadows of past centuries lived again in tho performance of that ancient ritual. It was curious to reflect how unbroken was the continuity of custom that crowned a twentieth-cen-tury King with tho rites and the symbols that did service a thousand years ago. But this sldo of the great occasion, would appeal more to th© home-dweller than to tho Briton from overseas. Greater Britain has not the same sense of kinship with England’s past, for our parents broke with the past when they uprooted themselves from British soil to start life afresh under alien skies. It is in the person of the King, in.tho symbolism of his sovereignty, that wo are united with England's island story; the ■ forms and ceremonies of a vanished ago have for us on antiquarian interest 1 rathor than a personal interest.