MEMORIES OF A ROYAL DURBAR

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 80, Issue 59, 11 March 1937, Page 10

MEMORIES OF A ROYAL DURBAR

DELHI SCENE IN 1911

The Colour of the East

JI IS '1 \\ ENTY-FIVE years since King George V. announced in Durbar at Delhi that his coronation had been celebrated on June 22, 3911, in Westminster Abbey, and that he desired that those who could not be present al the solemnity of the coronation should have the opportunity of taking part in its commemoration af Delhi, writes S. I’. Sheppard in the London “Observer.” Many of the Princes and others who were present, at that Durbar are dead; 1 some of the survivors probably find j their memory of those days has grown dim; and the present generation—wonderilig what King George VI. will do and see if his expressed hope to visit \ India alter the Coronation is fulfilled— ( can have little idea of the solemnity, j the splendour, and the colour of the great ceremony which must in many ] respects provide the precedent to be followed. It is worth while, then, briefly to recall not only what the Durbar was like, but what were some of the other cere- ' monies in which King George and Queen Mary took part. 1 The visit of King George to India t lasted from December 2, 1911, when he landed in Bombay, to January 10, 1912, when he left that port. It is not supposed that in these troublous times King ’ George VI. contemplates so long a visit to India as that. Even if he were to s save time by flying there (which would ' mean entering the country at the great air-port of Karachi, capital of the new-ly-created province of Sind, instead of through Bombay, the historic gateway ' of India) it is improbable that he yvould 1 be able to spare time for a lour of India. Will he, in any case, be asked to face a crowded programme like that which his father went through day after day for ten days on end at Dclb'® Pro-

bably not, but there were outstanding features in the 1911 programme which might well be repeated. Though the existence of New Delhi will in some ways simplify the task of those who will make the arrangements for the Royal visit—for the King will presumably stay in the great palace known as Viceroy’s House, and many of the Princes have built houses for themselves in the new capita]—there still remains an infinity of work to be done in preparing the camps and the Durbar arena; and that work will have to be very good indeed if it is to rival what was done under the direction of Sir John Hewett for the last Durbar. The camp that was then built, on the Bawari plain beyond the historic Ridge, covered more than 25 square miles, and to state that fact alone helps one to appreciate what hundreds of problems connected with railways, roads, motor transport, water, sanitation, markets, and lighting had to be solved. Never was a camp city so fine in detail and design, as survivors from the Press camp can testify. But the finest achievement was to be found in the Durbar amphitheatre, which held over 60,000 spectators and 20,000 troops. It was really two concentric amphitheatres in which were placed

the Durbar shamiana, or covered dais, A'here the King received the homage of the Princes, and, in the centre, the thrones on which Their Majesties later sat while the mounted heralds read, in English and then in Urdu, the proclamation of the rite at Westminster. It was after that supreme moment that the Viceroy, Lord Hardinge, read an announcement of various “boons,” notably that officers and men of the Indian Army should thenceforth be eligible for the Victoria Cross. Then came the great surprise of the day, when the King retraced his steps to the shamiana and there announced the transfer of the capital from Calcutta to Delhi and the consequential changes in the Provinces, which included the annulment of the much-criticised partition of Bengal. Never had State secret been better kept than that, and it seems incredible that such a surprise can ever again be sprung in so dramatic a way by the Sovereign in person. One other intensely dramatic incident marked that memorable day. Their Majesties, the Princes, and the high officials, had left the arena, and the troops were being withdrawn, when suddenly, as if moved by one common and irristible impulse, the Indian onlookers, whose serried' ■< '•olourful

ranks had seemed like spring flower beds round the pageantic scene, rushed in their thousands to prostrate themselves before the thrones on which the King and Queen had been sitting. Equally unforgettable was the People s Fail, for which Sir Louis Dane was responsible, held in the plain between the river Jumna and Delhi fort. A concourse variously estimated at from 2.)0,000 to 400,000 people gathered in that vast space, and upon them the King and Queen, in their robes and crowns, looked down from lhe balcony of the fort where lhe Mogul Emperors had been accustomed on great days to show themselves to their subjects. There will, one supposes, be a State entry and departure, as before. But even when King George entered Delhi, some of the former glory of such events had departed. According to connoisseurs in medievalism, the procession of the Princes’ retainers then was not even as fine as it was when Lord Curzon proclaimed the coronation of King Edward VII. The old order was passing; but even so, numerous horsemen in coats of mail, javelinmen and bowmen on foot carried the spectator back to. medieval times just as certainly and as swiftly as much of the Hindu ritual to be seen anywhere in India to-day turns the page back from the 20th. century to something very like the book of Leviticus. That sort of spectacle has to a great extent been mechanised or otherwise worried out of existence. Yet there is still enough of the old and the beautiful left in India to ensure that, whatever spectacle may be Organised in honour of the Royal visitor, it will be worthy of the Emperor of India.