INSIDE THE ABBEY
By ROBERT BERNAYS, M.P.
IT is impossible to describe the scene in the Abbey. It was too immense, too splendid, too symbolic, to be set down in formal sentences and in normal vocabulary. I can only record something of the tornado of emotions that swept through me as I watched the majestic pageant.
By 8.3o the Abbey looked like the finale of a Drury Lane musical comedy upon which all the money ever put into a theatrical enterprise had been lavished by a producer of genius. In front of me sat the Peeresses, a great square of exotic magnificence like some vast orchid house. Above them were the members of the House of Commons in all the uniforms of their varied professions—the Army and the Navy, the Air Force, the Law. Below in the theatre were the Bishops in white and purple. To the right and left were the great of the earth—the Indian Princes in all the amazing glory of their Durbar dress, the foreign diplomats in every variety of gorgeous livery, the leading Ministers in the splendid uniforms of Trinity House.
My thoughts turned from this glittering scene to the world outside. How cold and forbidding the weather had appeared as I had walked through the deserted back streets to get to the Abbey. It seemed symbolic of the dark and menacing appearance of the international situation. I idly wondered what would happen to the Empire, the might and grandeur of which the scene below so vividly impressed on me, if an aggressor decided that morning to bomb London and we were all trapped like the audience of a theatre that has caught fire. I heard a drumming noise through the massive walls and almost I felt that my nightmare had become a reality. But it was only the guns announcing the departure of the King and Queen for the Palace.
As if to mock the absurdity of my thoughts the sun came out and lent an added splendour to the superb pageantry. My mind switched to the Coronation day twenty-six years ago. Then too it had seemed, with the German Navy threatening our vitals and the whole country riven with the struggle over the Veto Bill, as if all that glory might in the not distant future be " one with Nineveh and Tyre." But some- how we had survived even at the cost of four and a quarter years of carnage.
From there my mind went to the changes that had come over our world in that period and the capacity of our race to adapt themselves to them. There was Mr. Ramsay MacDonald proudly taking up a central position near the throne in his capacity as Lord President of the Council. Twenty-six years ago he had been the relentless enemy of society as then constituted, the idol of the extremists in every branch of public policy. Now he was next to the Duke of Norfolk, the chief manager of the pageantry, and in a few days would be retiring from the Cabinet of a predominantly Conservative administration. Could there be a more impres- sive illustration of the astonishing absorptive powers of the British Constitution? Around me were the leaders in many a fierce onslaught, from the Labour benches, on the National Government. The only difference between them and the Government supporters was that they had insisted in appear- ing in the work-a-day Parliamentary uniform of black coat and striped trousers. Not for them the flummery of court dress in any form. But their presence there was an arresting _indication that on loyalty to the throne there were no divergences.
I looked down and caught sight of Mr. Baldwin seated apart from the notables waiting round the throne for the arrival of the Monarch—the Lord Great Chamberlain, the Lord High Constable, the Lord Chancellor and the Lord Steward. He appeared, from his corner seat in the nave next to the Prime Minister of Australia, as if he really had nothing to do with the proceedings. Nor had he any official part. Not once throughout the ceremony did he come into the centre of the stage. As for Mr. Neville Chamberlain, I never saw him at all. The Cabinet was out of the picture completely. They did not even sit together. I saw Sir Samuel Hoare in the front row of what was equivalent to the upper circle in a theatre. Other great Ministers were scattered about in positions from which they had no better view than the humblest back-bencher. Imagine General Goering in the shadows at a national celebration in Germany. But it is quite right for England. The solidity of the throne rests on its complete separation from politics. No party man should ever be associated with the crowning of a king.
By this time the Monarch had arrived and was taking the prescribed oaths. I was struck again by the changes in our political values since the last Coronation. Then all attention was concentrated on the oath of allegiance to the Constitution. There was a growing party in those days that was advocating that, in the struggle with the House of Lords, the King should reject Mr. Asquith's advice and dismiss the Govern- ment. That is all over now. Today the vital symbol of the Coronation is the sword. " With this sword," the Arch- bishop enjoined upon the King, " do justice, stop the growth of iniquity, protect the Holy Church of God, help and defend widows and orphans . . ." It is the sword that unhappily today is the focal point of world politics. How far and on what occasion must it be unsheathed to protect civilisation from the inroads of barbarism? I thought that the one of the most moving occasions of the whole ceremony was when, stripped of his robe, dressed only in his breeches and shirt, the King advanced to the altar and laid the sword upon it. It seemed to express its terrible importance—the new world of cruelty and savagery.
Another high light was when the King made his responses to the questions of the Archbishop. " All this I promise," be said—and then there was a long pause before he added " so to do." His hesitation gave a tremendous impression of sincerity. I believe that the time will come when the King's slight stammer will be one of his greatest assets. It is such a symbol of his courage and will to win through, whatever the difficulties that surround his path.
So the Coronation proceeded with every circumstance of pomp and dignity. I have only two criticisms to make of the character of the service. I wish that it had been possible for Their Majesties to receive the communion in one of the private chapels. It is such an intimate part of the Anglican liturgy that I felt that it lost a little of its solemnity by being conducted in the presence of 7,000 people, some of whom were avowed pagans and many of whom had long since lost all sense of the meaning of the bread and wine. I wish too that something could have been done to bring the Coronation into more intimate touch with the life of the community. I felt at times as if it were a little too like the Field of the Cloth of Gold and too far removed from the world of trades unions and factory in- spectors and unemployment and crippling taxation and the Means Test.
But perhaps that is not a fair criticism, for I have no sug- gestion to make for altering it. It may be that there is no compromise possible between the mediaeval splendour of the Abbey and a national demonstration at, say, Wembley Stadium.
Kipling once said, " It is the colour that gets into your throat." Certainly it got into mine at the Abbey. I have never come away from any scene of national rejoicing more deeply impressed with the power and majesty of royalty as the link of the Empire and the symbol of " every- thing that is noble and of good report."
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