Possessing an average share of American audacity, I found no great difficulty in pressing my way, even on foot, to a very favorable position, quite near the flagstaff beneath which the majesty of England was to take its stand....
Her Majesty has the royal virtue of punctuality, and all eyes were turned toward a low straw-wagon with two white ponies, which came trotting along the line of spectators.
. . .It was called very brilliant, and certainly the predominant English scarlet is incomparably more effective to the eye than our sober blue. But the very perfection of the appointment made it all seem such a play-soldier affair; I had grown so accustomed to measure soldiers by their look of actual service that a single company of bronzed and tattered men would have been a positive relief among these great regiments of smooth-faced boys. This involved no reproach to the young recruits, and did not affect the mere spectacle, but it impaired the moral interest. However, the drill and the marching were good, though there is a sort of heaviness about the British soldier when compared with the wonderful vigor and alertness of German infantry. As for the uniforms, the arms, the appointments, the horses, they were simply magnificent; I do not believe that there ever was an army in finer material condition than those sixteen thousand men at Aldershot.
