SYDNEY PAGEANT

Evening Post, Volume CXXV, Issue 21, 26 January 1938, Page 11

SYDNEY PAGEANT

THE CURTAIN-RAISER

WARSHIPS AND PLANES ARRIVE

THE CITY A BLAZE OF COLOUR

((.'lilted I'ress dissociation —By Electric Telegraph—Copyright.) SYDNEY, January 25. Aflame with colour and seething with life, Sydney, all ready for her epochal birthday, awoke today to the crash ol naval guns as salutes were exchanged when eight visiting warships steamed into the harbour.

From headlands and every other vantage point crowds watched the stately ships move to their moorings. The first of the grey advancing squadrons was the New Zealand cruiser Achilles, which glided unostentatiously to her berth. Then came the French sloop Regault de Genouilly, the Italian cruiser Montecuccoli. the Dutch sloop Flores, and finally, after a short interval, the American squadron, the Trenton Memphis, Louisville,, and Milwaukee.

Within an hour of berthing, the commanders went ashore to pay the customary official calls, and officers and sailors were mingling .with the crowds in the streets.

An equally stirring spectacle was the arrival of the five Royal Air Force flying-boats, with an escort of Australian Air Force and Naval planes.

As they swept over-the city, flying in V formation, traffic came to a standstill and crowds gazed skywards at one of the largest flotillas of aircraft seen at one time over the harbour.

The visiting flying-boats soon landed, but Air Force planes, supplemented by 10 seaplanes catapulted from the American cruisers, continued to soar over the city and suburbs in perfect formation, providing a memorable and impressive sight, a fitting curtainraiser to tomorrow's notable pageant.

The city tonight is crowded with people of all ages from all parts of the Empire and with other empires' naval officers and ratings. Indeed, there is a surprising number of foreigners abroad, evincing a lively interest in the illuminations, which are on an elaborate scale, making a vast blaze of colour. Here and there are large and small bejewelled crowns and coats-of-arms, and millions of coloured lights, flags, and pennants. Traffic congestion is very great, and will probably be much worse tomorrow night. Carpenters are still putting the .final touches to decorations and erecting barricades at the windows and entrances to business houses. The weather tonight is fine and mild, with no immediate prospect of rain to spoil tomorrow's "March to Nationhood.''