s (the guard ) change. One group leaves and another arrives. In summer and winter tourists stand outside the palace at 11:30 every morning and watch the Changing of the Guard.the Queen opens Parliament every autumn. But Parliament, not the Royal Family, controls modern Britain. The Queen travels from Buckingham Palace to the Houses of Parliament in a gold carriage - the Irish State Coach. At the Houses of Parliament the Queen sits on a throne in the House of Lords. Then she reads the Queen s Speech . At the State Opening of Parliament the Queen wears a crown. She wears other jewels from the Crown Jewels, too.year, there is a new Lord Mayor of London. The Mayor is the city s traditional leader. And the second Saturday in November is always the day for the Lord Mayor s Show. This ceremony is over six hundred years old. It is also London s biggest parade.Lord Mayor drives to the Royal Courts of Justice in a coach. The coach is two hundred years old. It is red and gold and it has six horses.it is also a big parade, people make special costumes and act stories from London s history.Britain as in other countries costumes and uniforms have a long history.is the uniform of the Beefeaters at the tower of London. This came first from France. Another is the uniform of the Horse Guards at Horse Guard s Parade, not far from Buckingham Palace. Thousands of visitors take photographs of the Horse Guards.is a symbol of Britain. And she wears traditional clothes, too. But she is not a real person.of ordinary clothes have a long tradition. The famous bowler hat, for example. A man called Beaulieu made the first one in 1850.of the British soldiers, Wellington, gave his name to a pair of boots. They have a shorter name today - Wellies . Is a very special royal tradition. On the River Thames there are hundreds of swans. A lot of these beautiful white birds belong, traditionally, to the king or queen. In July the young swans on the Thames are about two months old. Then the Queen s swan keeper goes, in a boat, from London Bridge to Henley. He looks at all the young swans and marks the royal ones. The name of this strange nut interesting custom is Swan Upping.are only six public holidays a year in Great Britain, that is days on which people need not go in to work. They are: Christmas Day, Good Friday, Easter Monday, Spring Bank Holiday and Late Summer Bank Holiday, Boxing Day.the most popular holiday in Britain is Christmas. Christmas has been celebrated from the earliest days of recorde...
