
Nо ceremonial happens by magic. Each major parade takes many hours of careful preparation. Soldiers have to clean all their personal kit. Cuirasses (breastplates), helmets and swords are painstakingly polished. It takes about 45 minutes using Brasso and chalk brushes to clean cuirass and helmet. Buckskins (white leather trousers), gauntlets (long gloves), cross belts, and sword slings are scrubbed down and a layer of white sap (similar to tennis shoe whitener) added. Cleaning jackboots (the tall, black leather boots worn on parade) is hugely time consuming. Hot beeswax is soaked into the leather and then tins of polish are laboriously layered on - many hours of continuous work. Troopers work through the night to get themselves ready for a State visit.