EXCEPT for the coronation of a monarch, there isn't a more richly traditional occasion on the British ceremonial calendar than the State Opening of Parliament.

The centuries-old pageant includes a separate gilded carriage to carry velvet cushions bearing the diamond studded Imperial State Crown, the Sword of State and the miniver-trimmed crimson Cap of Maintenance. Then the Duke of Norfolk, the Lord Chancellor and the Marquis of Cholmondeley, who address the Queen in the House of Lords, retire from her presence humbly -- and carefully -- by walking backwards down stairs and through corridors.

The titles of participants are gloriously preposterous -- Silver Stick in Waiting, Mistress of the Robes, Rouge Dragon Pursuivant, Maltravers Herald Extraordinary and Lady of the Bedchamber.

Such an absurdly outmoded observance seems an odd way to usher in the new Labor government, but that ceremony remains one of the few things in British public life that earnest new arrivals in the capital cannot change. Only a monarch can do that, and none of them has chosen to since Edward VII reviewed the procedure 90 years ago and pronounced it right up to date.