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The actual Coronation being finished, the Archbishop proceeded with the Communion Service, and the King and Queen received the Holy Communion, which was administered to them by the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Dean of Westminster.

At the end of the service the “Te Deum” was sung, and the whole assembly cheered as the King walked down the Abbey, in his Royal Robe and Crown, and bearing the Sceptre and Orb.

This is an outline of the Coronation Service of King Edward VII, and it is especially interesting because, in spite of some few small changes, it shows us what the Coronations of our Kings have been like ever since the Confessor’s days. It may be well just to explain what is meant by the word “Regalia,” because the history of the Regalia carries us back to times even before Edward the Confessor, as Offa, King of the Mercians, is said to have placed the Regalia and Coronation Robes in the church at Thorney Isle. We should notice that the Regalia, that is, the crowns, sceptres, and orbs, had Anglo-Saxon names. The King’s crown was called the crown of Alfred, or of St. Edward; the Queen’s crown was called the crown of Editha, wife of Edward the Confessor. The sceptre with the dove was a remembrance of the peaceful days of the Confessor’s reign, after the Danes were driven out. The Coronation oath used to be taken on a copy of the Gospels which was said to have belonged to Athelstane. The orb appears in the famous Bayeux tapestry, showing that it must have been used in Saxon days.