The riot of uniforms, the Grande Charge (which usually produced nothing more than prodigious amounts of dog food) and the music. Somewhere I managed to get a recording by the french police band of Napoleonic marches and anthems. I was delighted to find out that the olympic opening music used for years by ABC television was/is in reality the french Napoleonic cavalry call, Salut des Coleurs, used in parade when the banners of the regiments are massed and presented to the commander of troops.

As long as I’m just gumming up your blog. Talking about cavalry thunder…
As a youth I always wondered how horses could cope with the ultimate armored knights of the late middle ages. These guys were encased in steel equal to or more than their own weight. Somewhere I finally read that knights weren’t riding quarter horses; they were mounted on Percherons!!! Those humongous BIG black horses that always get outvoted by Clydesdales at horse shows (even though they can eat clydesdales).

Now imagine 5000 knights in a charge mounted on those houses, er horses …. sounds a lot worse than Waste Management blowing you out of bed at 4:30 on a May morning I can tell ya….