ED­IN­BURGH, Scot­land—In a som­bre, re­gal pro­ces­sion, Queen Eliz­a­beth II’s flag-draped cof­fin was dri­ven slow­ly through the Scot­tish coun­try­side yes­ter­day from her beloved Bal­moral Cas­tle to the Scot­tish cap­i­tal of Ed­in­burgh.

Mourn­ers packed city streets and high­way bridges or lined rur­al roads with cars and trac­tors to take part in a his­toric good­bye to the monarch who had reigned for 70 years.

The hearse drove past piles of bou­quets and oth­er trib­utes as it led a sev­en-car cortège from Bal­moral, where the queen died Thurs­day at 96, for a six-hour trip through Scot­tish towns to Holy­rood­house palace in Ed­in­burgh. The late queen’s cof­fin was draped in the Roy­al Stan­dard for Scot­land and topped with a wreath made of flow­ers from the es­tate, in­clud­ing sweet peas, one of the queen’s favourites.

The pro­ces­sion was a huge event for Scot­land as the UK takes days to mourn its longest-reign­ing monarch, the on­ly one most Britons have ever known. Peo­ple turned out hours ear­ly to grab a space by the po­lice bar­ri­cades in Ed­in­burgh. By af­ter­noon, the crowds were 10 peo­ple deep.

“I think she has been an ever-con­stant in my life. She was the queen I was born un­der, and she has al­ways been there,” said An­gus Ruthven, a 54-year-old civ­il ser­vant from Ed­in­burgh. “I think it is go­ing to take a lot of ad­just­ing that she is not here.”

A girl holds flowers at Green Park memorial, next to Buckingham Palace in London, yesterday, in memory of Queen Elizabeth II.

Kin Cheung

Si­lence fell on the packed Roy­al Mile in Ed­in­burgh as the hearse car­ry­ing the queen ar­rived. But as the con­voy van­ished from view, the crowd spon­ta­neous­ly start­ed clap­ping.

“A very his­toric mo­ment. I am quite speech­less ac­tu­al­ly,” said Fiona Mof­fat, a 57-year-old of­fice man­ag­er from Glas­gow. “She was a love­ly la­dy. Great moth­er, grand­moth­er. She did well. I am very proud of her.”

When the hearse reached Holy­rood­house, mem­bers of the Roy­al Reg­i­ment of Scot­land, wear­ing green tar­tan kilts, car­ried the cof­fin past the queen’s youngest three chil­dren—Princess Anne, Prince An­drew and Prince Ed­ward—in­to the throne room, where it was to re­main un­til to­day so staff can pay their last re­spects.

King Charles III and his Queen Con­sort Camil­la will trav­el to­day to Ed­in­burgh to join an­oth­er solemn pro­ces­sion that takes the queen’s cof­fin to St Giles Cathe­dral on the city’s Roy­al Mile. There, the cof­fin will re­main for 24 hours so the Scot­tish pub­lic can pay their re­spects be­fore it is flown to Lon­don to­mor­row.

The first vil­lage the cortège passed through was Bal­later, where res­i­dents re­gard the roy­al fam­i­ly as neigh­bours. Hun­dreds of peo­ple watched in si­lence. Some threw flow­ers in front of the hearse.

“She meant such a lot to peo­ple in this area. Peo­ple were cry­ing, it was amaz­ing to see,” said Vic­to­ria Pacheco, a guest house man­ag­er.

In each Scot­tish town and vil­lage, the en­tourage was met with re­spect. Peo­ple stood most­ly in si­lence; some clapped po­lite­ly, oth­ers point­ed their phone cam­eras at the pass­ing cars. In Ab­erdeen­shire, farm­ers lined the route with an ho­n­our guard of trac­tors.

Along the route, the cortege passed through lo­ca­tions laden with House of Wind­sor his­to­ry. Those in­clud­ed Dyce, where in 1975 the queen for­mal­ly opened the UK’s first North Sea oil pipeline, and Fife, near S. An­drews Uni­ver­si­ty, where her grand­son Prince William, now the Prince of Wales, stud­ied and met his fu­ture wife, Cather­ine.

Crowds watch as the hearse carrying the coffin bearing Queen Elizabeth II, draped with the Royal Standard of Scotland, passes Mercat Cross in Edinburgh, yesterday, as it continued its journey to the Palace of Holyroodhouse from Balmoral.

Ian Forsyth

Yes­ter­day’s solemn dri­ve came as the queen’s el­dest son was for­mal­ly pro­claimed the new monarch—King Charles III—in the rest of the Unit­ed King­dom: Scot­land, Wales and North­ern Ire­land. It came a day af­ter a pomp-filled ac­ces­sion cer­e­mo­ny in Eng­land.

“I am deeply aware of this great in­her­i­tance and of the du­ties and heavy re­spon­si­bil­i­ties of sov­er­eign­ty, which have now passed to me,” Charles said Sat­ur­day.

Just be­fore the procla­ma­tion was read yes­ter­day in Ed­in­burgh, a pro­test­er ap­peared with a sign con­demn­ing im­pe­ri­al­ism and urg­ing lead­ers to “abol­ish the monar­chy.” She was tak­en away by po­lice. Re­ac­tion was mixed. One man shout­ed, “Let her go! It’s free speech!” while oth­ers shout­ed: “Have some re­spect!”

Still, there was some boo­ing in Ed­in­burgh when Joseph Mor­row, Lord Ly­on King of Arms, fin­ished his procla­ma­tion with “God save the king!”

That up­set Ann Hamil­ton, 48.

“There’s tens of thou­sands of peo­ple here to­day to show their re­spect. For them to be here, heck­ling through things, I think it was ter­ri­ble. If they were so against it, they shouldn’t have come,” she said.

Still, it was a sign of how some, in­clud­ing peo­ple in Britain’s for­mer colonies, are strug­gling with the lega­cy of the monar­chy—and its fu­ture. (AP)