The girls danced with excitement when they saw that, far from being empty, the trunk had all sorts of things in it. They had been very neatly and carefully packed amongst layers of paper. First came some dresses, amongst them a lilac-flowered muslin, which Marjory recognized as the very one which her great-grandmother Hunter wore in the big picture which hung in the drawing-room. It had probably been kept for that reason. The dress did not seem to have suffered very much from its long imprisonment. The ground of it had turned yellow, but the lilac flowers were as fresh as ever. It was made entirely by hand, and it had a very short-waisted bodice and a frilled skirt. Rolled up with it was a pair of silk stockings and some dainty satin shoes, all yellow with age.
With a feeling of awe the girls unfolded these treasures of a bygone day, as if they feared lest the owners of them might rise up and forbid them to go on.
"Fancy uncle never knowing that all these lovely things were here!" cried Marjory. "Oh, what's this?" as she lifted out a bundle wrapped in linen.
"I believe it's somebody's wedding-dress," said Blanche, as she helped to undo the wrappings.
It was a wedding dress, and there was a veil with it, and a wreath of myrtle. Fastened to the wreath with white ribbon was a lace-edged paper, with the following words written on it in a fine Italian hand, "Alison Grant married John Hunter, October 15, 1843."
"That's my grandmother," said Marjory. "Uncle George says she was very beautiful and very good. I expect she must have put all these things here. It seems funny, though, that she put her wedding dress away when it was quite fresh; it doesn't look as if it had been worn."
"Perhaps she meant to keep it for her daughter," suggested Blanche. "Old-fashioned people used to do that. My mother didn't. She wore hers when she went to parties, and then had it dyed and made into a petticoat!"
"My mother was the only girl of the family who lived to grow up, and grandmother died when she was a little girl, so of course nobody knew about the dress being here."
Alan was more interested in the next find, which was a complete court suit--silk stockings, buckled shoes, and all. Then came an old uniform, moth-eaten long before Dame Alison's careful hands had folded it away. Its gold lace was tarnished almost beyond recognition, and on it was a label written in the same delicate handwriting, "Worn by General James Hunter at the battle of Waterloo, June 18, 1815, where he was mortally wounded."