Round the neck it was delicately embroidered in pure gold with tiny sprays of sycamore; and round the feet, similarly worked, was an endless line of lotus plants of unequal height, and with all the graceful abandon of natural growth.

Across the body, but manifestly not surrounding it, was a girdle of jewels.  A wondrous girdle, which shone and glowed with all the forms and phases and colours of the sky!

The buckle was a great yellow stone, round of outline, deep and curved, as if a yielding globe had been pressed down.  It shone and glowed, as though a veritable sun lay within; the rays of its light seemed to strike out and illumine all round.  Flanking it were two great moonstones of lesser size, whose glowing, beside the glory of the sunstone, was like the silvery sheen of moonlight.

And then on either side, linked by golden clasps of exquisite shape, was a line of flaming jewels, of which the colours seemed to glow.  Each of these stones seemed to hold a living star, which twinkled in every phase of changing light.

Margaret raised her hands in ecstasy.  She bent over to examine more closely; but suddenly drew back and stood fully erect at her grand height.  She seemed to speak with the conviction of absolute knowledge as she said: 

“That is no cerement!  It was no meant for the clothing of death!  It is a marriage robe!”

Mr. Trelawny leaned over and touched the linen robe.  He lifted a fold at the neck, and I knew from the quick intake of his breath that something had surprised him.  He lifted yet a little more; and then he, too, stood back and pointed, saying: 

“Margaret is right!  That dress is not intended to be worn by the dead!  See! her figure is not robed in it.  It is but laid upon her.”  He lifted the zone of jewels and handed it to Margaret.  Then with both hands he raised the ample robe, and laid it across the arms which she extended in a natural impulse.  Things of such beauty were too precious to be handled with any but the greatest care.

We all stood awed at the beauty of the figure which, save for the face cloth, now lay completely nude before us.  Mr. Trelawny bent over, and with hands that trembled slightly, raised this linen cloth which was of the same fineness as the robe.  As he stood back and the whole glorious beauty of the Queen was revealed, I felt a rush of shame sweep over me.  It was not right that we should be there, gazing with irreverent eyes on such unclad beauty:  it was indecent; it was almost sacrilegious!  And yet the white wonder of that beautiful form was something to dream of.  It was not like death at all; it was like a statue carven in ivory by the hand of a Praxiteles.  There was nothing of that horrible shrinkage which death seems to effect in a moment.  There was none of the wrinkled toughness which seems to be a leading characteristic of most mummies.  There was not the shrunken attenuation of a body dried