Before dinner they were taken to the room that was prepared for
them, and there they found elegant court dresses of purple velvet ready
to put on.
"Surely, John, they can not be for us!" cried Mrs. Duddlestone.
"Yes, but they must be! Did not the Queen say she would give us dresses?
and do not these dresses look as if they had been given by a queen?"
"John, I shall feel very strange before all the grand ladies!"
"Then you need not, wife, for the Queen and Prince will be there; and
the others will not trouble you; but this is a queer dress. It's like
being somebody else."
And very queer they felt, as for the first time they walked down the
grand stairs, in such, splendid dresses, to dine at the Queen's table,
with the Queen's servants to wait on them.
"You must go first, John," said his wife, for shyness came over her.
"Be not so foolish, wife," whispered John; and, though feeling rather
awkward in his new dress, he walked simply forward, as he might have
done in a friend's house.
The Queen met them at the door, and, turning to her other guests, who
were assembled, she said, "Gentlemen, I have to introduce to you, with
great pleasure, the most loyal people in the town of Bristol.
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