HIDDEN treasures discovered in attics and family heirlooms plucked off the mantlepiece found their way to Holker Hall yesterday.

The South Lakeland stately home, near Cark-in-Cartmel, played host to valuers from The Antiques Roadshow and the show's presenter Fiona Bruce.

Hundreds of people turned out to see what precious items and hidden gems could be uncovered by the experts.

Steven Watts had arrived from Troutbeck with a fire screen and a medicine bottle which he found in 1981 and had a colourful background.

The bottle of Dr Warner’s Safe Cure the Elixir of Life - ‘a kidney and liver-curing liquid’ - was brought from the United States 120 years ago to cure damage caused by drinking.

“There were quite a lot quack doctors over there,” said Steven. “I don’t know how many people he killed, but would you drink out of that bottle?”

India Polkinghorn and Andrew Lawrence, from Coniston, brought a self-restored chair and a mystery statue to be valued.

“I found it (the statue) when I was travelling in Nepal," said Andrew. "Turned out that it’s West African.”

“It was valued at about £150, which is good considering I paid about 30p for it.”

The antiques expert could not tell the pair how a brass West African statue had ended up thousands of miles away in another Continent.

“If only it could talk,” said India.

Another well-travelled statue was brought in by Rebecca Parris from Lancaster.

Rebecca’s parents brought the green soapstone Canadian Eskimo statue to the UK more than four decades ago.

She said that she had done some research into the statue but was still surprised by the estimated value of between £1,000 and £1,500.

It was examined by Paul Atterbury, an expert from the show’s ‘miscellaneous’ team, who said: “It has been fun, lots of people, lots of interesting things. The treat for us is that we never know what’s coming next. Each person has a new object and a new story, and that’s what we’re here for.”

“We have been doing this for a number of years and we want people to come. The main thing is that those people get home saying: ‘That was fun.’”