On the 2nd of March the strange news burst upon Europe, exciting rather a sense of solemnity than any less seemly feeling, of the sudden death of the Emperor Nicholas, former guest and fervent friend of the Queen--for whom she seems to have retained a lingering, rueful regard--grasper at an increase of territory, disturber of the peace of Europe, dogged refuser of all mediation. He had an attack of influenza, but the real cause of his death is said to have been bitter disappointment and mortification at his failure to drive the allies out of the Crimea. The "Generals, January and February," on whom he had counted to work his will, laid him low. CHAPTER XXVI. INSPECTION OF THE HOSPITAL AT CHATHAM--VISIT OF THE EMPEROR AND EMPRESS OF THE FRENCH--DISTRIBUTION OF WAR MEDALS. On the 3rd of March, the Queen and the Prince, with the Prince of Wales, Prince Alfred and the Duke of Cambridge, visited the hospital at Chatham, to which many of the wounded and sick soldiers had been brought home. The whole of the invalids who were in a condition to leave their beds "were drawn up on the lawn," each having a card containing his name and services, his wounds, and where received. Her Majesty passed along the line, saying a few kind words to those sufferers who particularly attracted her notice, or to those whose services were specially commended. It is easy to imagine how the haggard faces would brighten and the drooping figures straighten themselves in that royal and gentle presence. In the course of the month, at an exhibition and sale of water-colour drawings and pictures by amateurs, in aid of a fund for the widows and orphans of officers in the Crimea, the artistic talent of which there have been many proofs in the Queen's and the Prince's children, was first publicly shown. A water-colour drawing by the Princess Royal, already a fine girl of fifteen--whose marriage was soon to be mooted, in which she had represented a woman weeping over a dead grenadier, displayed remarkable merit and was bought for a large price. On the 16th of April the Emperor and Empress of the French arrived in England on a visit to the Queen. The splendid suite of rooms in Windsor Castle which includes the Rubens, Zuccarelli, and Vandyck rooms, were destined for the imperial guests. And we are told that, by the irony of fate, the Emperor's bedroom was the same that had been occupied on previous occasions by the late Emperor Nicholas and King Louis Philippe. Sir Theodore Martin refers to a still more pathetic contrast which struck the Queen. He quotes from her Majesty's journal a passage relating to a visit paid by the old Queen Amélie to Windsor two or three days before. "It made us both so sad to see her drive away in a plain coach with miserable post-horses, and to think that this was the Queen of the French, and that six years ago her husband was surrounded by the same pomp and grandeur which three days hence would surround his successor."