She was sitting at her table in Buckingham Palace, reading a letter, when the sleeve of her dress caught fire from a candle. Luckily Miss Hildyard and Miss Anderson (who were in the room at the time) promptly rolled the Princess in the hearthrug and extinguished the flames, though her arm was severely burnt from below the elbow to the shoulder. On the 8th of July the Queen again went to Aldershot to review a great body of Crimean troops, the Royal party including the King of the Belgians and Prince Oscar of Sweden. Unfortunately the weather somewhat marred the grandeur of the spectacle, but it became fair enough ere the day was done to admit of the regiments forming in three sides of a square round the Queen’s carriage. Then the officers who had been under fire, with four men from each company and troop, stepped forward, and her Majesty, rising, addressed them a few words of welcome and thanks. She told them to say to their comrades that she had herself watched anxiously over their difficulties and hardships, and mourned with deep sorrow for the brave men who had fallen in their country’s cause. When she ceased to speak, the cry of “God save the Queen” burst forth from every lip. The air was black with helmets, bearskins, and shakoes, which the men tossed up with delight. Flashing sabres were waving and glancing along the lines, and on every hillside crowds caught up the cheering that rose from the serried and glittering ranks of the army. Unhappily the day was saddened by a strange and melancholy occurrence. Lord Hardinge was seized with a fit whilst talking to the Queen. “He fell forward,” says Prince Albert, “upon the table before which he was standing. I assisted him to the nearest sofa, where he at once resumed what he was saying with the greatest clearness and calmness, merely apologising that he had made such a disturbance. When he was moved to London it was found his right side was paralysed.” Next day the Guards and Highlanders arrived, and were received by the Queen and enthusiastic crowds in the Park. “They marched past in fours,” writes Lord Malmesbury, “preceded by their colonels on horseback and their bands, in heavy marching order. Certainly they looked as if they had done work; their uniforms were shabby, many having almost lost all colour, their bearskins quite brown, and they themselves, poor fellows, though they seemed happy, and were laughing as they marched along, were very thin and worn.”[286] Lord Hardinge’s career was now closed. On the 9th of July he resigned, and on the 24th of September he died. On the 12th of July the Cabinet accordingly advised the Queen to appoint her cousin, the Duke of Cambridge, Commander-in-Chief, in succession to Lord Hardinge, and her Majesty was gratified to find that the arrangement was one which was highly popular with the troops. Thus the intention of Wellington was fulfilled, and the army again passed under the direct command of a Prince of the Blood Royal.