This was a piece of gratuitous cruelty, for the king, though wayward and unwise, had done nothing to justify such treatment. Richard rules constitutionally. Peace with France. To the surprise of the nation Richard took his humiliation quietly. But he was merely biding his time; he had sworn revenge in his heart, but he was ready to wait long for it. For the next nine years he appeared an unexceptionable sovereign, anxious only to conciliate the nation and parliament. He got rid of the ministers imposed upon him by the lords appellant, but replaced them by Bishop Wykeham and other old statesmen against whom no objection could be raised. He disarmed Gloucester by making a close alliance with his elder uncle John of Gaunt, who had been absent in Spain during the troubles of 1387-1388, and was displeased at the violent doings of his brother. His rule was mild and moderate, and he succeeded at last in freeing himself from the incubus of the French war--the source of most of the evils of the time, for it was the heavy taxation required to feed this struggle which embittered all the domestic politics of the realm. After two long truces, which filled the years 1390-1395, a definitive peace was at last concluded, by which the English king kept Calais and the coast-strip of Guienne, from Bordeaux to Bayonne, which had never been lost to the enemy. To confirm the peace, he married Isabella, the young daughter of Charles VI. (Nov. 1396); he had lost his first wife, the excellent Anne of Bohemia, two years before. Richard reduces Ireland to obedience. His revenge on Gloucester and the lords appellant. Banishment of Bolingbroke and Norfolk.