Chaucer continued all through his life to find a powerful friend in John of Gaunt. To his influence he doubtless owed various offices, which he held at different times. He was several times sent abroad on secret affairs of state, and at last obtained a permanent office in London, with a salary, and besides had a pension granted to him. His connexion with John of Gaunt was strengthened by the fact that his wife's sister, Katherine Swynford, who had been in the service of the Duchess Blanche, first became the Duke's mistress, and afterwards his third wife. The advantage of such a patron to the poet must have been great, as it relieved him from all anxiety about money, and permitted him to devote most of his energy to his art. We cannot overestimate what Chaucer did for the English language. Before his time French was the common language of the court, the schools, the law courts, and all the higher classes of society. The dialects spoken in different parts of England differed widely from one another, and it remained a question which of these dialects should triumph and form the cultivated English language. It was Chaucer who decided this question. It was his language that was to become the standard of English. This was due to the force of his genius, which made men feel the beauty, the power, and the capacities of the language which he used, so that insensibly it became the language of all cultivated men. And as the English language developed, it triumphed over the French. One of the acts, which commemorated Edward III.'s jubilee, is an edict in which he said, that as the French tongue "was much unknown in the country," all pleas should be henceforth in English. On the 14th November, 1362, Edward III. celebrated his jubilee; that is, his fiftieth birthday. In honour of the day he proclaimed a general pardon, and set all prisoners at liberty, and recalled all exiles. To commemorate it still further, he conferred various dignities upon his sons. Lionel was made Duke of Clarence; John of Gaunt was solemnly raised to the dignity of Duke of Lancaster. The king in full Parliament girt him with a sword, and set upon his head a cap of fur, and a circlet of gold and pearls. Edmund, the fourth son, was made Earl of Cambridge.