When the war began, the Black Prince was helpless with illness. He was so furious with the French that he had himself carried in a litter to attack them, and, for the first time, he showed himself cruel to the people he conquered. Everything seemed to go wrong. Their eldest son died, to the great grief of the prince and princess, and at last the prince was so ill that he had to give up the command of his army to his brother, John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, and return to England. It was a sad coming home, very different from their joyous setting out for France. In England, too, things were going badly; the king was old, and the people were discontented because of the extravagance of the court and the nobles. The Black Prince and his wife retired to their castle at Berkhamsted. He was afflicted with a grievous malady and suffered terribly, but he interested himself in the affairs of the country and supported the Parliament, which was trying to remedy some of the abuses of the government. In order to do this, he moved up to London to the royal palace at Westminster. It was there that he died after four years of illness and suffering. He commended his wife and his little son Richard to the care of his father and brothers, and begged his followers that as they had served him, so they would serve his little son. The princess was broken-hearted at her husband’s death and bewailed herself with bitter tears and lamentations. She was named guardian of her little son Richard, who was then ten years old; he was made Prince of Wales and declared heir to the throne, and only a year passed before, at his grandfather’s death, he became King of England. Those were anxious days in England. The country was worn out with the expenses of long wars and of an extravagant court. The people had suffered from a terrible pestilence called the Black Death. Everywhere there was want and scarcity, which led to bitter discontent. The boy king was surrounded by his uncles, ambitious men, who each wished to be the chief power in the country. His mother, the Princess Joan, does not seem to have had any ambition to take part in public affairs; we do not hear of her mixing herself up in any of the intrigues that went on round the little king; only once or twice she seems to have come forward to make peace. She is said to have been interested in the teaching of John Wiclif, a learned clergyman. Disgusted with the corruption of many of the clergy, he was trying to teach a purer faith, and he had translated the Bible into English so that even the unlearned might read it. But we hear so little about Joan that it is clear that she must have lived very quietly during these troubled days.