[Sidenote: [1387-1390 A.D.]] The king of Castile did not long survive this reconciliation with the Plantagenet. On the 9th day of October, 1390, he was killed by falling under his horse. The reign of Juan I was one of continued troubles, which, though his abilities were moderate, his firmness prevented from ruining the state, or endangering his own power. Once, indeed, during the disputed succession to the Portuguese crown, he seriously intended to resign in favour of his own son Henry, who, as the son of Beatrice, daughter of Ferdinand, was the true heir to the Portuguese no less than the Castilian throne. His object was to secure the execution of the treaty made with that prince, and forever to unite the two crowns. But his nobles, who were evidently no less averse to such a union than their western neighbours, not merely advised but compelled him to preserve his dignity.[g] But the greatest glory of King Juan’s reign was his successful expedition against the coasts of England, to punish the presumption of the duke of Lancaster. Once more the maintenance of the Lancastrian claims was the signal for the destruction of a British fleet. Not content with threatening the ports, the Castilians, emboldened by former successes, sailed up the Thames, in 1380, and took or burned the shipping in the river almost within sight of London.[h] THE GOOD KING HENRY III (1390-1406 A.D.) [Sidenote: [1390-1396 A.D.]] The crown descended to Henry, Juan’s first-born son, who since his betrothal in 1387 had taken from the ancestral seat of his family, now elevated into a principality, the title of “prince of Asturias,” which has been borne by the heir-apparent of Castile ever since. Henry, surnamed the Infirm, was a weakly prince of eleven years of age, and a regency had to be appointed during his minority, whence much evil accrued to the realm of Castile. By the last testament of the late king the affairs of state were to be managed by a council of regency composed of the three estates of the kingdom. This arrangement was contested as showing too little regard for the rights of the heads of the great families, and a fresh regency was set up by the help of the estates, in which the lords temporal and spiritual--the duke of Benavente, a natural son of Henry II, Count Pedro of Trastamara, the marquis of Villena, the archbishops of Toledo and Santiago de Compostella, the grand-masters of the orders, and others--divided the royal authority between them. No notice was taken of the assessors of the middle class who ought to have been admitted to their deliberations. But the nobles at the head of affairs, each one of whom was eager to take advantage of these propitious circumstances to enrich himself and increase his own power, were soon at variance and strife among themselves, the kingdom was split up into factions, the crown property alienated, disorder prevailed throughout the country.