Whatever men might have hoped from the Congress at Bruges, and from the lay ministry formed by the influence of John of Gaunt and his party, all their hopes were now disappointed. They had hoped for reform in the Church, and all they obtained was a compact with the Papacy for the maintenance of old abuses. The man who had been foremost in making this compact, the Bishop of Bangor, was rewarded by translation by Papal provision to the see of Hereford. This was what the lay ministry had done for the Church after all its promises of reform. And what had become of the money which they had voted for the continuance of the war? How had the war been conducted? A few short years before France had lain crushed and humbled at the feet of England; now nothing remained of all that the Black Prince had won in France, except Bayonne, Bordeaux, Calais, and a few other unimportant places. The English navy had been annihilated; the English coasts had been insulted by the enemy; never had England known such degradation. Men had believed in the Duke of Lancaster, and this was what he had led them to. Now men saw his personal aims, his selfish ambition. All the tide of popular fury was turned against him and his ministers. He was accused, whether justly or not we cannot say, of designs on the throne; since he knew that his brother, the Black Prince, could not live long. When he was dead nothing would stand between Lancaster and the throne but the young Prince Richard. There was no man more unpopular than he in England; for he was regarded as the opponent of the people's hero, the Prince of Wales.

But the people alone could do nothing against the power and influence of the Duke. In their hour of need, however, they found a leader in the man who had so often led their armies victoriously against the enemy, in the Black Prince himself.

Parliament met at Westminster in the spring of 1376. It was three years since it had last met—an unusually long interval, considering the frequent Parliaments held in this reign. The Black Prince had moved to the royal palace at Westminster, that he might be able to watch over the proceedings. The King opened Parliament on the 28th of April; and on the following day the Lord Chancellor Knyvet addressed the Lords and the Commons assembled in the great chamber at Westminster. He told them briefly the reasons for which they had been summoned. "First, to advise on the good government and peace of the kingdom of England; secondly, to consider for the external defence of the kingdom, by land as well as by sea; and thirdly, to make arrangements for the continuation of the war with France." The Commons were then bidden to retire, and deliberate apart in their own chamber in the Chapter-house of the Abbey of Westminster. At the demand of the Commons, certain bishops and barons were appointed to deliberate with them, and give them their advice on the subject of the subsidy to be granted to the King. The next point was the choice of a Speaker, and the election made by the Commons was in itself a mark of their opposition to the Duke of Lancaster. Peter de la Mare, the man chosen, was the steward of Edmund Mortimer, Earl of March, who had married Philippa, the only child of Lionel Duke of Clarence, Lancaster's elder brother. Philippa had a prior right to the throne to that of John of Gaunt, and therefore she and her husband necessarily opposed his ambitious schemes. Peter de la Mare's policy was sure to be opposition to the Duke. He was, a contemporary chronicler tells us, "a man of abundant wisdom and courage; a lover of justice and truth; neither the bribes nor the threats of his enemies could deter him from the right course."

With regard to the demand for a subsidy, the Commons consented to grant the same sum as they had given three years before; more they would not give on account of the great scarcity throughout the land produced by the plague, the murrain amongst the cattle, and the failure of the crops. This matter once settled, the Commons proceeded to what they considered the chief business of the session, the petitions about grievances. Headed by Peter de la Mare, they carried their answer about the subsidy to the council and the barons.

Then, standing before the nobles, amongst whom John of Gaunt stood foremost, the Speaker began to disclose the grievances of the country. The people, he complained, were exceedingly weighed down by taxes; but even this they would have borne patiently had the money been usefully employed; yet in spite of the great expenditure the wars had not prospered. The Commons demanded an account of the way in which the money had been spent. "Neither is it credible," concluded the Speaker, "that the King should want such an infinite treasure, if they were faithful that served him." Great was the indignation of Lancaster at this insolence of the Commons, as he called it. Full of wrath, he declared his intention of silencing them next day by a show of his power; but his followers pointed out to him that the Commons had the support of the Black Prince, his brother, and that he could not crush them. Afraid lest they should go further, and allow disclosures to be made about the evil manner of his own life, he appeared before them next day seemingly mild and gracious. Then the Commons went on with their proceedings. They stated that, on account of the great wars abroad, the present Council was insufficient to manage the affairs of the state; and they asked that ten or twelve bishops, lords, and others be added to strengthen the Council. They next unfolded a long list of grievances, which showed the disordered condition and the maladministration of the country.

They petitioned, first of all, that the King's guilty officers be punished, they insisted that such heavy taxation would not have been necessary, considering the immense amount of money that had come into the kingdom as ransoms for French prisoners, if only it had been properly and honestly administered. They promised that the King should have no difficulty in getting plenty of money for the war, and his other necessities, if he would first dismiss and punish his ministers. They attacked Richard Lyons, a London merchant, and a creature of the Duke's. He had had patents granted him by members of the Council, to buy up merchandise, and sell it again at his own price; he had also caused customs to be put upon wool and other commodities, which he levied principally for his own profit. It was no wonder that the Duke, who interfered in this way with the trade of London, should draw upon himself the hatred of the Londoners. Lyons tried to save himself by sending a bribe to the Prince of Wales, in the shape of a barrel containing £1,000. The Prince refused it with scorn; but afterwards regretted his refusal, saying that he would have "done a good deed by sending it to the knights that travail for the realm." Lyons then sent his money to the King, who kept it, saying "that he took the same in part payment of the money that was owing to him; for this and much more he owed him, and had not presented him with anything but his own."

Lyons could not save himself. He was ordered to be imprisoned at the King's pleasure, to lose the freedom of the city, and have all his goods seized.

Next followed the impeachment of Lord Latimer, another creature of the Duke's, who was Chamberlain and Privy Councillor, and governor of a castle in Britany, where he had appropriated large sums of money, and had taken bribes to surrender places to the French. He was also sentenced to be fined and imprisoned. Other accusations followed, all founded on much the same charge—appropriation of the public money. One man, William Ellis, an accomplice of Lyons, had extorted money at Yarmouth from ships driven by stress of weather into the port. Another, John Peachy, had obtained from Lyons a patent giving him the exclusive right of selling sweet wines in London. Sir John Neville was sentenced to be fined and imprisoned, because he had allowed some soldiers whom he was conducting to France to ravage the country all the way to Southampton. The Commons declared in plain terms that the people of England would no longer consent to have their interests trampled upon, and their trade interfered with, for the sake of enriching a greedy baronage and its creatures. In all this they were firmly supported and encouraged by the Prince of Wales and the good Bishop William of Wykeham, who was quite restored to the favour of the people. In fact, the Black Prince had seen that the best policy would be to attempt to unite against the baronage the Commons and the national clergy. The Commons were quite ready to welcome the clergy back to office; for they now saw only too well the selfish policy which had made John of Gaunt wish to drive them out.

But the Commons did not stop short with attacking the evil counsellors of John of Gaunt; they went on to impeach Alice Perrers, the woman who had gained such an unworthy influence over the King in his old age. They passed an ordinance against "certain women of the court, and especially Alice Perrers, who interfered with the course of justice in the kingdom, sitting side by side on the bench with the judges." Alice Perrers was examined before the nobles, and banished from the court. She was obliged to swear that she would keep away from the King.

It was by its vigorous attack upon all these abuses, and its desire to restore an orderly and discreet administration, that this Parliament earned for itself the name of "The Good Parliament." It established the right of Parliament to demand the redress of grievances, and to impeach the King's ministers. When we remember that at the beginning of the reign of Edward III. the one function of the Commons was to vote subsidies, we shall realize how great the increase of the power and influence of Parliament must have been during the reign, to admit of such proceedings as those of the Good Parliament taking place. Parliament was now strong enough to cause the ministers of the crown to be removed, and new ones more pleasing to it to take their place. Knyvet, the Lord Chancellor, was the only one of the old ministry who was retained.