But the years were disastrous both at home and abroad.

The war went steadily against the English arms.

The long negotiations with the Pope which went on at Bruges through 1375, and in which Wyclif took part as one of the royal commissioners, ended in a compromise by which Rome yielded nothing.

The strife over the Statute of Labourers grew fiercer and fiercer, and a return of the plague heightened the public distress.

Edward was now wholly swayed by Alice Perrers, and the Duke shared his power with the royal mistress.
But if we gather its tenor from the complaints of the succeeding Parliament his administration was as weak as it was corrupt.