for the duchy of Brittany, and immediately returned to take in hand, himself, his own cause.

But in the very year of his escape, on the 26th of September, 1345, he died at the castle of Hennebon, leaving once more his wife, with a young child, alone at the head of his party and having in charge the future of his house.
The Countess Joan maintained the rights and interests of her son as she had maintained those of her husband.

For nineteen years, she, with the help of England, struggled against Charles of Blois, the head of a party growing more and more powerful, and protected by France.

Fortune shifted her favors and her asperities from one camp to the other.

Charles of Blois had at first pretty considerable success; but on the 18th of June, 1347, in a battle in which he personally displayed a brilliant courage, he was in his turn made prisoner, carried to England, and immured in the Tower of London.