Only one happy event distinguished the close of this reign. As early as 1343 Philip had treated, on a monetary basis, with Humbert II., Count and Dauphin of Vienness, for the cession of that beautiful province to the crown of France after the death of the then possessor. Humbert, an adventurous and fantastic prince, plunged, in 1346, into a crusade against the Turks, from which he returned in the following year without having obtained any success. Tired of seeking adventures as well as of reigning, he, on the 16th of July, 1349, before a solemn assembly held at Lyons, abdicated his principality in favor of Prince Charles of France, grandson of Philip of Valois, and afterwards Charles V. The new dauphin took the oath, between the hands of the Bishop of Grenoble, to maintain the liberties, franchises, and privileges of the Dauphiny; and the ex-dauphin, after having taken holy orders and passed successively through the Archbishopric of Rheims and the Bishopric of Paris, both of which he found equally unpalatable, went to die at Clermont in Auvergne, in a convent belonging to the order of Dominicans, whose habit he had donned.
In the same year, on the 18th of April, 1349, Philip of Valois bought of Jayme of Arragon, the last king of Majorca, for one hundred and twenty thousand golden crowns, the lordship and town of Montpellier, thus trying to repair to some extent, for the kingdom of France, the losses he had caused it.
[Illustration: John II., called the Good----318]