When he came to die he had little of the philosopher about him, but shivered and cried at the dark passage. It may be a matter of wonder how Bourne found time or inclination to marry; but he did so, and the maiden's name was Lucia. He even begat children, of whom one was a Lieutenant of Marines, and left some vague property, a house in Westminster and land in Bungay. The poet's death took place in 1747, not unexpected by himself, as I have said, and by a disease which, he records with grateful thankfulness, left him in full and calm possession of his faculties. He had written his own epitaph, which may be thus rendered: _Vincent Bourne, of unfeigned piety and utter humility, who in no place forgot his God or forgot himself, descends into the silence which he loved_. It is a touching estimate, and shows, in its anxiety to deal only with essentials, how incidental his work was to his character; he forms no pompous appreciation of the value of his writings, but leaves them, like Sibylline leaves, for the wind to whirl away, the only testimony to his quiet and observant eye, his love of simple things, his intense interest in nature and humanity. _Qui bene latuit, bene vixit_, he might have said. Cowper wrote to Newton in 1781, in reply to a letter suggesting that he should translate Vincent Bourne's Latin poems, and offering literary assistance. It appears to have been one of the few occasions on which Newton gave Cowper sensible advice. Cowper replies that he is much obliged for the offer of help: "It is but seldom, however, and never, except for my amusement, that I translate; because I find it impossible to work by another man's pattern. I should at least be sure to find it so in a business of any length. Again, that is epigrammatic and witty in Latin which would be perfectly insipid in English, and a translator of Bourne would frequently find himself obliged to supply what is called the _turn_.... If a Latin poem is neat, elegant, and musical, it is enough; but English readers are not so easily satisfied. To quote myself, you will find, on comparing 'The Jackdaw' with the original, that I was obliged to sharpen a point, which, though smart enough in the Latin, would in English have appeared as plain and blunt as the tag of a lace.... Vincent Bourne's humour is entirely original; he can speak of a magpie or a cat in terms so exquisitely appropriated to the character he draws, that one would suppose him animated by the spirit of the creature he describes. And with all his drollery, there is a mixture of rational and even religious reflection at times, and always an air of pleasantry, good-nature, and humanity, that makes him in my mind one of the most amiable writers in the world. It is not common to meet with an author who can make you smile, and yet at nobody's expense, who is always entertaining and yet always harmless; and who, though always elegant and classical to a degree not always found in the classics themselves,