In 1716 Fletcher was in Paris, where he took ill. His nephew Andrew, afterwards a judge of the Court of Session under the title of Lord Milton, who was then studying at Leyden, hearing that his uncle wished to return home, hurried to Paris. They reached London, but the old gentleman was unable to go further. Lord Sunderland called on him, and asked if there was anything he wished done. ‘I have a nephew,’ he replied, ‘who has been studying the law. Make him a judge when he is fit for it.’[23] [23] ‘I have heard,’ says Mr. Ramsay, ‘Sir Hugh Paterson say, who knew Saltoun well, that he early predicted his nephew would turn out a _corrupt fellow_, and a perfect courtier. Saltoun, however, hated all Kings and Ministers of State.’--Ochtertyre MS. 1. 87. On the 15th of September 1716 he died; and his nephew brought his body to Scotland in a leaden coffin, which was laid in the family vault under the parish church of Saltoun, where it still remains. A scrap of paper among the manuscripts in the Bodleian Library at Oxford bears this curious memorandum, in the handwriting of Thomas Rawlinson, the great antiquary and book collector: ‘Andrew Fletcher of Saltoun, dyed in London, on Sunday, September 16th 1716, of a flux contracted by drinking ye waters of the River Seine at Paris. He died Christianly and bravely, only concerned for ye ruin of his country, and yt he had been base enough to have kissed the hand of ye insulting Tyrant.’[24] [24] The date given by Rawlinson is wrong. Fletcher died on the 15th of September. He was succeeded, in the estate of Saltoun, by his brother Henry, and afterwards by his nephew, Andrew Fletcher of Milton, who, as Lord Justice-Clerk, was, for many years, the Duke of Argyll’s right-hand man in the management of Scottish affairs. Many of the books collected by Fletcher are still preserved at Saltoun Hall, where there is a tablet with this inscription, ‘This Library was built A.D. 1775, by Andrew Fletcher of Saltoun, to contain that excellent collection of books made by his great uncle of Illustrious Memory, whose name he bore. Lieutenant-General Henry Fletcher of Saltoun inscribes this marble to the memory of his lamented brother, and desires to remind their common successors that the Love of Letters or of Arms has always distinguished the family of Saltoun.’