e both accountable and thankful."

He had come before he was fifty to regard himself as an old man, and
to speak of his "aged endeavors." Where and how he lived in his later
years, and with what surroundings and under what circumstances he
died, there is no record. That he had no settled home, and was in mean
lodgings at the last, may be reasonably inferred. There is a manuscript
note on the fly-leaf of one of the original editions of "The Map of
Virginia...." (Oxford, 1612), in ancient chirography, but which from its
reference to Fuller could not have been written until more than thirty
years after Smith's death. It says: "When he was old he lived in London
poor but kept up his spirits with the commemoration of his former
actions and bravery. He was buried in St. Sepulcher's Church, as Fuller
tells us, who has given us a line of his Ranting Epitaph."

That seems to have been the tradition of the man, buoyantly supporting
himself in the commemoration of his own achievements. To the end his
industrious and hopeful spirit sustained him, and in the last year of
his life he was toiling on another compilation, and promised his readers
a variety of actions and memorable observations which they shall "find
with admiration in my History of the Sea, if God be pleased I live to
finish it."

He died on the 21 St of June, 1631, and the same day made his last will,
to which he appended his mark, as he seems to have been too feeble to
write his name. In this he describes himself as "Captain John Smith
of the parish of St. Sepulcher's London Esquior." He commends his soul
"into the hands of Almighty God, my maker, hoping through the merits of
Christ Jesus my Redeemer to receive full remission of all my sins and to
inherit a place in the everlasting kingdom"; his body he commits to the
earth whence it came; and "of such worldly goods whereof it hath pleased
God in his mercy to make me an unworthy receiver," he bequeathes: first,
to Thomas Packer, Esq., one of his Majesty's clerks of the Privy Seal,
"all my houses, lands, tenantements and hereditaments whatsoever,
situate lying and being in the parishes of Louthe and Great Carleton, in
the county of Lincoln together with my coat of armes"; and charges him
to pay certain legacies not exceeding the sum of eighty pounds, out
of which he reserves to himself twenty pounds to be disposed of as he
chooses in his lifetime. The sum of twenty pounds is to be disbursed
about the funeral. To his