There is a lovely account of St Bede’s last days handed down to us in a letter written by his pupil Cuthbert, to another of his pupils, Cuthwin.  Cuthwin had written, telling Cuthbert how he was diligently saying Masses, and praying for their “father and master, Bede, whom God loved,” and Cuthbert is glad to answer his fellow-student’s enquiries as to the departure of that “dear father and master.”

His death-illness began “a fortnight before the day of Our Lord’s Resurrection,” and lasted till Holy Thursday.  All the time he was full of joy and thanksgiving.  Cuthbert says he has never seen any man “so earnest in giving thanks to the living God.”

He made a little poem in English about the absolute importance of everybody considering, before his departure, what good or ill he has done, and how his soul is to be judged after death.  “He also sang antiphons,” says Cuthbert, “according to our custom and use.”  Cuthbert gives one of them, which is the lovely antiphon to the “Magnificat” at second Vespers on Ascension Day.

His work went on during his illness.  He was making a translation of part of St John’s Gospel into English, “for the benefit of the Church,” and was working at “Some collections out of the ‘Book of Notes’ of Bishop Isodorus, saying, ’I will not have my pupils read a falsehood, nor labour therein without profit after my death.’” As the time went on his difficulty of breathing increased, and last symptoms began to appear; but he dictated cheerfully, anxious to do all that he could.  On the Wednesday he ordered them to write with all speed what he had begun; and then “we walked till the third hour with the relics of saints, according to the custom of that day.”

Then one of them said, “Most dear Master, there is still one chapter wanting:  do you think it troublesome to be asked any more questions?” He answered, “It is no trouble.  Take your pen, and make ready, and write fast.”

After this he distributed little gifts to the priests, and spoke to all, asking that Masses and prayers might be said for him.  His desire was, like St Paul’s, to die and be with Christ:  Christ Whom he had so loved, and at Whose feet he had laid all his gifts and all his learning.

“One sentence more,” said the boy, was yet to be written.  The Master bad him write quickly.  “The sentence is now written,” said the boy.  And the dear Saint knew that the end was come, and asked them to receive his head into their hands.  And there sitting, facing the holy place where he had been used to pray, he sang his last song of praise, “Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Ghost,” and “when he named the Holy Ghost he breathed his last and so departed to the Heavenly Kingdom.”

St Bede was buried at Jarrow, but his relics were afterwards taken to Durham by a priest named Elfrid, and laid by St Cuthbert’s side.  In the twelfth century a glorious shrine was built over these relics by the Bishop of Durham, Hugh Pudsey:  a shrine that, like many another, was destroyed in the sixteenth century uprising of the king of the country against the Church of Our Lord Jesus Christ.