The islanders are generally able to read and write; their pronun elation, though not unmarked by provincialism, is more correct that from their remote situation would be expected. Their general con dition is poor; their employments are agriculture, kelp-making, fishing and pilotage. Sailing packets ply regularly twice a week betweec Hugh Town and Penzance. Besides the Wolf, other dangerous rocks as the Bucks, Rennel, and Leven Stones, lie in the course. Near Levee Stones, a floating light has lately been stationed by the Trinity House A light-house has been erected on Bishop Rock, in the south-west par of the group.
The Scilly Islands are generally considered to have been the Caasiterides of the Greeks. But it seems probable that the weatere extremity of Cornwall must be included in the term Casaiterides, anc that the chief supply of tin was derived from it, for there are no trace: of workings in the islands sufficient to countenance the opinion that much tin was ever obtained from them.
From the time of the Romans, who used them occasionally as s place of banishment, there is no notice of the islands in history until their conquest by Athelstan, king of England, who expelled the Danes about the year 938. Of their ancient importance these islands retain
little trace. There are some primeval monuments; but the early inhabitants appear to have been replaced by others of Saxon origin, as indicated by their names, angusge, and customs. The Scilly Island/ are not enumerated as part of the duchy of Cornwall, in the original grant of that duchy to the eldest eon of the king of England. (12 Edward Ill.) Part of the islands, and the churches in all of them, belonged to the abbey of Taviatock ; but it was not until the Spanish wars in the time of Elizabeth that the islands attracted much notice. In the great civil war they were loog held for the king by Sir John Greenville, or Granville, who fitted out armed vessels, which made several captures. At length, in 1651, a formidable armament, under Admiral Blake and Sir George Ayecue, effected tho reduction of the islands Sir Cloudealey Shovel was lost on the rocks which form the south-western portion of the group, with his own ship and some others on their return from Tonlon, in 1707.
SCeNDR. [Srees] SCIO. [Cults)