In the names of two of the eastern islands of Scilly, Great and Little Arthur, are found a reminiscence of the followers of the “Flower of Kings,” who are said to have lived and died on the islands where they had been so strangely (and mercifully) cut off from the rest of their kind.
So runs the legend, which sober, unromantic people spend their efforts and waste their breath in trying to disprove. They prefer to think that the sea between Scilly and Cornwall is called in Cornish Lethowsow (i.e., lioness) on account of its violence and turbulence, and that King Arthur’s followers escaped by boat—or not at all!
There is a tradition of the house of Trevilian that one of their ancestors had great possessions in Lyonnesse, and saved himself at the time of the inundation by swimming to shore on a white horse; in memory whereof the crest of the family is still a white horse.
Whether or not these stories have a foundation of truth, no one can say; but there is certainly a general resemblance in character and formation between Scilly and the Land’s End.
The whole of the islands are composed of granite, which is seen cropping up everywhere through the soil. Huge blocks and boulders of it lie scattered all along the coast, many of them of weird and fantastic shapes. The strangest have been given special names, more or less appropriate. On the peninsula of Peninnis, St. Mary’s Island, there is the “Tooth,” a slender conical rock 30 feet high; also the “Pulpit,” with its flat sounding-board, a fine specimen of horizontal decomposition.
Then there is the remarkable “Giant’s Punchbowl” on St. Agnes, consisting of two large masses of rock—the “Bowl” itself, and the base on which it stands. The base is over 10 feet high, the Bowl more than 8 feet, and the entire height of the top of the Bowl from the ground is nearly 20 feet. The Giant could have indulged in a hogshead of punch at a time, for that is the capacity of the natural basin. In former days the Bowl was a “logan-stone,” and could easily be rocked by two or three men with a pole, but now it rests on its base at two points.
Another strangely shaped rock on St. Agnes is known as the “Nag’s Head”; but there certainly never was on sea or land a horse with a head of that shape, whatever other strange beast it may resemble. It is thought to have been worshipped in ancient times, for there is a circle of stones round it.
It is not a hard rock, this island granite, and is easily worn away by the action of the wind and water. At many points the sea has eaten out large caves in the cliffs, and bellows in them, with the sound of thunder, in rough weather.
The wildness and grandeur of the coast scenery form a great contrast to the peaceful farms lying but a short distance away. The flowers are sheltered from the boisterous winds where necessary by high hedges of euonymus, veronica, and escallonia. Evergreen shrubs are naturally chosen, for at the time when they are most needed no others are in leaf. The escallonia and veronica grow with great luxuriance, and send forth a glow of bright pink bells and purple spikes against the dark background of their glossy leaves. Of trees the islands can make but little boast; they are too much exposed to the violence of storms. The only really large trees are at Holy Vale and Newford on St. Mary’s, and there are no others of any size, except in the gardens.
Dracæna palms flourish particularly well, and when one sees a group of them against the deep blue of the sea it is difficult to believe that one is still in the British Isles, and not on the shores of the Mediterranean.