CORNWALL they were so remote as to be practically at the mercy of any despotic ruler, and they probably owed their chief privileges and im- munities to the Tresco monks. In 1539 Sir Francis Godolphin was granted all civil author- ity, and in his family it remained, with the brief interval of the Commonwealth, till 1H30. In 1 83 1 Mr. Augustus Smith became proprietor. Scilly bore its share in the troubles of the Civil War. It was the last refuge of the fugitive Charles II., before he escaped to Jersey and thence to France. Fortified by the gallant Sir John Grenville, it was used as a centre of privateering by those ardent loyalists who would neither surrender nor seek a foreign shore ; but in 165 1 Grenville could maintain the position no longer. The noble seaman Blake, together with Sir George Ascue, completed at sea that which Fairfax had done on shore. The islands were taken by storm. But Grenville had nothing to be ashamed of; and he had already honour- ably declined to be bribed by the Dutch for the delivery of these islands into their hands. He might be a Royalist, but he was an Englishman first. During the French wars the isles were garrisoned, and became a rendezvous for mer- chantmen waiting convoy. About the year 1830, owing to the failure of the kelp industry, the islanders were reduced to great straits. It seemed as though all attempts to support an industrial population must fail. An effort was made to start active fishery, but in spite of their position the Scillonians have 274
