Similar troubles ensued with subsequent keepers, though no such flagrant case was discovered; but it was often needful to caution those engaged in looking after the lighthouse to avoid ‘meddling with wrecks,’ which, despite the presence of a lighthouse, seem to have been not infrequent, and to avoid ‘drinking’ and the company of wreckers. There is other evidence that for a long time to come the keepers were too much hand and glove with the inhabitants of the islands to avoid suspicion. Altogether this first lighthouse that the Trinity House had built for fully fifty years, and certainly the most elaborate one, cost the board a good deal of annoyance and a good deal of money; so much of the latter, that the Duke of York, then master, was asked soon after its erection graciously to ‘forego’ his annual allowance on account of the poverty of ‘the House,’ which he graciously did. It will be remembered that in the autumn of the year 1707 Sir Cloudesley Shovell’s vessel, and the fleet accompanying it, were cast away on the Scillies, Sir Cloudesley and many others perishing. On that occasion the keeper of the lighthouse took time by the forelock, and, quite as soon as news of the disaster reached London, there came from him an assurance as to the ‘goodness’ of his light when the wreck occurred. The board made no answer till it had heard some of the sailors who escaped, and these all agreed that, on the occasion, the light was dim in the extreme, owing they believed, to ‘the foulness of the glass.’