To-day the principal inhabitants are black rabbits; but the ruins of several houses may still be seen. One of them is known as “Armorel’s Cottage,” after the heroine of Sir Walter Besant’s novel, _Armorel of Lyonnesse_. It stands, a mere shell, roofless and crumbling, at the foot of the southern hill. Bracken and bramble have encroached on all sides, within and without, blocking up the doorway and leaving no traces of a floor. An elder and a tamarisk alone show where the cottage-garden used to be. It is a pretty spot for a home, on the edge of the narrow plain which connects Samson’s two hills, with a full sight of the sea and of the neighbouring islands on the right and on the left. Now the ground is covered with wild violets and the air is heavy with the scent of the gorse; later, when summer comes, tall foxgloves will rise in battalions from the midst of the fresh green bracken, which as yet shows nothing but tiny tender spirals above the dark earth. It is over twenty years since Besant’s book was written, but still you may see new-comers to Scilly clasping each his copy of _Armorel_. The original of “Peter the boy” is still living on St. Mary’s, and is still known as Peter, though that is not his real name. Still he answers to Besant’s description, looking no older, probably, than twenty years ago. He had a terrible blow on the head from the crane of a steamer, which knocked him insensible, and after that all his hair fell out, and never would grow again. But the accident had one happy result: he had been subject to fits, and this blow on the head worked a complete cure! It is such a simple though drastic remedy, that all doctors and surgeons ought to know of it! The “girl” who is credited with having been the original of Armorel, for the sole reason that she was the last girl to live on Samson, was married and in the North of England long before Besant came to Scilly. With most unreasonable annoyance, she declared she would scratch his eyes out if ever she met him, thus proving that she had no resemblance in character to the Armorel of fiction. As for “Peter,” he was “noways particular,” to use his own expression. Not far from Armorel’s Cottage there are the ruins of an ancient building, which is supposed to have been a church; but as to when and how it was built, and to whom dedicated, who can tell? XII ST. AGNES If you want to visit the little island of St. Agnes, you had better choose a fairly calm day, for the coast is so rocky that in rough weather it is not easy to land. There are two ways of getting there from St. Mary’s: either in your own hired sailing-boat, when you can choose your own time; or else you can be “delivered with the mails” by the steam-launch, in which case you must be ready for starting soon after the arrival of the steamer from Penzance. Very energetic people can also go in the launch when she fetches the mails, leaving St. Mary’s at 6.30 in the morning.