Of the Nicols whose literacy was recorded, 90.5% could both read and write, 1.4% could read but not write, and 8.1% could do neither. Men came out slightly ahead, 92.3% reading and writing against 88.6% of women. Bear in mind these figures include young children; the census itself only counted people aged nine and over when calculating illiteracy, on the grounds that it was unfair to label a child illiterate before they'd had a chance to learn.