Green Dots of the Empire. 19 
local traders in the Ellice Group, and the present 
generation of natives. 
Eighty or ninety miles away is Nukulaelae, a 
cluster of thirteen low-lying islets, forming a 
perfect atoll, and enclosing with a passageless 
and continuous reef a lagoon five miles in length 
by three in width. This narrow belt of land— 
in no case is any one of the islets over a mile in 
width—is densely covered with coconuts, and, 
seen from the ship, presents an enchanting ap¬ 
pearance of the brightest green, accentuated on 
the westerly or lee shore by beaches of the most 
dazzling white. Thirty years ago Nukulaelae 
had a population of four hundred natives. 
Then one day, in 1866, there came along two 
strange vessels, a barque and a brig, and hove-to 
close to the reef, and in a few hours nearly two 
hundred of the unfortunate, unsuspecting, and 
amiable natives were seized and taken on board 
by the Peruvian cut-throats and kidnappers that 
had swept down upon them, and, with other 
companions in misery, torn from their island 
homes, taken away to slavery in the guano pits 
of the Chincha Islands, on the coast of South 
America. Of the Nukulaelae people none but 
two ever returned—they all perished miserably 
