The Loyalty islanders are Melanesians; the several islands have each its separate language, and in Uea one tribe uses a Samoan and another a New Hebridean form of speech.
Meanwhile the labour traffic, which had been initiated, so far as the, Pacific islands were concerned, by an unsuccessful attempt in 1847 to employ New Hebridean labourers on a settlement near the present township of Eden in New South Wales, had attained considerable proportions, had been improperly exploited and, as already indicated, had led the natives to retaliation, sometimes without discernment, a notorious example of this (as was generally considered) being the murder of Bishop Patteson in 1871.
The Hebridean islands exceed 500 in number, of which one-fifth are inhabited.
Potatoes, barley and a little oats are grown, and the pasture being good the cattle are larger than most of the Hebridean breeds.
These family connexions with the Hebridean Scots and with the O'Neills made the lord deputy, Sir John Perrot, afraid of a powerful combination against the English government, and induced him to establish garrisons in Tyrconnel and to demand hostages from Hugh MacManus O'Donnell, which the latter refused to hand over.