The Etymology of the word Rum. 77 
ary of the French Language, writes as follows of its 
origin : — 
Guildive (ghil-di-v') 5. /. Nom qu'on donne dans les lies de 
l'Amerique, a l'eau-de-vie qu'on tire des gros sirops de sucre et de 
l'ecume des premieres chaudieres. On dit aussi tafia. L'eau-de-vie 
qu'on tire des cannes est appelee guildive ; les sauvages et les negres 
l'appellent tafia, le p. labat, Nouv. voy. aux ties fr. t. in, p. 410. 
— Etym. Ce passage du P. Labat prouve que guildive est ne parmi 
les colons francais, tandis que tafia r.ppartient aux sauvages. M. 
Roullin a fait quelques conjectures supposant que guil repr^sente soit 
guiller, fermenter, soit giler, terme populaire, pour jaillir, et dive, forme 
corrompue de diable. Mais, dans ces cas 011 tout renseignement his- 
torique manque, on ne sait jamais si quelque circonstance speciale, 
quelque nom propre ne sont pas caches sous le mot qu'on veut expliquer. 
While the French long retained this name for the 
eau-de-vie of the West Indies, the English had by 1660 
substituted RUM for KlLL-DEVIL. In enquiring how the 
new form of appellation came into the language, there 
seems strong reason for coming to the conclusion that 
as in the case of the word cab, which has been cut off 
from its original, cabriolet, and of tar from tarpaulin,* 
which was Jack-Tar's earlier designation, so RUM has 
been clipped from Rumbullion. 
The earliest notice of drink as being made in Barba- 
dos appears to be that by JAMES HOWELL, who, writing 
on the 7th of October, 1634, to Lord CLIFFORD, says, 
,( in the Barbado island the common drink among the 
" English is mobbi, made of potato roots. "f In the earli- 
* Christopher Jeaffreson, writing from London, on the 12th Sep- 
tember, 1683, to John Steele, one of his white servants on St. 
Christopher's Island, says of some surfeit-water which Steele's wife had 
presented to the Young Squire, for use during his recent voyage to 
England from St Kitts, that he thought it "too good for the Tar- 
pollions at sea," so he had preserved it for use ashore. — "A Young 
Squire of the Seventeenth Century ;" London, 1878, vol. II, p. 69. 
t Familiar Letters, 10th edition, London, 1737, p. 364. 
