420 RUB 
RUB 
ably larger than many of the West India islands which are 
cultivated. Its soil, and the natural advantages connected 
with it, might perhaps be found in no degree inferior to any, 
of them. It abounds with deer, wild hogs, Indian rabbits 
and birds of many species; parrots are innumerable, and 
their incessant noisy chattering may be heard a considerable 
distance from the shore. The Spaniards have a kind of 
military station or look-out post on this island. This, how¬ 
ever, may rather be considered as intended to establish their 
right to it by occupancy, than as a means of defence, as the 
force does not consist of more than five or six men. The 
small adjoining islands of Helene, Moratte, and Borburette, 
are separated from this island by a narrow channel, and seem 
to be almost detached parts of it. In the south part of tlie 
island are some ports, and besides these, some little channels 
fit for small vessels. In the west part of the island are some 
meadows, in which mules are bred, and of these meadows 
the greatest part of its territory consists. Lat. 16. 23. N. 
long. 86. 45. W. 
To RUB, v. a. [rhubio , Welsh: rciben, German, to 
wipe. Dr. Johnson.'] —To clean or smooth any thing by 
passing something over it; to scour; to wipe ; to perfrieate. 
—To touch so as to leave something that touches behind.— 
Their straw built citadel new rubb'd with balm. Milton. — 
To move one body upon another.—Look, how she rubs her 
hands. It is an accustomed action with her, to seem thus 
washing her hands. Shakspeare. —To obstruct by col¬ 
lision. 
’Tisthe duke’s pleasure. 
Whose disposition all the world well know. 
Will not be rubb'd nor stopp’d. Shakspeare. 
To polish; to retouch.—The whole business of our 
redemption is, to rub over the defaced copy of the creation 
to reprint God’s image upon the soul. South. —To remove 
by friction: with off or out. —A forcible object will rub 
out the freshest colours ata stroke, and paint others. Collier. 
—If their minds are well principled with inward civility, a 
great part of the roughness, which sticks to the outside for 
want of betterteaching, time and observation, will rub off ; 
but if ill, all the rules in the world will not polish them. 
Locke. —To touch hard.—He, who before he was espied, was 
afraid, after being perceived, was ashamed, now being hard¬ 
ly rubbed upon, left both fear and shame, and was moved to 
anger. Sidney. 
To Rub down. To clean or curry a horse. 
When his fellow beasts are weary grown,: 
He’ll play the groom, give oats, and rub'e m down. 
Dry den. 
To Rub up. To excite; to awaken.—You will find me 
not to have rubbed up of what some heretofore in the city 
did. South. 
To Rub up. To polish; to refresh. 
To Run, v. n. To fret; to make a friction. 
This last allusion gall’d the panther more, 
Bee au e indeed it rubb'd upon the sore ; 
Yet seem’d she not to winch, though shrewdly pain’d. 
Dryden. 
To get through difficulties. 
No hunters, that the tops of mountaines scale, 
And rub through woods with toile seeke them all. 
Chapman. 
Many lawyers, when once hampered, rub off as 
well as they can. L'Estrange. —’Tis as much as one can do 
to rub through the world, though perpetually a doing. 
L'Estrange. 
RUB, s. Frication; act of rubbing.—Inequality of 
ground, that hinders the motion of a bowl. 
We’ll play at bowls. 
’Twill make me think the world is full of rubs, 
And that my fortune runs against the bias. Shakspeare. 
A rub to an overthrown bowl proves an help by hinder¬ 
ing it. Fuller. —Any uneveness of surface.—Faces look 
uniformly unto our eyes: how they appear unto some animals 
of a more piercing or differing sight, who are able to disco¬ 
ver the inequalities, rubbs, and hairiness of the skin, is not 
without good doubt. Brown.— Collision ; hinderance ; 
obstruction. 
The breath of what I mean to speak 
Shall blow each dust, each straw, each little rub 
Out of the path, which shall directly lead 
Thy foot to England’s throne. Shakspeare. 
Difficulty ; pause of uneasiness.—To sleep; perchance to 
dream ; ay, there’s the rub. Shakspeare. 
RUB-STONE, s. A stone to scour or sharpen.—A cra- 
dle for barlie, with rub-stone and sand. Tusser. 
RU'BBER, s- One that rubs.—-Yonder’s mistress Young- 
love, brother, the grave rubber of your mistress’s toes. 
Beaum —The instrument with which one rubs. 
Servants ■ •, 
Then blow the fire with puffing cheeks, and lay 
The rubbers and the bathing sheets display. Dryden. 
A coarse file.—The rough or coarse file, if large is called a 
rubber, and takes off the unevenness which the hammer made 
in the forging 
RUBBAGE, or Rubbish, s. [Of uncertain etymology]. 
Ruins of buildings; fragments of matter used in buildings. 
What trash is Rome! 
What rubbish, and what offal! when it serves 
For the base matter to illuminate 
So vile a thing as Caesar. Shakspeare. 
Confusion; mingled mass.—That noble art of political 
lying ought not to lie any longer in rubbish and confusion. 
Arbuthnot. —Any tiring vile or worthless. 
RU'BBIDGE, s. Improperly, though anciently used, for 
rubbish. 
RUBBIO, a measure of corn in Italy, equal to bushels. 
RU'BBLE, s. Rubbish. This is perhaps the oldest form 
of thfr word rubbish. —Carry out rubble, as mortar, and 
broken stones of old buildings. Barret. — Bubble, or rub¬ 
bish, of old houses. Barret. —Pieces of timber, bars of 
iron, massy stones, together with all the rubble and stones 
in the walls of that great and glorious pile. Dean King. 
RUBBLE-STONE, s. Rubble-stones owe their name to 
their being rubbed and worn by the water, at the latter end 
of the deluge, departing in hurry and with great precipi¬ 
tation. Woodward. — See Mineralogy, p. 473, where 
Rubble-stone is described under its proper term, Are- 
NAR1US GRISEUS. 
RUBEFACIENTS, s. Substances which produce red¬ 
ness of the skin: as, embrocations, blister-plaster, &c. 
RUBELLIO, a name given by some authors to a small 
sea-fish of a red colour, caught in the Mediterranean, and 
more usually called by writers on these subjects the ery- 
thrinus. 
RUBELLITE, in Mineralogy, a species of tourmaline, 
of a reddish-violet colour. It differs from tourmaline, being 
infusible under the blow-pipe, but it loses its colour and 
transparency. Its specific gravity is 3.1. It contains, ac¬ 
cording to Klaproth,—silex 43.5; alumine 42.25; soda 9; 
oxyd of iron and manganese 1.5. 
A specimen analysed by Vauquelin, gave 7 parts in the 
100 of oxyd of iron and manganese. This stone is some¬ 
times used in jewellery. In the Greville collection of mine¬ 
rals in the British Museum, there is a magnificent specimen 
of the red rubellite, originally presented to Col. Symes by 
the king of Ava. It has been valued at 1000/. 
RUBELLUS, a name given by some authors to the com¬ 
mon roach, and by others to the rudd or finscale. 
RUBENS (Sir Peter Paul), a most accomplished man, 
and extraordinary painter, was the son of John Rubens and 
Mary Pipelings, both descendants of distinguished families 
of the city of Antwerp. His father was one of the principal 
magistrates of that place, when civil war desolated Flanders; 
and its calamities approaching the precincts of his abode, he 
left it for Cologne, in which city our artist was born, in 1577. 
The 
