callibogus n also calabogus, calebogus, calibogus, callabogus; calli. Apparently a maritime beverage of eastern North America: DAE calibogus (1758 [Dedham, Mass]-), DC callibogus (Nfld: 1771-); see also OED purl sb³ b 'hot beer with gin'; switchel (1840 quot Haliburton: purl talabogus). A drink made by mixing spruce beer, rum or other liquor and molasses; formerly also in clipped form calli with specifying word egg, king, etc.
   [1766] 1971 BANKS 140 From this [spruce] Liquor in itself Very Weak are made three Kinds of Flip Cald here Callibogus, Egg Calli & King Calli the first Simply by adding Rum Brandy or Gin If you cannot get Either of the First as much as is agreable The second by heating the first with the Addition of an Egg & Some Sugar the third King Calli By adding spirit to the Contents of the Copper as soon as it is ready to Put into the Cask & Drinking it hot. [1771] 1792 CARTWRIGHT i, 139 They supped with me, and afterwards smoked a few whiffs of tobacco and drank a little callibogus. [1826] 1866 WILSON 350 You had better take a drop of calebogus to keep out the cold. 1861 DE BOILIEU 161-2 Then we take copious draughts of drink, christened on the [Labrador] coast 'caltibogus,'—a mixture of rum and spruce-beer, 'more of the former and less of the latter,'—when the meal is over. 1886 Colonist Christmas No 11 On the Goulds Road the following very suggestive advertisement dangled from a fir tree, near a tilt, 'Spruce Beer & Co.' It is easy to imagine the sleeping partners in the firm who might be classed under the generic title of 'Calibogus.' 1901 Christmas Review 6 The social side of the club life consisted of story-telling and a discussion of that favourite outport brew, Calabogus. 1937 DEVINE 13 Callabogus. A drink of spruce beer and rum mixed. 1964 Evening Telegram 7 Feb, p. 3 Calabogus, a drink popular in Newfoundland for more than 200 years, is now being made available to tourists at Canadian National's Newfoundland Hotel. The drink, a mixture of spruce beer, molasses and dark rum, is now among the cocktails available.

Go Back