Note 178 — Chapter XI
Reading edition
This word is spelled by different writers, in various ways. The island was afterwards (in 1644, according to Callender,) called the Isle of Rhodes, and by an easy declension, Rhode-Island. (Holmes, vol. i. p. 246.) In a letter of Roger Williams, already quoted, written before May, 1637, the name Rode-Island is applied to it. The reason does not appear. A fancied resemblance to the Isle of Rhodes is supposed to have been the origin.