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 (1653), p. 108. His directions on catching and dressing fish are equally serviceable; but it is to be regretted that this cheery ‘brother of the angle’ advocated the use of salmon-roe bait, a pernicious doctrine unknown, or at least unpublished, before his time. The ‘Art of Angling’ met with good success, and passed through several editions. In the edition of 1657, and in later editions, the title is ‘Barker's Delight, or the Art of Angling.’

[Westwood and Satchell's Bibliotheca Piscatoria, 1883, pp. 21–23, where a full bibliography of the book will be found; Add. MS. 30501, ‘The Art of Angling Augmented’ (1664), is catalogued by the British Museum authorities as the ‘Second Part’ of Barker's Art of Angling. It is merely a book of extracts from Walton and Barker.]  BARKER, THOMAS (1722–1809), scientific and miscellaneous writer, son of Samuel Barker the Hebraist [q. v.], was born at Lyndon, Rutland, in 1722. His principal work is ‘An Account of the Discoveries concerning Comets, with the way to find their Orbits, and some improvements in constructing and calculating their places; by T. B. Gent.,’ London, 1757, 4to. It contains a catalogue of the elements of the comets then known, and an explanation of Newton's problem of finding a comet's orbit from three observations; but the most valuable and original part is a ‘Table of the Parabola,’ for ascertaining any orbits which are approximately parabolic, and ‘for use in the parabolick motion of projectiles.’ This table was afterwards reprinted by Sir Henry C. Englefield in his work on the orbits of comets (1793), with special praise of the author's skill and industry.

Barker was for many years an assiduous observer of meteorological phenomena, his principal results being regularly registered in the ‘Philosophical Transactions’ of the Royal Society in which also appeared many other papers by him of a scientific nature. He also published three works in controversial theology, viz. 1. ‘A Treatise on the Duty of Baptism,’ London, 1771, 8vo. 2. ‘On Prophecies relating to the Messiah,’ London, 1780, 8vo. 3. ‘On the Nature and Circumstances of the Demoniacks in the Gospels,’ London, 1783, 8vo. Some of his views in this department are characterised in Nichols's ‘Literary Anecdotes’ as ‘sentiments not always orthodox or Calvinistic.’

It is specially remarked of Barker that though he lived to eighty-eight, he had from infancy subsisted entirely on a vegetable diet. He died at Lyndon on 29 Dec. 1809.

[Nichols's Literary Anecdotes, iii. 112 (note); Phil. Transactions, ix. 698, x. 645, xi. 432, 514, and xiii. 131, &c.; Sir H. C. Englefield's Orbits of Comets, note in Preface and table at end.]  BARKER, THOMAS (1769–1847), landscape and subject painter, known as ‘Barker of Bath,’ was born at a village near Pontypool in Monmouthshire in 1769. His father, Benjamin Barker, who died in 1793, was the son of a barrister, but having run through considerable property, he took to painting horses, and young Barker at an early age also showed a genius for drawing figures and sketching landscapes. Through the removal of his family to Bath, the talents of the lad attracted the notice of a wealthy coach-builder of that city named Spackman, who received him into his house, and afforded him the opportunity of copying works of the old Dutch and Flemish masters. At the age of twenty-one he was sent by Spackman to Rome, and provided during four years with ample funds to maintain his position as a gentleman. This proved of great advantage to him, although while there he painted but little, contenting himself with storing his mind with knowledge for future use. He was entirely self-taught, and neither in drawing nor in painting did he ever receive a single lesson. On his return to England in 1793 he settled at Bath, and although he devoted himself chiefly to landscapes and rustic scenes, he painted occasionally also portraits and scriptural subjects. His career was successful, and few pictures of the English school have been more widely known than ‘The Woodman,’ which was engraved by Bartolozzi, and copied in needlework by Miss Linwood. While Barker's talents were in full vigour, no artist of his time had a greater hold on popular favour. His pictures of ‘The Woodman,’ ‘Old Tom,’ and gipsy groups and rustic figures, were copied upon almost every available material which would admit of decoration—Staffordshire pottery, Worcester china, Manchester cottons, and Glasgow linens; yet for this service rendered by the artist to the artisan he never claimed anything for copyright, but rejoiced in the reflection that his labours and his talent afforded profitable employment to others, and were the means of enriching more than himself alone. He nevertheless amassed a considerable fortune by the practice of his art, and expended a large sum in the erection of a house at Sion Hill, Bath, upon the walls of which he painted in 1825 a fresco, thirty feet in length and twelve feet in height, representing ‘The Inroad of the Turks upon Scio in April 1822.’ This was his most remarkable work, and possessed qualities of