Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 59.djvu/88

 him invaluable aid. On 27 April 1734 Bentley was sentenced by the college visitor, Thomas Green (1658-1738) [q. v.], bishop of Ely, to be deprived of the mastership of Trinity College. On the resignation of John Hacket, the vice-master, on 17 May 1734, Walker was appointed to his place, and resolutely refused to carry out the bishop's sentence. On 25 June 1735, at the instance of John Colbatch, a senior fellow, the court of king's bench granted a mandamus addressed to Walker, requiring him to execute the sentence or to show cause for not doing so. Walker, in reply, questioned the title of the bishop to the office of general visitor, and the affair dragged on until 1736, when Green's death put an end to the attempts of Bentley's opponents. Walker was the constant companion of Bentley's old age, and was introduced by Pope into the 'Dunciad' with his patron (, Works, ed. Elwin and Courthope, iv. 201-5).

In 1744 Walker was appointed professor of moral philosophy at Cambridge, and in 1745 he was nominated rector of Thorpland in Norfolk, a living which he exchanged in 1757 for that of Upwell in the same county. He was devoted to horticulture, and had a small garden within the precincts of Trinity College which was famous for exotic plants, including the pineapple, banana, coffee shrub, logwood tree, and torch thistle, which, with the aid of a hothouse, he was able to bring to perfection. On 16 July 1760 he purchased the principal part of the land now forming the botanic garden at Cambridge from Richard Whish, a vintner, and on 25 Aug. 1762 conveyed it to the university in trust for its present purpose. In 1763 he published anonymously 'A Short Account of the late Donation of a Botanic Garden to the University of Cambridge' (Cambridge, 4to). He died at Cambridge, unmarried, on 15 Dec. 1764.

[Monk's Life of Bentley, 1833, ii. 26, 81, 349-56, 379-84,400-6; Scots Mag. 1764, p. 687; Annual Reg. 1760, i. 103; Willis's Architectural Hist. of Cambridge, 1886, ii. 582-3, 646, iii. 145, 151; Blomefield's Hist. of Norfolk, 1807, vii. 99, 470.] 

WALKER, ROBERT (d. 1658?), portrait-painter, was the chief painter of the parliamentary party during the Commonwealth. Nothing is known of his early life. His manner of painting, though strongly influenced by that of Van Dyck, is yet distinctive enough to forbid his being ranked among Van Dyck's immediate pupils. Walker is chiefly known by his portraits of Oliver Cromwell, and, with the exception of the portraits by Samuel Cooper [q. v.], it is to Walker that posterity is mainly indebted for its knowledge of the Protector's features. The two best known types—the earlier representing him in armour with a page tying on his sash; the later, full face to the waist in armour—have been frequently repeated and copied. The best example of the former is perhaps the painting now in the National Portrait Gallery, which was formerly in the possession of the Rich family. This likeness was considered by John Evelyn (1620–1706) [q. v.], the diarist, to be the truest representation of Cromwell which he knew (see Numismata, p. 339). There are repetitions of this portrait at Althorp, Hagley, and elsewhere. The most interesting example of the latter portrait is perhaps that in the Pitti Palace at Florence (under the name of Sir Peter Lely), which was acquired by the Grand Duke Ferdinand II of Tuscany shortly after Cromwell's death. In another portrait by Walker, Cromwell wears a gold chain and decoration sent to him by Queen Christina of Sweden. Walker painted Ireton, Lambert (examples of these two in the National Portrait Gallery), Fleetwood, Serjeant Keeble, and other prominent members of the parliamentary government. Evelyn himself sat to him, as stated in his ‘Diary’ for 1 July 1648: ‘I sate for my picture, in which there is a death's head, to Mr. Walker, that excellent painter;’ and again 6 July 1650: ‘To Mr. Walker's, a good painter, who shew'd me an excellent copie of Titian.’ This copy of Titian, however, does not appear, as sometimes stated, to have been painted by Walker himself. One of Walker's most excellent paintings is the portrait of William Faithorne the elder [q. v.], now in the National Portrait Gallery. In 1652, on the death of the Earl of Arundel, Walker was allotted apartments in Arundel House, which had been seized by the parliament. He is stated to have died in 1658. He painted his own portrait three times. Two similar portraits are in the National Portrait Gallery and at Hampton Court; and one of these portraits was finely engraved in his lifetime by Peter Lombart. A third example, with variations, is in the university galleries at Oxford.

[Walpole's Anecdotes of Painting, ed. Wornum; De Piles's Art of Painting (supplement); Noble's Hist. of the House of Cromwell; Granger's Biogr. Hist. of England (manuscript notes by G. Scharf); Cat. of the National Portrait Gallery.] 

WALKER, ROBERT (1709–1802), ‘Wonderful Walker,’ was born at Undercrag in Seathwaite, Borrowdale, Cumberland, in 1709, being the youngest of twelve children; his eldest brother was born about