Walker, JOHN

Walker, JOHN, dictionary-maker, was born at Colney Hatch in Middlesex, 18th March 1732, was by turns actor, schoolmaster, and peripatetic teacher of elocution, passed from Presbyterianism to the Roman Catholic communion, and died in London, 1st August 1807. His well-known Rhyming Dictionary first appeared in 1775, and has since relieved the poetic pains of countless poetasters, and even of Lord Byron. His Critical Pronouncing Dictionary was published in 1791, and had not lost its vogue, or the value of a traditional name, after nearly forty editions and sixty years.