BAR’NABY (Widow), the title and chief character of a novel by Mrs. Trollope (1839).  The widow is a vulgar, pretentious husband-hunter, wholly without principle. Widow Barnaby has a sequel called The Barnabys in America, or The Widow Married, a satire on America and the Americans (1840).

BARNABY RUDGE, a half-witted whose companion is a raven.  He is enticed into joining the Gordon rioters.—­C.  Dickens, Barnaby Budge (1841).  (See RUDGE.)

BARNACLE, brother of old Nicholas Cockney, and guardian of Priscilla Tomboy of the West Indies.  Barnacle is a tradesman of the old school, who thinks the foppery and extravagance of the “Cockney” school inconsistent with prosperous shop-keeping.  Though brusque and even ill-mannered, he has good sense and good discernment of character.—­The Romp (altered from Bickerstaff’s Love in the City).

BARNADINE, malefactor, condemned to death, “who will not die that day, upon any man’s persuasion.”—­Shakespeare, Measure for Measure.

BARNES (1 syl.), servant to colonel Mannering, at Woodburne.—­Sir W. Scott, Guy Mannering (time, George II.).

BARNEY, a repulsive Jew, who waited on the customers at the low public-house frequented by Fagin and his associates.  Barney always spoke through his nose.—­C.  Dickens, Oliver Twist (1837).

BARN’STABLE (Lieutenant), in the British navy, in love with Kate Plowden, niece of colonel Howard of New York.  The alliance not being approved of, Kate is removed from England to America, but Barnstable goes to America to discover her retreat.  In this he succeeds, but being seized as a spy, is commanded by colonel Howard to be hung to the yardarm of an American frigate called the Alacrity.  Scarcely is the young man led off, when the colonel is informed that Barnstable is his own son, and he arrives at the scene of execution just in time to save him.  Of course after this he marries the lady of his affection.—­E.  Fitzball, The Pilot (a burletta).

BARNWELL (George), the chief character and title of a tragedy by George Lillo.  George Barnwell is a London apprentice, who falls in love with Sarah Millwood of Shoreditch, who leads him astray.  He first robs his master of L200.  He next robs his uncle, a rich grazier at Ludlow, and murders him.  Having spent all the money of his iniquity, Sarah Millwood turns him off and informs against him.  Both are executed (1732).

[Illustration] For many years this play was acted on boxing-night, as a useful lesson to London apprentices.  BARON (The old English), a romance by Clara Reeve (1777).

BAR’RABAS, the rich “Jew of Malta.”  He is simply a human monster, who kills in sport, poisons whole nunneries, and invents infernal machines.  Shakespeare’s “Shylock” has a humanity in the very whirlwind of his resentment, but Marlowe’s “Barrabas” is a mere ideal of that “thing” which Christian prejudice once deemed a Jew. (See BARABAS.)—­Marlowe, The Jew of Malta (1586).