348); but upon this interesting question, as also for an exposition of Barrett's method and the important advances subsequently made upon it by Griffith Davies and others, we can here only refer to the authorities mentioned below.
Some time after Barrett's death most of his papers were destroyed by fire. The tables were purchased by Charles Babbage, who made use of them in his ‘Comparative View.’ With that exception, and that of the specimens in Baily's appendix, they were never printed.
Barrett also published, in 1786, an ‘Essay towards a System of Police,’ in which he recommends one more patriarchal than that of Russia or the Caliph Haroun al Raschid.
[Baily's Doctrine of Life Annuities, 1813, appendix; same work, ed. 1864, editor's preface and sect. 37 seqq.; Assurance Magazine, i. 1, iv. 185, xii. 348; Babbage's Comparative View of Assurance Institutions, 1826; Walford's Insurance Cyclopædia, art. ‘Columnar Method.’]
BARRETT, JOHN (d. 1810), captain in the royal navy, a native of Drogheda, was made a lieutenant on 2 Nov. 1793, and having distinguished himself in command of the store-ship Experiment at the capture of St. Lucia, in June 1795, he was, on 25 Nov., advanced to the rank of post-captain. In October 1808 he had the dangerous task of convoying a merchant fleet of 137 sail through the Sound, then infested by the Danish gunboats. His force, quite unsuitable for the work, consisted of his own ship, the Africa, of 64 guns, and a few gun-brigs; in a calm, the small heavily-armed row-boats of the Danes had an enormous advantage, and in an attack on the English squadron on 20 Oct. they inflicted a very heavy loss on the Africa. In such a contest the English gun-brigs were useless, and the Danish boats, taking a position on the Africa's bows or quarters, galled her exceedingly; twice her flag was shot away, her masts and yards badly wounded, her rigging cut to pieces, her hull shattered, and with several large shot between wind and water; nine men were killed and fifty-three wounded. The engagement lasted all the afternoon. ‘Had the daylight and calm continued two hours longer, the Africa must either have sunk or surrendered; as it was, her disabled state sent the ship back to Carlscrona to refit.’ In 1810 Barrett had command of the Minotaur, 74 guns, and was again employed in convoying the Baltic trade. On a wild stormy night of December the ship was driven on the sands of the Texel and lost, with nearly 500 of her crew, Captain Barrett amongst the number. He is described as having acted to the last with perfect coolness and composure. ‘We all owe nature a debt,’ he is reported to have said; ‘let us pay it like men of honour.’
[Brenton's Naval Hist. of Great Britain, iv. 499; James's Naval Hist. of Great Britain (ed. 1860), i. 333, iv. 369.]
BARRETT, JOHN, D.D. (1753–1821), vice-provost and professor of oriental languages of Trinity College, Dublin, was the son of an Irish clergyman, entered Trinity College as a pensioner in 1767 when fourteen years of age, was scholar in 1773, B.A. in 1775, fellow and M.A. in 1778, B.D. in 1786, D.D. in 1790, and senior fellow in 1791. Having been sub-librarian and librarian, he was elected in 1807 vice-provost. His first publication was a thin duodecimo volume, ‘Queries to all the Serious, Honest, and Well-meaning People of Ireland,’ put forth in 1754 under the pseudonym ‘Phil. Hib.’ (Brit. Mus. Cat.). In 1800 he published ‘An Enquiry into the Origin of the Constellations that compose the Zodiac, and the Uses they were intended to promote,’ in which he is said to have been more happy in opposing the hypotheses of Macrobius, La Pluche, and La Nauze than in establishing his own, ‘which consisted of the wildest and most fanciful conjectures’ (London Monthly Review). He is one of the latest writers on astrology, and the book is an extraordinary example of learned ingenuity. In 1801 Barrett edited a much more important publication, ‘Evangelium secundum Matthæum,’ known as ‘Codex Z Dublinensis Rescriptus.’ It appears that in 1787, while examining a manuscript in the library of Trinity College, Dublin, he noticed some more ancient writing under the more recent Greek, which turned out to be part of Isaiah, some orations of Gregory of Nazianzen, and a large portion of the gospel of St. Matthew. Barrett set himself with great assiduity to decipher the portions of St. Matthew, and they were engraved for publication at the expense of the college. Barrett assigned the codex to the sixth century, at latest, and this date has been adopted by most subsequent critics. His reasons are given in detail in the ‘Transactions of the Irish Royal Academy,’ vol. i. In 1853 S. P. Tregelles obtained, by the chemical restoration of the manuscript, some valuable additions which were illegible to Barrett, and published them as a supplement; and in 1880 an edition by T. K. Abbott appeared, bringing to light some other important omissions of his two predecessors in the work. Abbott tries to make out a case
