[f. LAKE sb.3 + -ER1.]
† 1. A visitor to the English lakes. [A pun: see quot. 1805.] Obs.
1798. [J. Plumptre] (title), The Lakers; a Comic Opera in Three Acts.
1805. Bp. Watson, in R. Watson, Life (1818), II. 269. Lakers (such is the denomination by which we distinguish those who come to see our country, intimating thereby not only that they are persons of taste who wish to view our lakes, but idle persons who love laking: the old Saxon word to lake, or play, being of common use among schoolboys in these parts).
1806. Southey, in C. C. Southey, Life, III. 41. You would come as a mere laker and pay a guide for telling you what to admire. Ibid. (1829), Sir T. More (1831), I. 42. A stepping-stile has been placed to accommodate Lakers with an easier access.
2. One of the ‘Lake poets.’
1819. Miss Mitford, in L’Estrange, Life (1870), II. 73. Apropos to Mr. Jeffrey and Mr. Wordsworth, I want you to read one fair specimen of the great Laker.
1876. E. FitzGerald, Lett. (1889), I. 381. The Lakers all … first despised, and then patronised ‘Walter Scott.’
3. (U.S. local.) A fish living in or taken from a lake, spec. the lake-trout of N. America.
1846. J. Wilson, Lett., in Hamilton, Mem., vii. (1859), 234. Fresh-water ones [trout] found in the river, but more like lakers.
1876. Forest & Stream, 13 July, 368/2. He pulls like a laker, and you’ll think you’ve got a whale.
4. A boat constructed for sailing on the great lakes of America.
1887. F. H. Smith & J. B. Millet, in Century Mag., Aug., 484/2. A twenty-foot laker can slip through any lock without scratching her paint.
