BOOK OF DOVECOTES 



The Roman columbarium was usually round, 

 the vaulted roof being generally of stone, 

 though tiles were sometimes used. The en- 

 trance was small, and the windows either lat- 

 ticed or covered^with a double trellis to ensure 

 the birds against the invasion of snakes and 

 other vermin. The interior surface of the walls 

 was covered with a smoothly worked cement 

 made from ground marble, while the outer 

 face immediately around the windows was 

 often similarly treated, so that no foothold 

 might be offered to small climbing animals. 

 The nest-holes, very similar to those that we 

 may see to-day in many an English dovecote, 

 lined the walls from floor to roof; the entrance 

 to each being only large enough to admit the 

 bird, but the whole expanding inwards to the 

 breadth of a foot. Sometimes the nests appear 

 to have been circular,, and in some instances 

 they were constructed of a kind of porcelain. 

 Before each row of nests there was a shelf 

 eight inches broad, to serve as an alighting- 

 place and promenade. 



There was one detail in the construction 

 of a Roman pigeon-house which, though it 

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