FRENCH COLOMBIER 



washed externally, with a view to making it 

 conspicuous to its inmates on their homeward 

 flight. Charles Waterton, who usually knew 

 what he was talking about, says that this prac- 

 tice was forbidden in England in his father's 

 time, as being likely to attract a neighbour's 

 birds. 



The argument seems hardly sound ; but cer- 

 tainly a whitewashed English dovecote is not 

 often seen. 



It is in France that we first hear of, and may 

 often find, an important adjunct of the dove- 

 cote which seems not to have been generally 

 in use in Rome. This was th^polence, a piece 

 of mechanism used for gaining easy access to 

 the upper tiers of nests. The vital portion was 

 a massive beam or arbre, secured in an upright 

 position in the centre of the dovecote by being 

 pivoted into socket-holes placed in the floor 

 and roof respectively. In these socket-holes 

 the beam revolved freely at a touch. Jutting 

 horizontally from the beam were several arms, 

 technically known as ih^potencesov *' gallows," 

 though the term gradually came to mean the 

 mechanism as a whole. These arms were not 



21 



