WALES 



he built is there to-day, an empty shell, the 

 sparrow and the rabbit its sole tenants, to re- 

 mind us of the disenchanted poet's stay. 



But the Llanthony monks had surely other 

 thingstolose besidesthe inmatesof theirdove- 

 cote if they feared attack; it was not for the 

 sake of safety thattheybuilttheir columbarium 

 partly underground. So, with the problem still 

 unsolved, we pass to Wales. 



And here we find, a little unexpectedly, the 

 name of "culver-house," fairly familiar in parts 

 of the south and south-east of England. '* Cul- 

 ver" at first sight seems quite possibly akin to 

 the ''columba" of the Latins; is it a mere cor- 

 ruption, we may ask.-^ So fancied Grimm, but 

 he was wrong. For "culver" isan Anglo-Saxon 

 word, well known in other forms. The cowslip 

 is the "culverkeys," and you may call a fool a 

 "culverhead." 



This short digression is not wholly uncon- 

 nected with the first of South Wales dove- 

 cotes to be noticed here; asemi-artificial, semi- 

 natural one. Half-natural, for it is constructed 

 in a fissure of the cliff close by Port Eynon, on 

 the coast between Worms Head and Mumbles; 



199 



