DORSET 



living vesture that a building can well have. 

 There is asingle dormer window just above the 

 eaves of the tiled roof, upon the top of which is 

 a small wooden cupola having three tiers of en- 

 trance-holes, alighting-ledges being provided 

 for each tier. The vane surmounting all is a bird 

 which we may take to be a pigeon. 



The walls are three feet thick, the door three 

 feet six inches high, by two feet six in width. 

 Insidethereisapotence,ingoodworkingorder, 

 with its ladder still in place. Of about one thou- 

 sand nest-holes some are simply oblong, while 

 a few have two entrances. 



At Melplash Court, near Beaminster, now a 

 farm, there is a circular stone dovecote said to 

 have been built in 1604. It stands in a field and 

 is of rather small size; forty feet only in diameter, 

 and twelve feet high to the eaves. The walls are 

 forty inches thick, the doorway four feet high. 

 The nest-holes, about two hundred in number, 

 are simple oblong recesses; nopotenceremains, 

 but timbers inthe roof suggest one having been 

 in use. 



Piddletrenthide Manor presents us with a 

 dovecote differing entirely in one respect from 



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