BOY PIGEON-KEEPEKS. 



to afford ? Well do we remember our first two pigeon- 

 houses, of widely-diverse construction ; the earliest 

 effort of contrivance being an old tea-chest fixed against 

 a wall, with the complicated machinery of a falling 

 platform, or " trap," in front, to be drawn up by a half- 

 penny-worth of string, so as to secure the inmates, or 

 their visitors, for a learned inspection ; the second, a 

 more ambitious piece of architecture, namely, a tub 

 mounted on the top of a short scaffold-pole, divided 

 internally into apartments, each of some cubic inches 

 capacity, and each with a little landing-place project- 

 ing for the birds to alight upon, after their meal on 

 the ground, or their circling exercise above the house- 

 tops. And the wonderment to behold the process of 

 fixing this lofty structure firm and upright in its site 

 in the back-yard ! How the man dug an awful hole in 

 the ground, from which he could with difficulty shovel 

 out the earth for the crowding, and the pushing, and 

 the peeping in of us children and the maids how the 

 tall structure was, by the combined efforts of all pre- 

 sent, slowly set upright how three or four vast flint- 

 stones (rocks they seemed to us to be) were jammed in 

 at the foot with a beetle borrowed from the paviour that 

 lived up a yard in our street how, when earth and 

 pebbles had been duly added to make all smooth and 

 tight, we retired a few yards and looked up with admi- 

 ration and when at last the short ladder was brought 

 wherewith to ascend, which we did without delay, and 

 inspect the lockers, Sineaton, gazing from the top of 

 the Eddystone Lighthouse, or Stephenson darting on a 

 locomotive engine through the Menai Tube, might 

 enjoy a pride higher in degree, but not stronger in 

 intenseness ! 



B 2 



