BOOK OF DOVECOTES 



lib, Milton's friend, that towards the middle of 

 the seventeenth century the number of Eng- 

 lish dovecotes was estimated at twenty-six 

 thousand. If we allow five hundred pairs of 

 pigeons to each cote — a fairly modest com- 

 putation, many dovecotes having upwards of 

 one thousand nests — and then remember that 

 a pair of pigeons will consume annually four 

 bushels of corn, the enormous loss of grain to 

 farmers will be seen. 



It is to be understood that for many cen- 

 turies the right to erect and maintain one of 

 these structures was strictly limited. Those so 

 favoured by the Norman laws were the lords of 

 manors, a class which included not only a vast 

 number of landowning laymen, but also abbots 

 and other ecclesiastics, the parson of a parish 

 being frequently among the number. As to 

 this last-named class there will be something 

 more to say, especially with reference to the 

 kind of dovecote which they sometimes used. 



This feudal privilege is generally stated to 

 have been abolished during the reign of Eliza- 

 beth. It is certain that during the sixteenth 

 andseventeenth centuries there wasa lar^ead- 

 36 ^ 



