AROUND EDINBURGH 



midst of which it stands. Here is a dovecote, 

 tall and square; the lower part now used as a 

 hen-house, and the whole so draped with ivy 

 that it is almost impossible to ascertain the 

 shape of roof. But still some fragment of its 

 ancient purpose clings about the place; from 

 time to time a pair of pigeons settle in it for a 

 season, rear a brood, and presently depart. 



If we now take a west-going car we shall 

 reach Murrayfield. Thence it is little more 

 than a full mile to where, beyond the gates of 

 that Zoological Park which is the prideof Edin- 

 burgh, lies the village of Corstorphine, with 

 its quaint squat-towered, stone-roofed church. 

 Some fifty yards beyond it, in a garden which 

 was once a field, stands an exceptionally fine 

 exampleof the othertypeof Scottish dovecote, 

 circular in plan. 



It is a large building, over eighty feet in 

 circumference, and holding quite a thousand 

 nests. The walls are about three feet thick, 

 the domed roof has a central opening, and the 

 occupants were offered a second means of en- 

 trance by a curious little window -shaped group 

 of holes placed above the midmost string-course 



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