-26 The Ancient Stone Crosses for a short distance, and crossing the head of a little brook, y/e shall find it has become a smooth green path of consider- able width. By following this grassy road, which runs nearly due east and west, and which we shall be well able to do, -even after it loses its present character and is covered with heather, for it is marked throughout the whole of its course by small heaps of stones placed at short distances apart, we shall reach the moor gate at Harford. This path forms the most direct route to that place from Owley or from Brent. We shall find the object of which we are in quest about a mile from the gate by which we have entered on the moor. It is the top of the shaft, and one of the arms of a very curious old cross, and it is much to be lamented that it has been so mutilated. It is known as Spurreil*s Cross (though the moormen sometimes call it Purl's) and is situated by the side of the path we have been following, close to the point where it is intersected by an old road, which though now exhibiting the marks of wheels and showing us tliat it is sometimes used as a way for bringing in peat, is very probably an ancient track, and can be traced a consider- able distance. It passes between Sharp Tor and Three Barrows, and goes direct to Left Lake Ford, and from thence to one of the boundary stones of Ugborough and Harford Moors. From this point it becomes a narrow path, but can be followed as far as Hook Lake, a stream that runs down the hollow called Stony Bottom and falls into the Erme, Erme Pound is at no great distance from that hollow, and a little to the north of it the Abbots* Way crosses Red Lake. South of the cross this track may be traced to the enclosed lands below the Eastern Beacon. The shaft of SpurrelPs Cross is missing, and the mutilated head is simply fixed up on a few loose stones. There is little doubt, however, that, being found at the intersection of paths, it is now on its original site, or within a short distance of it. But besides marking the track from Owley and the one which crosses it, it also served to indicate the direction of another. This latter ran from Buckfast to Plympton, and joins the Owley path not far from where the cross is seen. I have traced it for several miles along the verge of the moor. It crossed the Erme at Harford and went through Cornwood» and thence to Plympton by way of Sparkwell.
