ii8 The Anctent Stone Crosses This little settlement lies immediately under the hill on which are the numerous crags known as the Sourton Tors, though between it and that eminence now runs the London and South Western Railway. On the green by the roadside, and not very far from the church, is the base of a cross. It is a roughly worked stone, rectangular in shape, and measuring about three feet across, with a socket nine inches square. The cross itself has disappeared, and nothing seems to be known of it. There were formerly several small granite pillars, exhibiting some rather careful workmanship, lying near this base. They formed the supports to the large granite slabs originally used as gravestones, but which have been employed to pave the churchyard path. These pillars are now built into the wall of the Jubilee Church Room, opened in 1897. From Sourton the road passes over Prewley Moor, and enters on the enclosed lands again near where a cottage stands, formerly known as Jockey Down's House. A little farther on we reach Sourton Down, now enclosed, and here, close to the hedge on our right, shall perceive a remarkably fine cross. It is rather over eight feet in height, but the arms project barely two-and-a-half inches, and this circumstancct together with the fact of the stone bearing an ancient in- scription, has caused some to think it likely that this cross was fashioned out of a primitive menhir. Mr. C. Spence Bate in a paper in the sixth volume of the Transactions of the Plymouth Institution (1866-7), considers this was probably the case, and readers of John Herring may possibly remember that the Rev. S. Baring-Gould has also adopted this view.*" Immediately under the arms the shaft is fifteen inches wide ; the head is rather more than this towards the top, and rises above the arms about nine inches. The inscription is in three lines, and as in the case of the stones now at Tavistock is cut lengthwise. It is very difficult to make out what it is, but the second word of the first line
- "Iii the midst of Sourton Down stands a very humble tavern,
backed by a few stunted trees, twisted and turned from the west ; and by the roadside is to be seen a tall granite cross, once a burial monument of a British chief, and bearing an inscription that was cut into and rendered illegible in mediaeval times, when the upright stone was con- verted into a wayside cros.'* ^ohfi Henitig, chap. xxxi. The '* humble tavern *' has long been closed.
