Page:Devon & Cornwall Notes & Queries.djvu/423

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54 i^^f Ancient Stone Crosses introduced. A new liead was made for the shaft by a stone- mason of Walkhaniplon, and the restoration was complete. Antiquaries will feel grateful to Mr. Gray for this good work, as indeed will all to whom the sight in our villages of these memorials of the years that are flown is a source of pleasure. Entering the churchyard, we shall notice that there is a small granite cross over the porch, and one also on the roof of the aisle, and another over the transept. Immediately above the window of the latter is a niche in the wall, reaching to its apex, in which is a slab bearing upon it a cross in relief. The church is of the fifteenth century, but portions of it remain which are of earlier date, the north pillar of the chancel-arch exhibiting traces of Norman carving. In a corner of the churchyard is a monument erected over the grave of Lady Seccombe, of Walreddon, who died in 1884, consisting of a beautiful white marble cross and pedestal ; and nearer to the lich-gate is a squared granite block on which an inscription is cut in relief. This marks the grave of one Walter Mattacot, and the letters on the stone tells us that he died in 1657. In the courtyard of Gratton Farm, in this parish, there was formerly a stone with an incised cross. This probably belonged to the old manor house there, though if it could be proved that the chapel of St. Matthew, licensed in 1433, the site of which is now unknown, stood anywhere near, we might be right in supposing it to be a relic of that building. Reluctantly leaving Meavy, with its Elizabethan manor- house, its time-worn cross, its granite tower and pleasant green, and its venerable oak, which tradition tells us was stand- ing prior to the time when its lands were held by Judhael the Norman, we pass on our way to the extensive commons occupying the southern portion of the parish. The road at the western end of the village will lead us to a picturesque old bridge of one arch thrown across the Mew, whence by a true Devonshire lane we shortly reach a cross-road, and turning up the hill, shall enter upon Calisham Down. Following the path that skirts this down, and passing through a gate we soon find ourselves on another common. This is Greenwell Down, across which we shall make our way, keeping close to the enclosures on our left, and shall strike a branch of the road that we have just forsaken, where