As the moment of our departure from Blackfriars approaches, I am paying more attention, once again, to our physical surroundings: this morning to the grand Victorian robustness of the underside of Blackfriars Bridge seen from the Embankment, designed by Joseph Cubitt and with metalwork by The Patent Shaft and Axletree Company in Wednesbury. It replaced the eighteenth-century toll bridge designed by Robert Mylne and opened in 1769:-