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Then onto the exhibition of Spanish devotional sculpture at the National Gallery. Polychrome multi media. That is to say the heads, hands and feet were always painted wood, while the clothes might be wood, painted cloth or a mixture. There might or might not be an interior wooden frame to hold the whole thing together. With a naked man, the idea seemed to be to make the sculpture of the naked man, then add a sculpted loin cloth, either wood or painted cloth, afterwards. We learn that Spanish ecclesiastics went in for a sort of tonsure that I have never seen before, perhaps copied from the New World. Head completely shaven, just leaving a bar of hair above each ear and a tuft on the forehead. The people who made these things were famous in their own land, in the same way that painters and sculptors were elsewhere. Fascinating stuff, some very lifelike. Especially so when one remembered that it was all over 300 years old. There must have been a touch of restoration along the way: seems a bit unlikely that these things would survive so long without a bit of help.

Some of the figures were rather lurid. Life size, life like versions of dead and dying Christs. Complete with all the gory bits. Plus the head off of John the Baptist, served up on a fancy silver platter, complete with lovingly modelled sectioned neck. Complete with various pipes. The heads were often positioned so that if the faithful happened to glance up while they were praying, they had the illusion of Christ looking down on them personally. Rather odd to think of pious widows in vigorous middle age praying beneath beefcake with blood and tears. I learn from the rather handsome catalogue that the central organs of the church went to some trouble to convince themselves that praying in the vicinity of such figures did not amount to worshipping idols - graven images even - a practise quite clearly banned by Old Testament authority. Must try to get to Spain to see some of these things in their proper surroundings. The National Gallery had a good shot with its darkened rooms, but not the same as a proper church. Or maybe even Mexico. I am told they go one better there.

Out of there, slightly shell shocked, and onto a circumnavigation of Green Park, in full autumnal splendour. A big plus for London town. Here we learned that the Queen was not at home, with just the union jack flying over Buckingham Palace. On the other hand, someone had made the steps near Clarence house into a memorial to the late Queen Mother and the Prince of Wales has taken to flying what looked like the royal standard over what I think was Clarence House itself. I assume that he was at home. I had thought that only the reigning monarch was allowed to fly the standard, perhaps except in the case of certified incapacity, clearly not the case just presently, but I have clearly got this wrong.

While we are on royals, according to our local freebie, the Queen has developed a new mode of visiting. She does not actually get out of her limousine, just rotates in her seat so that she faces the open door with her feet on the ground, and smiles graciously as she is presented with a small bouquet. It seems that she paid a visit of this sort to St Barnabas in Temple Road on the way home from the last Derby.

On the way home, we come across yet another species of Openreach van, taking the total to three now. Around Epsom, the Openreach engineers drive around in standard Transit vans. As you get into Sutton they have moved up to something bigger, a sort of cross between a Transit and a Luton. By the time you get to London Bridge, as we did the other week, they are into small panel wagons. London Bridge clearly the home of the heavy gang.