Autograph letter signed from William Fairbairn to Miss Susan Horner, Athenaeum Club, 2 May 1856: “Your anxiety for the public safety induces me to reply in writing on the subject of the Bridge you were so kind as to submit to my consideration. It is a very pretty sketch, not unlike the Bridge of Sighs, and the only danger is that it might actually become one of that description if traversed by the delicate, the aged, and the infirm. I strongly suspect that there would be some puffing to get to the top and some actually hard breathing to get down again. In fact if the thing has to be done at all, it must be provided with a Jacobs ladder, or travelling platform – constantly in motion – and on which you are at once trans-ported without fatigue – from one side of the street to the other. Now all this can be done but according to the Manchester school will it pay: and will the public submit to be taxed at a half-penny a head for the ride, or will they prefer a sharp look out [...] and take the crossings. There are points for consideration which, if heard with your confidence as engineer, we must think about [...]”.

Includes a full-body portrait photograph of Fairbairn (64 × 100 mm)