F. Colburn (Francis Colburn) Adams
Chapter 84
shoeing. And a little further on, a dash of yellow and white paint
on a little sign-board at the entrance of an alley, guarded on one
side by a broken-down shed, and on the other, by a three-story,
narrow, brick building (from the windows of which trail long
water-stains, and from the broken panes a dozen curious black heads,
of as many curious eyed negroes protrude), tells us somewhat
indefinitely, that Mister Mills, white-washer and wall-colorer, may
be found in the neighborhood, which, judging from outward
appearances, stands much in need of this good man's services. Just
keep your eye on the sign of the white-washer and wall-colorer, and
passing up the sickly alley it tells you Mister Mills may be found
in, you will find yourself (having picked your way over putrid
matter, and placed your perfumed cambric where it will protect your
lungs from the inhalation of pestilential air,) in the cozy area of
'Scorpion Cove.' Scorpion Cove is bounded at one end by a two-story
wooden house, with two decayed and broken verandas in front, and
rickety steps leading here and there to suspicious looking passages,
into which, and out of which a never-ending platoon of the rising
generation crawl and toddle, keep up a cheap serenade, and like
rats, scamper away at the sight of a stranger; and on the other, by
the back of the brick house with the negro-headed front. At the
sides are two broken-down board fences, and forming a sort of
net-work across the cove, are an innumerable quantity of unoccupied
clothes-lines, which would seem only to serve the mischievous
propensities of young negroes and the rats. There is any quantity of
rubbish in 'Scorpion Cove,' and any amount of disease-breeding
cesspools; but the corporation never heard of 'Scorpion Cove,' and
wouldn't look into it if it had. If you ask me how it came to be
called 'Scorpion Cove,' I will tell you. The brick house at one end
was occupied by negroes; and the progeny of these negroes swarmed
over the cove, and were called scorpions. The old house of the
verandas at the other end, and which had an air of being propped up