Two posts set up at the entrance to the
Lane showed that it was no thoroughfare for vehicles. The houses
were of three storeys. There were two or three dirty little shops,
but the rest were ordinary lodging-houses, the front-doors standing
wide open as a matter of course, exhibiting a dusky passage, filthy
stairs, with generally a glimpse right through into the yard in the
rear. In Elm Court the houses were smaller, and had their fronts
whitewashed. Under the archway which led into the Court were
fastened up several written notices of rooms to be let at this or
that number. The paving was in evil repair, forming here and there
considerable pools of water, the stench and the colour whereof led
to the supposition that the inhabitants facilitated domestic
operations by emptying casual vessels out of the windows. The dirty
little casements on the ground floor exhibited without exception a
rag of red or white curtain on the one side, prevailing fashion
evidently requiring no corresponding drapery on the other. The Court
was a _cul de sac_, and at the far end stood a receptacle for ashes,
the odour from which was intolerable. Strangely enough, almost all
the window-sills displayed flower-pots, and, despite the wretched
weather, several little bird-cages hung out from the upper storeys.
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