DC By the Book

Excerpt: As they neared Capitol Hill, the neighborhood deteriorated. Among the shabby plank boarding-houses and taverns they passed half a dozen buildings wich bore signs: SLAVES FOR SALE. Chained coffles of slaves passed them from the direction of the Baltimore road, bare feet thick with gray mud. Everywhere in town January had seen dark faces, but further up the avenue the black men and women he'd seen were well-dressed, like artisans or shopkeepers. Here they wore the clothes of laborers, or the numbered tin badges of slaves.