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The second story is let out in lodgings, furnished or unfurnished, to persons of different descriptions, particularly to the priestesses of Venus. The rooms above, termed mansardes, in the French architectural dialect, are mostly inhabited by old batchelors, who prefer economy to show; or by artists, who subsist by the employment of their talents.
You passed out of the place and found yourself in the Rue Royale newly named Rue Leveux and there, Dessein's stood before you, with its long yellow wall, archway and spacious courts, on each side a number of quaint gables or mansardes, sharp-roofed. Over the wall was seen the foliage of tall and handsome trees.
The rich and poor thronged alike to their mansardes, to learn the secrets of the future. Their prophecies were principally of death. They foretold to women the approaching dissolution of husbands, and to needy heirs, the end of rich relatives, who had made them, as Byron expresses it, "wait too, too long already." They generally took care to be instrumental in fulfilling their own predictions.
These chambers are spacious, and though the ceilings are low, they receive a more uninterrupted circulation of fresh air, than the less exalted regions. Over the mansardes, in the very roof, are nests of little rooms, or cock-lofts, resembling, I am told, the cells of a beehive. Journeymen shopkeepers, domestics, and distressed females are said to be the principal occupiers of these aerial abodes.
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