If the person or family is of importance, occupying the first or
second floor, the porter sounds a bell once or twice, to give notice that a
visitor is at hand. The stranger in the meantime ascends the great
staircase, the highway common to all, and arrives at the outer door,
equivalent to a street door, of the suite of rooms inhabited by his
friends.
Beside this hangs a bell-cord, with which he rings for admittance.
When the family or person inquired for is of less importance, or lives in
some remote part of the mansion less easy to be apprised, no signal is
given. The applicant pronounces the name at the porter's door, and is told,
_"Montez au troisieme, au quatrieme; sonnez a la porte a droite ou a
gauche."_ ("Ascend to the third or fourth story; ring the bell on the
right or left hand door"); as the case may be.
The porter and his wife act as domestics to such of the inmates of the
mansion as do not keep servants; making their beds, arranging their rooms,
lighting their fires, and doing other menial offices, for which they
receive a monthly stipend.
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