Sagacious regulations and constant inspection have banished the dramatic and the surprising from the French as well as from the English lighthouse. Everything has been reduced to a system, and the keepers are under a discipline scarcely less rigid than that of soldiers. In France, indeed, veteran soldiers or tried seamen are generally selected to fill up any vacancies that may occur in the lighthouse administration. This is divided into two classes: the inspectors, who receive a thousand francs yearly (about £40), and are intrusted with the superintendence of several lighthouses; and the keepers, who are divided into six classes, and whose annual wages vary from 475 to 850 francs (say £18 to £34). Extra payment is awarded to those who serve in the sea lighthouses. Their number is never less than three in a lighthouse of the first class, or two in those of the second and third class lighthouses. * * * * * The “code,” so to speak, from which we borrow these details is nearly the same among all maritime nations. It indicates to the keepers their duties, and prescribes to them the nature of their daily work. As for their mode of life, it is much the same everywhere, only more or less agreeable according to the stations. In France the lighthouses served by a single keeper are intrusted to married men, who live in the establishment with their family. Not only does such an arrangement ameliorate their lot, but it also gives the assurance that in case of need they will immediately be replaced in attendance on the lamp—a task so easy that it can be discharged by a woman or even by a child. The habitation allotted to them consists of one or two apartments, with a chimney, an outhouse, and sometimes a cellar. A green and a small garden are invariably attached. In some lighthouses the keeper’s house is so placed with reference to the tower that the lamp is visible from one of the windows; but in most the house is annexed to the tower, in such a manner that if the keeper is compelled to rise and attend to the lamp, at least he is not exposed, immediately after leaving his couch, to the rigour, it may be, of a winter night. * * * * * In lenticular lights of the first, second, and third class, whose flame requires surveillance throughout the night, several keepers are needed, who take their watch in turn. Formerly the keepers and their families lodged together. But, unfortunately, those dissensions which seem inevitable when a colony is numerous, and not amenable to a strict discipline, were found to break out at very short intervals, and in an exceedingly disagreeable manner. The authorities, therefore, resolved only to admit their own servants into the interior of the lighthouses, leaving to them, if married, the care of securing suitable lodgings for their wives and children. To each keeper a room was allotted, and the kitchen was common to all.