"Although but one grade of keeper is recognized by law, usage has divided keepers into a number of grades, with different pay as well as different duties, and with promotion running through the various grades. At one light-house there may be but one keeper; at another, a principal keeper and an assistant; and there is a station where there is a principal keeper with four assistants, the fourth having the lowest grade and the lowest pay, and the others having been appointed at that grade, and promoted as merit was shown and vacancies occurred; or they may have been transferred and promoted from another station. "Although persons are appointed to the service and assigned to a given station, they are frequently transferred from one station to another, as the interest of the service may demand, and while it is usual to consult a keeper's wishes in his assignments, there is nothing in the regulations to prevent the transfer of a man appointed in Maine to a station in Georgia; and occasionally keepers are, with their own consent, transferred from one district to another at a great distance. Young men who have seen some sea service are preferred as assistants at the larger stations; and at stations requiring but one keeper, retired sea captains or mates who have families are frequently selected. "Keepers are forbidden to engage in any business which can interfere with their presence at their stations, or with the proper and timely performance of their light-house duties; but it is no unusual thing to find a keeper working at his station as a shoemaker, tailor, or in some similar capacity, and there are light keepers who fill a neighboring pulpit, who hold commissions as justice of the peace, and there are still others who do duty as school teachers without neglecting their light-houses. "The Board has done much to make keepers comfortable. They are furnished with quarters for themselves, and in certain cases for their families, and when so far distant from market as to make its carriage equal or exceed its cost, with fuel and rations. Suitable boats are furnished stations inaccessible by land; and at those stations on shore, distant from markets, barns are built for their cattle and horses. Something also has been done for the intellectual needs of the keepers and their families by supplying them with libraries. These are arranged in cases so constructed that they make rather a neat appearance when set upright on a table, and they need only to be closed and locked to be ready for transportation. They contain on an average about fifty volumes each. One of these libraries is left at a station for some three months, when it is exchanged and passed on to another station. This is usually done when the inspector makes his quarterly inspection; so each of the stations to which libraries are furnished sees some two hundred different books each year."