The sessions were held in the permanent building erected in the centre of Chicago to accommodate the intellectual portion of the Exposition. Four thousand people assembled on Monday, September 11, 1893, to see a Roman Catholic cardinal mount the platform at 10 A.M., in company with the Shinto high-priest, an archbishop of the Greek Church, a Hindoo monk, a Confucian mandarin, and a long array of Buddhists and Taoists from the far East. All these dignitaries wore gorgeous robes of various colours. With them were a Parsee girl, a Theosophist, a Moslem magistrate from India, a Catholic archbishop from New Zealand, a Russian and an African prince, a negro bishop, several Episcopalian prelates, Rabbis, and Jewesses, missionaries returned from many lands, doctors of divinity of various Protestant sects, and the lady managers of the great Fair. A prominent Presbyterian pastor took the chair, and cordial declarations of the brotherhood of religions were made by Catholic archbishops, the Shinto high-priest, a Buddhist delegate, and the Confucian sent by the Emperor of China. Full hearing was given in subsequent sessions to advocates of the Jain religion, which is perhaps the oldest, as well as of the Parsee, Jewish, Moslem, Taoist, and Vedic faiths, besides a score of the leading Christian denominations. The Parliament lasted seventeen days; and the audiences were so large that most of the essays were repeated in overflow meetings. There were also some forty congresses held in smaller halls for speakers who could not find room on the great platforms. One of these meetings was held by Jewesses, of whom nineteen spoke. Some of them were also heard from the platform of the Parliament; as were many clergy women.