On October 13th, 1836, the “Deaconess Hospital, Kaiserswerth,” was opened, practically without patients and without deaconesses. For his hospital the pastor had secured a part of the deserted factory, the stopping of which had plunged his people into destitution in the first year of his pastorate--a singular example of the realisation of poetic justice. He fitted the “wards” with mended furniture, cracked earthenware, and such utensils as he could beg. His stock of linen embraced only six sheets. But cleanliness cost nothing, and the hospital certainly had that. On the Sunday morning after the opening the first patient, a poor suffering servant girl, knocked at the door for admittance. Four other sick persons came during the month, and in the course of a year sixty patients had been received in the primitive hospital, and funds were coming in for the support of the work. Almost simultaneously with the patients came the nurses. First a solitary candidate presented herself for training as a deaconess and several probationers followed. In the course of a year seven nurses had entered the institution. There was nothing haphazard about their admission, for the pastor, when he instituted his order of Protestant deaconesses, made a simple code of rules. No deaconess was to be under twenty-five years of age, and although she was engaged for a term of five years, she was free to leave at any moment. The candidates were solemnly received into the community and consecrated to their work by the laying on of hands by the pastor, who invoked a final blessing in the words: “May God the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, three Persons in one God, bless you; may He stablish you in the Truth until death, and give you hereafter the Crown of Life. Amen.” The dress of the deaconesses is very quaint and simple, but not unbecoming. It consists of a plain blue cotton gown, a white apron, large white turned-down collar, and a white muslin cap surrounding the face in the old style and tied under the chin with a large bow. The young girl probationers look very sweet and attractive in the cap, which has a tendency to heighten the beauty of a fresh young face while it seems singularly appropriate to the elderly women who have passed from active service to the Home of Rest, later provided. Unlike their Roman Catholic sisters, the Kaiserswerth deaconesses were not fettered by a vow. Their vocation was to be the servants of Christ and the servants of the sick and poor. They could at any time return to their families if their services were needed, and were at liberty to marry, but not to remain in the hospital afterwards, as it was considered that the new ties would interfere with entire devotion to their work.