The first communion to which the converts were admitted was celebrated in September, 1854, in the large room on the lower floor of the Female Seminary. Eleven Nestorians partook with the missionaries, and three of them were women, who had graduated there. After the service, some of the men went up stairs and sat down without speaking. Miss Fiske, not knowing the cause of their silence, and fearing lest they might have been disappointed by the simplicity of our forms, did not venture to allude to the subject, till one of them asked, "Is it always, so when you commune, or was this an unusual occasion?" "Why, did you not enjoy it?" "Not enjoy it! Jesus Christ himself seemed almost visibly present; it was difficult to realize that it was not the Saviour in person who presided at the table. It must have been just such a scene when the ordinance was first instituted in Jerusalem; and I could not get rid of the inquiry, 'Shall one of us go out like Judas and betray him?'" It is a significant fact that those most accustomed to mediaeval forms, when regenerated by the Spirit, relish them the least; and the more spiritual they become, the more they crave the simple forms of the New Testament, because they draw the least attention to themselves, and fix it most completely on the Saviour. In January, 1855, as many as seventy of the converts, after careful examination, were allowed to partake; and once every four months the privilege was renewed, with an accession of from twelve to thirty communicants each time. These were occasions of unusual interest. Several days were devoted to religious meetings, and even in midwinter pious people made long journeys, and crossed bleak mountains on the snow, to attend them. One woman, Hoimar, of Salmas,[1] travelled sixty miles, through deep snow and piercing cold, to be present at this ordinance in January, 1858. [Footnote 1: See page 171.]