The next step was, to teach the cretin some knowledge of objects around him, animate and inanimate, and of his relations to them.  The exercise of the senses followed, and gayly colored pictures were presented to the eye, charming music to the ear, fragrant odors to the smell, and the varieties of sweet, bitter, sour, and pungent substances to the taste.

When the perceptive faculties were thus trained, books were made to take the place of object lessons; reading and writing were taught by long and patient endeavor; the elements of arithmetic, of Scripture history, and of geography were communicated; and mechanical instruction was imparted at the same time.

Under this general routine of instruction, Dr. Guggenbuehl has conducted his establishment for seventeen years, often with limited means, and at times struggling with debt, from which, more than once, kind English friends, who have visited the Hospital, or become interested in the man, during his occasional hasty visits to Great Britain, have relieved him.  His personal appearance is thus described by a friend who was on terms of intimacy with him; the place is at one of Lord Rosse’s conversazioni.  “Imagine in the crowd which swept through his Lordship’s suite of rooms a small, foreign-looking man, with features of a Grecian cast, and long, shoulder-covering, black hair; look at that man’s face; there is a gentleness, an amiability combined with intelligence, which wins you to him.  His dress is peculiar in that crowd of white cravats and acres of cambric shirt-fronts; black, well-worn black, is his suit; but his waistcoat is of black satin,—­double-breasted, and buttoned closely up to the throat.  It is Dr. Guggenbuehl, the mildest, the gentlest of men, but one of those calm, reflecting minds that push on after a worthy object, undismayed by difficulties, undeterred by ridicule or rebuff.”

In his labors in behalf of the unfortunate class to whom he has devoted himself, Dr. Guggenbuehl has been assisted very greatly by the Protestant Sisters of Charity, who, like the Catholic sisterhood, dedicate their lives to offices of charity and love to the sick, the unfortunate, and the erring.

Dr. Guggenbuehl claims to have effected a perfect cure in about one third of the cases which have been under his charge, by a treatment of from three to six years’ duration.  The attainment of so large a measure of success has been questioned by some who have visited the Hospital on the Abendberg; and while a part of these critics were undoubtedly actuated by a jealous and fault-finding disposition, it is not impossible that the enthusiasm of the philanthropist may have led him to regard the acquirements of his pupils as beyond what they really were.