DEACON OF A TRADE 



DEAD NETTLE 



705 



In Protestant churches tlie position of deacons 

 . Aiming 1'reshvteriaiiM, the elders have the 

 spintiial oversight of" the con^re^at ions ; while 

 deacons (as in the Free Church of Scotland ) and 

 managers in others have the care of the financial 

 all'.iiis. Aiming Congregationalist*. the deacons 

 combine both spiritual and linancial duties. The 

 < 'lunch of England has retained in the main the older 

 form of onlination. The deacon has only the hands 

 of tin- l>islio|> laid upon him, and not those of any 

 attendant prirsts also; he cannot consecrate the ele- 

 ment- at holy communion or pronounce the absolu- 

 tion or lii'iii'iliction ; and he only preaches by special 

 iirnise from tin- bishop, and not directly by virtue 

 of his oilier. For this, as well as for holding any 

 limrlice or church-preferment, priest's orders are 



i .-ssary. The oilier is now regarded very much as 



simply one of probation Iwsfore admission to priest's 

 orders. But in ancient times it was not uncommon 

 for a man to remain a deacon for life. The cardinal 

 deacons at Koine sometimes remain such, especially 

 if much occupied with secular business. Thus 

 the late celebrated Cardinal Antonelli always re- 

 mained a deacon. Before a person can be appointed 

 deacon in the English Church, he must have 

 reached the age of twenty-three, and he usually 

 remains in this office one year at least. 



DEACONESSES (ancilhe, iinn/strir, riduce, virgines, 

 e/ii.-i>-uptf, presbyterte), female ministers or servants 

 of the church or Christian society in the time of the 

 apostles ( Rom. xvi. 1 ). At a later period, they co- 

 operated with the deacons, showed the women their 

 place in the church assemblies, assisted at the bap- 

 tism of persons of their own sex, instructed those 

 who were about to be baptised as to the answers 

 they should give to the baptismal questions, arranged 

 the agapce or love-feasts, and took care of the sick. 

 In the 3d century it seems to have leen also part 

 of their duty to visit all Christian women who 

 were suffering imprisonment, and to be hospitable 

 to such as had come from afar. In very early times 

 they were consecrated to their otiice by ordination 

 in the same manner as other ecclesiastical or 

 spiritual personages ; later, however, they were 

 inducted into their office by prayer without the 

 imposition of hands. Until the 4th century, the 

 deaconesses had to be either maidens or widows 

 who had been only once married, and sixty years of 

 age ; but after the Council of Chalcedon the age 

 was fixed at forty. Their assistants were called 

 sub-deaconesses. After the 6th century in the 

 Latin Church, and after the 12th century in the 

 Greek Church, the office of deaconess was discon- 

 tinued ; but the former has retained the name. In 

 convents, for example, the nuns who have the care 

 of the altar are called deanmr^rs. In the Reformed 

 Churches of the Continent there are deaconesses 

 who nurse the sick and tend the poor. The first 

 deaconesses' house at Kaiserwerth on the Rhine, 

 near D'dsseldorf, was founded by Pastor Fliedner 

 in 1836 ; and now scattered over the Protestant 

 world there are upwards of sixty similar institu- 

 tions, with fully 6000 sisters. The Church of Scot- 

 land adopted the office of deaconess in 1887-88. 

 The Diocesan Deaconess Institution, London, was 

 established in 1861; but Sisterhoods (q.v.) have 

 struck a much deeper root in the Anglican com 

 munion. See works by Dean Howson (1886) and 

 Cecilia Robinson ( 1899). 



Deacon of a Trade, the president, for the 

 time being, of certain incorporations in Scotland, 

 where, prior to the passing of the Burgh Reform 

 Act, 1834, the deacons of trades or crafts represented 

 the trades in the respective town -councils. That 

 act enacted that the deacons shall no longer be 

 recognised as official and constituent members of 

 tiie town-council, but preserved the power of the 

 crafts to elect deacons and other officers for the 



management of their affairs. The deacon -convener 

 of the trades in Edinburgh and Glasgow U Btill a 

 member of the town-council. See IH.AN UK <ii iu>. 

 Dead, in seafaring language, ia very frequently 

 employed OB part of a designation or phroHe having, 

 in general, a meaning somewhat opposite to that of 

 active, effective, or real. The chief of such phrase* 

 are the following : Dead-eye*, circular, flattudi 

 wooden blocks, without sheaves, and having eyes 

 f<ir lanyards, which form a purchase or tackle 

 whereby the shrouds or other fixed rigging are 

 extended or set-up taut ; Dead-flat, the name for 

 one of the midship- timbers ; Dead-lights, strong 

 wooden shutters used to close cabin-windows, on 

 the approach of a storm, to protect the glass ; Dead- 

 ropes, such as do not run in blocks ; Dead-wood 

 is the term applied to the solid blocks of timber 

 erected upon the keel throughout the sharp portions 

 of a ship^s hull at stem and stern, the chief object 

 being to give solidity and strength to the ends of 

 the ship ; Dead-reckoning, an estimation of a 

 ship's place without celestial observations, mode 

 chiefly by the log-book, and liable to error on 

 account of currents, lee-way, fluctuation of wind, 

 &c. To these may be added Dead-wind, a seaman's 

 designation for a wind blowing directly against a 

 ship s course. 



Other compounds are Dead-lock, a position of 

 matters when they have become so complicated 

 that they are at a complete standstill and progress 

 is impossible ; Dead-freight, the compensation paid 

 to the shipmaster by the merchant who freights a 

 whole ship for the space which he fails to occupy ; 

 Dead language, one no longer spoken ; and Dead- 

 letter, a letter undelivered and unclaimed at the 

 Post-office (q.v.). The Dead-points of an engine 

 are when the connecting-rod and the crank are in 

 one line (see CRANK). The impetus of the fly- 

 wheel is necessary to carry the engine over these 

 points, and if it is allowed to stand at either of 

 them, a start is impossible till the fly-wheel is 

 turned by hand sufficiently to permit of the piston 

 acting on the crank. 



Dead, BOOK OF THE, the great funerary work 

 of the ancient Egyptians, who themselves entitled 

 it Per-em-Hru, 'to go forth from (or by) day.' It 

 is 'a collection of prayers and exorcisms composed 

 at various periods for the benefit of the pilgrim- 

 soul in his journey through Amenti (the Egyptian 

 Hades) ; and it was in order to provide him with 

 a safe-conduct through the perils of that terrible 

 valley that copies of the work, or portions of it, 

 were buried with the mummy in his tomb.' Such 

 copies, hieroglyphic or hieratic according to the 

 age when they were executed, and made some to 

 order, others for sale, constitute fully one-half of 

 the thousands of extant papyri They are mostly 

 corrupt and faulty ; but as the fruit of ten years' 

 toil, a pure text at lost has been published by 

 Edouard Naville in Das Aegyptisrhe Todtenbuch 

 der XVIII. bis XX. Dynaxtn- ( Berlin, 1886), whose 

 folio supplement contains 212 plates of texts, 

 vignettes, and variants of vignettes. Dr Birch's 

 English translation (Kin/pf* J'lm-c in I'nircrsal 

 History, vol. v. 1867) is based on Lepsius' imperfect 

 Turin text ( 1842), as also is 1'irnct's French trans- 

 lation (1882). See the articles EGYPT, HIERO- 

 GLYPHICS, and AMKXTHKS: two works by E. A. 

 \Vallis Hii.l-r ( 1895 and 1897); and a masterly 

 article on M. Naville'swork by Mi-- A. 15. Edwards 

 in the A<-il'->n>i for 10th September 1887. 



Dead, PRAYER FOR THE. See PRAYER, PUR- 

 GATORY. 



Deadly Mghtshnde. See BELLADONNA. 



Dead-men's Fingers. See ALCYUXH-M. 



Dead Xettle (Lamium), a genus of Labiafce. 

 L. purpureum and L. album, together with (Gale- 



