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Soon after death came to Pius XI last week, the great eleven-ton Campanone, largest of St. Peter's bells, was set to its deep, sad tolling. This week, as a triple coffin was lowered to the crypt of St. Peter's, not only the Campanone and the bells of Rome's mourning churches but a tolling from hundreds of cathedrals, from thousands of parish churches the world over, sounded the grief of the widowed Church and millions of her children over the loss of the kindly little man whom, they devoutly and humbly believed, the workings of the Holy Spirit had given them 17 years before.
*Precedent was broken even at the Pope's death, perhaps by his order. Cardinal Pacelli omitted the age-old ceremonial of tapping the Pontiff's forehead with a silver mallet, while calling him by name, to make sure he was dead. †Meaning: badly dressed.