POPE LAID TO REST

Pahiatua Herald, Volume XLVIII, Issue 14069, 16 February 1939, Page 5

POPE LAID TO REST

SOMBRE RITUAL AT ROME SILENCE ENVELOPES VAST BASILICA. United Press Assn. —By Electric Telegraph—Copyright. ROAIE, February 14. With sombre ritual the body of his Holiness Pope Pius was entombed in the crypt between the coffin of Pope Pius X. and the coffins of three Stuart princes, one of whom w r as Bonnie Prince Charlie. The great bell of St. Peter’s tolled while canons bearing flaming torches, a choir intoning the Miserere ? and violet-robed cardinals and bishops walked in procession along the Papal guarded nave with the body of the Pope, borne on a litter, to the altar beneath the Seat of St. Peter.

Here in a chapel lighted by 100 candles and two immense braziers, absolution was pronounced. The cardinals and bishops and the Pope’s relatives kissed the Pope’s feet.

The body was laid by Noble Guards in a coffin of cypress wood". The Ala jor DOlllO covered the body with a red silk veil. A prelate read in Latin a summary of the Pope s life from a parchment, and placed it in the coffin, which was closed and sealed and placed in a second lead coffin. This was sealed and placed in a coffin of polished elm. The coffin was then borne to its position in the vaults, where the choir again sang the Aliserere. Then all departed while the hymn of rejoicing and praise, “In Paradisum,” was sung. Only one prelate was left to pray. Thereafter silence fell on the vast Basilica. This silence will be unbroken until the entry of the new Pope.