No sweet voices sang melodious anthems or exulting hymns.

The monks, in hoarse tones and monotonous harmonics, chanted the penitential psalms.

Here and there knelt a figure clothed in mourning robes, and absorbed in secret prayer; but over the majority of the assembly either blank despondency or sullen inattention universally prevailed.
As the last dull notes of the last psalm died away among the lofty recesses of the church, a procession of pious Christians appeared at the door and advanced slowly to the altar.

It was composed both of men and women barefooted, clothed in black garments, and with ashes scattered over their dishevelled hair.

Tears flowed from their eyes, and they beat their breasts as they bowed their foreheads on the marble pavement of the altar steps.
This humble public expression of penitence under the calamity that had now fallen on the city was, however, confined only to its few really religious inhabitants, and commanded neither sympathy nor attention from the heartless and obstinate population of Rome.