Palls were, from a very early period, regarded as essential parts of the funeral paraphernalia. In 1598, the Kirk Session of Glasgow ordered a black cloth to be bought "to be laid on the corpses of the poor," and, for at least two hundred years afterwards, it was the custom for the "mort-cloth" to be taken to the house where a corpse awaited burial, and laid over it. The reason for this may be found in the early custom of burial without a coffin, and in the case of those who desired to show some regard for appearances, in the proclamation of Council in 1684, that coffins should not be covered with silk or decorated with fringes or metal-work. The mort-cloths kept "to be laid on the corpses of the poor" were probably of coarse black woollen cloth; but those used at the funerals of well-to-do people were, as a rule, of richer and more handsome material. In the sessional records of the parish of Mauchline for 1672 there is an entry of the payment of a sum of no less than L10, 12s. 4d. as completing the price of a new mort-cloth, which implies that some portion of the total cost had been paid previously. Another new mort-cloth provided for the same parish in the last quarter of the eighteenth century is described as having been made of Genoa velvet, conformably fringed. The preaching of funeral sermons received little favour in Scotland during the early period of the Reformed Church. "We have," says Baillie, writing from London during the sitting of the Westminster Assembly, "with much difficulty, passed a proposition for abolishing their ceremonies at burials, but our difference about funeral sermons seems irreconcilable. As it has been here and everywhere preached, it is nothing but an abuse of preaching, to serve the humours only of rich people for a reward. Our Church has expressly discharged them, on many good reasons; it's here a good part of the minister's livelihood, therefore they will not quit it. After three days' debate, we cannot yet find a way of agreeance." It was in consequence of this inability to agree on the subject that the Scottish commissioners at Westminster declined to hear the sermon preached on the occasion of the funeral of Pym. Baillie wrote:--"On Wednesday, Mr Pym was carried from his house to Westminster on the shoulders, as the fashion is, of the chief men of the Lower House, all the House going in procession before him, and before them the Assembly of Divines. Marshall had a most eloquent and pertinent funeral sermon--which we would not hear, for funeral sermons we must have away, with the rest."