Coeval with the introduction of church bells has been the appropriation of one of them to the service of the dying; originally this bell was tolled when one was yielding up life in order that all who heard it might offer up prayer for the departing spirit, and after death another bell was rung, called the "soul bell." The "Passing Bell," as it is now most inappropriately called, is not rung until some hours after death, and corresponds more nearly to the original "soul bell." In some districts it is always rung exactly twenty-four hours after death, the tenor bell being used for an adult, and the treble for a child; the big bell is generally reserved for funerals. In rural districts after the "passing bell" has tolled, the sex of the deceased is indicated most generally by tolling twice for a woman and thrice for a man, to this is often added the age by giving one toll for each year. In the middle ages it was customary at the funeral of any great person to have his horse led, and armour borne, before his corpse, the horse being afterwards claimed as a mortuary due to the church at which the burial took place; the armour was either reserved for the next of kin of the deceased, or else was hung up in the church. No doubt much of the armour suspended over tombs is mere "undertaker's trappings," although often considered genuine and of antiquity. Over the tombs of bishops, the Episcopal mitre and pastoral staff was sometimes suspended, as in the case of those in Winchester Cathedral hanging over the tomb of Bishop Morley, who died in 1696; and of those in Bromsgrove Church, Worcestershire, suspended over the Monument of Dr. Hall, Bishop of Bristol, who died in 1710. The hearse, so often mentioned in wills and funeral directions, was not a carriage for the conveyance of the body like that in use at the present day, but was a four square framework of timber, from each corner of which rose a rafter slanting, and all four rafters met at the top; this was covered with black cloth, and at the funerals of persons of distinction was set up for a time in the choir, for the reception of the body during the service; it was surrounded with rails, and fringed and ornamented according to the rank of the deceased. Until the Reformation, hearses were garnished with numerous lights as well as with pencils and escocheons, but with the change of faith the lights were discontinued. These hearses were introduced about the fourteenth century, and they continued to be used until the civil wars of the seventeenth century.