In whichever form it appears, however, the pall was secured in its place by pins. At first, when the vestments were of simple description, these pins could be run through pall and chasuble without doing much damage; afterwards, however, when enrichments were heaped upon the chasuble, these pins were not run into that vestment at all, but through loops provided for the purpose. It was discovered, however, that the pall in its latest development would stay in its place quite as well without pins as with them, and the loops were therefore abandoned. As the pins were generally made of gold, with heads of precious stones, some reluctance was felt at abandoning them altogether, and accordingly they sank into the position which the maniple and other vestments assumed—that of being ornaments. The length of the pendent tails shows considerable variety at different times. They are extremely long—often extravagantly so—in monuments dating between the eleventh and fourteenth centuries. After that date they were curtailed, and at present are not more than a foot long. There is a little button of lead sewn into the ends of the tails to make them hang properly. The pall never displayed that tendency to elaborate adornment which distinguished the other vestments of the mediaeval age. Doubtless the fact that all palls were made at Rome, and but few were made at a time, prevented any great change in fashion. Some differences are, notwithstanding, noticeable. In the earliest representations of tailed palls there is to be seen a single cross at the end of each tail; the same cross is to be seen worked on early _oraria_ and _mappulae_. But in mediaeval and modern times there is a difference. At present the pall has six crosses, one on each tail and four on the oval, worked in black. In the middle ages we find sometimes four, sometimes as many as eight, worked in purple.