VaticanEyewitness Daniel McLaughlin A Roman woman, apparently managing to sleep late on this extraordinary Friday morning, opened her shutters and called down to an acquaintance on Via Ottaviano.
In response, thousands of Poles glared up at her and hissed, as politely as they could, "Sssshhhh!"
The funeral of Pope John Paul II was about to begin, and in St Peter's Square, as in this nearby street, the red and white of his homeland dominated the day.
Between a blue sky and the heads of more than a million tired Polish pilgrims - who spent precious money and dozens of hours getting here in buses, cars and trains - banners streamed in the breeze and told of a nation's devotion to its favourite son.
Many flags carried the names of towns and villages from across Poland, including Bialystok close to Belarus and Rzeszow near Ukraine, held aloft by pilgrims who revered the pontiff as both the leader of their church and as the strongest keeper of the flame of Polish identity through the darkest days of communist rule and martial law.
He was, several Poles remarked, the embodiment of the Polish spirit's victory over communism, and the nation's re-emergence as a strong, free and still intensely Catholic European nation. That, they said, was why celebration triumphed over sadness yesterday.
"It took 20 hours to get here and the Austrians tried to turn us back at the border," said Pawel Jasynski (25), a medical student from the town of Sedziszow, who arrived with 18 friends of all ages in three cars and a bus.
"They thought we were coming here to look for work, and said not to go to Rome because the roads were closed. So we went to another border post and drove through."
Krzystof Cyzio (30), the organiser of the trip and bus-driver, had called his brother back from Belgium to make a journey that he started planning after the Pope's death last Saturday night.
"We stood 12 hours in a queue to see his body," said Krzystof. "He was the best man in Poland and in the world, and we had to say goodbye. It is important for us." The grief of last weekend was now replaced by gratitude, Pawel added.
"We are so proud that he is Polish and we have to wish him well on this last trip. Lots of special people have come here to do the same thing," he said, referring to the unprecedented gathering of national leaders and dignitaries on St Peter's Square.
The Sedziszow pilgrims, who included several elderly men and women, had slept in their vehicles at the Stadio Olimpico, where thousands of Polish cars were parked after the long journey south to a city besieged by more than four million mourners.
For Krzystof, a highlight of the trip was a chance meeting at the Coliseum with Viktor Yushchenko, Ukraine's new president. He congratulated him on an election hailed in Poland as a victory over malign Russian influence.
That win was also a triumph for Poland's president, Alexander Kwasniewski, who helped broker a final political deal, but he did not win applause from his massed countrymen when his face flashed across the big screen erected on Via Ottaviano.
That privilege was reserved for Lech Walesa, who was Poland's first post-communist president after leading the Solidarity union, a movement John Paul supported in its fight for democracy throughout the 1980s.
Walesa, whose political star fell quickly in the 1990s, was among the dignitaries at the funeral, and his former Solidarity comrades were in the crowd a few miles away.
"We have so much sorrow," said a former Polish deputy from Solidarity, Ewa Tomaszewska, who was among the mourners.
"For Poles, and for Solidarity, it's hard. He is no longer behind us to help and defend us as he did during the siege". She was referring to the siege the communist authorities imposed in a 1981 attempt to break the trade union, which has lost much political influence in recent years.
"At the same time, he is not suffering any more," she said.
"He has left us an enormous legacy, hundreds of thousands of pages of encyclicals, books and homilies. We must study them now, reflect on them to know how to live in the years to come."
Holding red-and-white Solidarity flags aloft on Via Ottaviano, two stalwart members of the union said they had come with two busloads of comrades on a 35-hour trip from Warsaw.
"John Paul II was our greatest supporter," said Grzegorz Orlowski (51), "a great ally in social defence".
His friend, Jan Karwowski (55), added: "We are sad but, also, he was such a great man, and here we are now together, one people, unified. There is a feeling of brotherhood here today."
Daybreak found many Poles huddled under blankets after a night in the open, but they rose as one to greet the coffin of the former archbishop of Krakow, Karol Wojtyla, for a final farewell.
Watching the funeral procession on the huge screens, they seemed stunned with pride at the sight of so many of their countrymen in St Peter's Square, and many cried at the display of national devotion.
While the Italians applauded the progress of the Pope's coffin towards the altar, most Poles fell silent, clasping their hands before them, reverential and contemplative.
They turned down the Polish stations on their portable radios, and such was the hush over the packed street that their flags could be heard fluttering in the chilly breeze.
Later in the day, when the Pope's coffin was already in the Vatican crypt, that breeze would bring cold rain to a city that had seen only sunshine over the past days.
Three hours on, some cried and hugged friends and family as they bade farewell to John Paul.
Many had hoped he would come home for ever in death, and the pontiff's final testament showed that he had considered burial in Poland.
Several Polish mourners said the scale and formality of yesterday's ceremony made them feel oddly distant from a man to whom they always felt so close.
Others described a feeling of bewilderment, of being almost fearful of imagining their country adrift in the world without the guidance of Karol Wojtyla.
Others acknowledged that an era was over - a time of struggle and ultimate victory with leaders such as Walesa and, above all, the Pope - but that the future had to be faced with the strength, determination and faith that John Paul showed to the end of his days.
"We Catholics know that he is before God and praying for us now," said Waldek Matuszak (29), a computer engineer from the town of Kalisz.
"He is closer than ever to us now. He is our protector."
Waldek travelled for 30 hours to Rome on a bus with 58 other people, including five priests and his friend, Jarek Perskawiec (23), who said he hoped to have time to look around the Italian capital before heading home.
But as a million or more of his countrymen drifted back to their vehicles, or gathered to talk and sing in the rain that began falling on St Peter's Square, he knew he had been part of a unique pilgrimage, one his nation would never forget.
"We are united here, in solidarity and love," Jarek said. "Today, Rome is a Polish city."