"The Norman horse," says Milman, "poured into the streets, but the Romans fought at advantage, from their possession of the houses and their knowledge of the ground. They were gaining the superiority: the Normans saw their peril. The remorseless Guiscard gave the word to fire the houses. From every quarter the flames burst forth furiously: houses, palaces, convents, churches, as the night darkened, were seen in awful conflagration. The distracted inhabitants dashed wildly into the streets, no longer endeavoring to defend themselves, but to save their families. They were hewn down by hundreds. The Saracen allies of the pope, who had been the foremost in the pillage, were now the foremost in the conflagration and the massacre."
Gregory, it is said, exerted himself at this terrible moment, yet not, alas! to save his so-called flock from the cruelty of the Normans, but to save some of the principal churches from the general conflagration. Guiscard was at length master of the city, or rather of the ruins of Ancient Rome, but his vengeance was not yet appeased. Thousands of Romans were publicly sold as slaves, and thousands carried off as prisoners. It is supposed that neither Goth nor Vandal, neither Greek nor German, ever brought such desolation on the city as this capture by the Normans. And be it carefully noted by the reader, as showing the real spirit of popery, that the ferocious Guiscard was bribed by Gregory to become his ally, his deliverer, his protector, and his avenger. The miseries, massacres, and ruin of Rome were justly attributed to the obstinacy of the pope at that time, and have been ever since by all impartial writers. And no one was ever more fully persuaded of this fact than Gregory himself. He never trusted either his person or his fortunes even within the ramparts of St. Angelo after the departure of his Norman allies.