Sismondi estimates that the riches of Constantinople before the siege reached twenty-four million pounds sterling. The Count of Flanders wrote to the Pope that the wealth of Constantinople exceeded that of all Europe put together; and Villehardouin declared that never in the history of the world had so great riches been collected in a single city. The property divided was valued at one million eight hundred thousand pounds; and if Gibbon is correct, the whole booty must have reached four million pounds sterling. In the division half was given to the Crusaders, and half to the Venetians; and the latter received fifty thousand silver marks additional, which was due them from the barons. The whole story of the terrible destruction of works of art--of bronzes sent to the melting-pot, of marbles and other beautiful statues and ornaments that were ruthlessly broken--is heart-rending, but is not strictly a part of the story of Venice, since the ignominy and sacrilege of these deeds belong to other nations as well. Nothing was sacred to the plunderers. Pears tells us-- "Every insult was offered to the religion of the conquered citizens. Churches and monasteries were the richest storehouses, and were therefore the first buildings to be rifled. Monks and priests were selected for insult. The priest's robes were placed by the Crusaders on their horses. The icons were ruthlessly torn down from the screens or were broken. The sacred buildings were ransacked for relics or their beautiful caskets. The chalices were stripped of their precious stones and converted into drinking-cups. The sacred plate was heaped with ordinary plunder. The altar-cloths and the screens of cloth-of-gold, richly embroidered and bejewelled, were torn down, and either divided among the troops or destroyed for the sake of the gold and silver which were woven into them. The altars of Hagia Sophia, which had been the admiration of all men, were broken for the sake of the material of which they were made. Horses and mules were taken into the church in {64} order to carry off the loads of sacred vessels, and the gold and silver plates of the throne, the pulpits, and the doors, and the beautiful ornaments of the church. The soldiers made the chief church of Christendom the scene of their profanity. A prostitute was seated in the patriarchal chair, who danced, and sang a ribald song for the amusement of the soldiers.... The plunder of the same church in 1453 by Mahomet the Second compares favorably with that made by the Crusaders of 1204." Hazlitt adds to his account of the pillage:--