It was, so to say, a legitimate explosion of the delight and the hopes of a young nation anxious to show its power.

The question was to make Rome a modern capital worthy of a great kingdom, and before aught else there were sanitary requirements to be dealt with: the city needed to be cleansed of all the filth which disgraced it.

One cannot nowadays imagine in what abominable putrescence the city of the popes, the _Roma sporca_ which artists regret, was then steeped: the vast majority of the houses lacked even the most primitive arrangements, the public thoroughfares were used for all purposes, noble ruins served as store-places for sewage, the princely palaces were surrounded by filth, and the streets were perfect manure beds which fostered frequent epidemics.

Thus vast municipal works were absolutely necessary, the question was one of health and life itself.

And in much the same way it was only right to think of building houses for the newcomers, who would assuredly flock into the city.