The foreigners who came to our country seeing the serene beauty of our sky and the fertility of our fields, reading the codes of our laws and hearing talk of progress, of civilisation and of religion might believe that the Italians of the Two Sicilies enjoy an enviable happiness. And yet, no state in Europe is in a worse condition than ours… the poeple die of hunger, and are in a worse state than beasts.
Luigi Settembrini 1847
