The Rome City Authorities accepted the decision of the three judges of the fountain competition at face value and arranged a compromise between the first two winners by increasing the prize money from 40,000 to 45,000 lire, with 7/10 going to Zappala for his eight side groups and the rest to Della Bitta for his central arrangement of Neptune. At the same time, the two were required to prepare life-size clay models to be tried out in the fountain and to judge the reaction of the public.
This took place in 1876. Here is the description, which corresponds exactly to what we see today: "The main statue in the centre of the fountain depicts Neptune standing on a rock and fighting a sea monster; around him, near the edge of the pool are two Naiads. One seems to be smiling as she wraps her tail around a swan whose neck she is squeezing so that the water will gush from its mouth; the other looks disgusted as she grasps the end of another sea monster’s tail and, with her left hand, tries to protect herself against the water that sprays violently over her from her own mouth. In between, are two seahorses: one, meek and obedient, allows itself to be led by a happy child; the other, maddened and wild, is trying to overturn a little rider who cannot control it and is trying desperately to cling on to the mane of the unruly steed. These four groups are interspersed with as many others, each representing an imp: one toys playfully with a crab, one with a shell, a third struggles fearfully with a revolting sea monster; the last tries manfully to climb onto a fish that seems to be some kind of dolphin".
Opinions of the fountain design were evidently favorable since both Della Bitta and (especially) Zappala graduated from wood and clay to hammer and chisel and carved these statues which, in accordance with competition rules, had to be inspired by and create a balance with the groups composing the Fountain of the Moor. So, in June 1878, the adverse fate of this fountain – whose water had, in 1703, even been "bent and twisted furiously to the opposite side of the shell" – by an "earthquake of four shocks and the most terrible tremblings that went on for more than half a quarter of an hour [sic]" – was finally resolved by the erection of those magnificent "realistic" arrangements which, especially those by Zappala around the sides, remind one so much of cemeteries.
I wouldn’t like you to think that last comment is just my little joke. Although I had already written it as a conclusion to my history of this fountain, as I was taking a last look through the books and papers from which I had gleaned the information I noticed that the first Committee responsible for examining the models also had another task. It was officially described as "The Municipal Committee for the examination of designs and models for the statues submitted for the decoration of the fountain of the Calderari and for the statue of Christ on the Cross that is to be set up at the public entrance to the Cemetery at Campo Verano".
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