His position as treasurer had given him an insight into the abuses prevailing in the financial department of the Papal Government, and a reduction or suppression of a number of dishonestly obtained pensions took place. He published various laws for the protection of farmers and corn-dealers, and offered substantial pecuniary rewards to industrious and intelligent peasant farmers. A Congregation of Cardinals was called together to pass regulations to put a stop to the grave disorders occasioned by idleness, mendicity, and too low wages; the system of weights and measures was thoroughly investigated, and one contractor in particular, who had received 900,000 crowns from the Apostolic See during the famine of 1771–72 to buy grain for the assistance of ruined farmers, was forced to restore 280,000 crowns of this money to the Treasury. Pius VI. ordered the drainage of the Pontine Marshes, and employed for this purpose the celebrated engineer, Louis Benck; and although the work was not finished, owing to the Revolution, 12,000 acres were reclaimed. He also cleared the Appian Way, then impassable owing to the vast multitude of stone heaps from ruined buildings by which it was encumbered. Pius VI. embellished, completed, arranged, and classified the “Museo Clementino.” Combined with these reforms he gave great attention to charitable institutions, initiated those schools of the Christian Brothers which are now spread all over the world, and erected many orphanages and refuges for poor children of both sexes.