Right arrived second with 147 seats. Depretis was confirmed Prime Minister by the king. During his long tenure Depretis recomposed his cabinet four times, first throwing out Giuseppe Zanardelli and Alfredo Baccarini in order to please the Right, and subsequently bestowing portfolios upon Cesare Ricotti-Magnani, Robilant and other Conservatives, so as to complete the political process known as Trasformismo. Depretis also completed the railway system and initiated colonial policy by the occupation of Massawa; but, at the same time, he increased indirect taxation, corrupted the parliamentary parties, and, by extravagance in public works, impaired the stability of Italian finance. He argued that a wider suffrage would give citizens a moral dignity and sense of responsibility. Despite an insistent gout, Depretis remained Prime Minister until his death. More and more often he gathered the government in the living room of his house, at Via Nazionale in Rome. Transferred to Stradella due to the aggravation of the disease, he died there on 29 July 1887, at 74 years old. After the funeral he was buried in the cemetery of his home town. He was replaced at the head of the Left and at the head of the government by Francesco Crispi. Political ideology and legacy Depretis was the founder and the main proponent of Trasformismo ("Transformism"), a method of making a flexible centrist coalition of government which isolated the extremes of the left and the right. The process was initiated in 1883, when he moved to the right and reshuffled his government to include Marco Minghetti's conservatives. This was a move Depretis had been considering for a while before 1883. The aim was to ensure a stable government that would avoid weakening the institutions by extreme shifts to the left or right. Depretis felt that a secure government could ensure calm in Italy. At this time middle class politicians were more concerned with making deals with each other and less about political philosophies and principles. Large coalitions were formed, with members being bribed to join them. The liberals, the main political group, was tied together by informal "gentleman's agreements", but these were always in matters of enriching themselves. Indeed, actual governing did not seem to be happening at all, but since only 2 million men had franchises, most of these wealthy landowners did not have to concern themselves with such things as improving the lives of the people they were supposedly representing