At the Trevi Fountain in Rome, people throw coins to ensure a return to the City.

In Malta, they throw bottles and cans into the Tritons Fountain in Valletta.

Works Department employees last night drained the fountain at City Gate and removed sacks full of bottles, cans and other rubbish - a department official calculated that a ton of material was removed.

The fountain is cleaned every morning, when floating items are removed, but many sink to the bottom and can only be removed when the fountain is drained, which happens at intervals of three to four months.

The clean-up was carried out at night to cause the least inconvenience.The fountain will be refilled today - it takes 270,000 litres of water which will be supplied by eight large bowsers.