While the Liberals were imitating the Tirards and the deputies of the extreme Left, to whom Dufaure referred in his despatches, Espivent in every point copied General Thiers. He had rifled all the administrative departments of Marseilles. The treasury office of the garrison had been shuffled off to Aubagne. Fifteen hundred Garibaldians of the army of the Vosges and soldiers who were rejoining their depots in Africa were left without bread, without pay, without _feuilles-de-routes_, and would have remained without refuge if Gaston Cremieux and Bouchet had not caused a provisional quartermaster to be named by the council. Thanks to the Commission, those who had shed their blood for France received bread and shelter. Gaston Cremieux said to them in an address, "You will remember when the time comes, the fraternal hand that we have held out to you." He was a gentle enthusiast, who beheld the revolution under rather a bucolic aspect. On the 26th the isolation of the Commission became more obvious. No one armed against it, but no one joined it. Almost all the mayors of the department refused to placard its proclamations, and at Arles a manifestation in favor of the red flag miscarried. The fiery spirits at the prefecture did nothing to explain the import of the flag which they had unfurled, and, in the midst of this dull calm, in view of Marseilles looking on curiously, it hung from the campanile of the prefecture motionless and mute as an enigma. * * * * * The capital of the south-west also saw its insurrection die out. Toulouse had vibrated at the thunder-burst of the 18th March. In the Faubourg St. Cyprien there was an intelligent and valiant workingmen's population that formed the very sinews of the National Guard, and had since the 19th relieved the watch to the cries of "Vive Paris!" A few revolutionists summoned the prefect, Duportal, to pronounce for or against Paris. For a month the _Emancipation_, which he directed, had made a campaign against the rurals, and he had even in a public meeting emphasized his Republican views. But he was not the man to take the initiative, and refused to break with Versailles. The clubs, however, beset him, obliging the officers of the National Guard to take an oath to defend the Republic, and asked for cartridges. M. Thiers, seeing that Duportal would after all follow their lead, named as prefect De Keratry, the former prefect of police of the 4th September. He arrived on the night of the 21st-22nd at the house of the general of the division, Nansouty, and being told that the garrison consisted of only 600 disbanded men, and that the whole National Guard would declare for Duportal, he beat his retreat on Agen.