All happened as planned. Although some surprise was expressed at the sight of a general officer in full uniform, driving in a gig, no questions could be addressed to a person of his rank. The guards turned out and saluted, and the barrier of Clichy was reached without accident; then the first post-house at La Chapelle, where the horse was changed. Here a party of gensdarmes seemed disposed to be inquisitive, but Captain Hely-Hutchinson dismounted and gossiped with them on the coming arrival of troops. More gensdarmes were encountered along the road, but none accosted them, and La Valette hugged his pistol close and would have resisted recapture. There was a long halt at Compiègne awaiting the general’s large carriage, which Captain Ellister was bringing after them from Paris. It was during this half that Sir Robert Wilson, having caught sight of some straggling gray hairs beneath La Valette’s wig, produced a pair of scissors and deftly acted as barber in removing them. Taking the road in the new carriage they sped along rapidly through the night, and reached Valenciennes, the last French town, at 7 o’clock in the morning. Here the captain of gendarmerie on duty summoned them to his presence to exhibit their passports, but Sir Robert Wilson refused haughtily. “Let him come to me. It is not the custom for a general officer to wait on captains. There are the passports; he can do as he pleases.” It was bitterly cold, the officer was abed and did not care to turn out, but gave the passports his _visé_ without more ado. A last obstacle offered in the person of an officious custom-house officer, but he was quickly satisfied, and the frontier was passed in safety. Some close chances had been surmounted on the way. They ran the risk of detection at the various post-houses, where the carriage was examined closely and the passengers interrogated. Once the identity of La Valette was questioned; he was travelling under the assumed name of Colonel Losack, and no such name could be found in the British army list, but Sir Robert Wilson carried it off with a high hand. A nearer danger was that La Valette had very marked features, and he was well known to many officials, having been Napoleon’s Postmaster General, while the hand-bills notifying the escape and describing him in detail had been very widely distributed. At one town, Cambray, a dangerous delay occurred through the obstinacy of the English sentry at the gate, who refused to call up the guardian to pass them through during the night. He had received no orders to that effect and was deaf to all entreaties, although they came from a general officer.