ifted this dumb comrade of other victories to a horse.
With an earnest oath he brushed the incident away by assuring his
posse that unless the earth opened and swallowed up the robbers they
could not escape. A few hours after taking up the trail, a ranch was
sighted and the dog was left, the instructions of the Good Samaritan
being repeated. At this ranch they succeeded in buying two fresh
horses, which proved a valuable addition to their mounts.

Now it became a hunt of man by man. To an experienced trailer like
the marshal there was little difficulty in keeping the trail. That the
robbers kept to the outlying country was an advantage. Yet the latter
traveled both night and day, while pursuit must of necessity be by day
only. With the fresh horses secured, they covered a stretch of country
hardly credible.

During the day they found a place where the robbers had camped for at
least a full day. A trail made by two horses had left this camp, and
returned. The marshal had followed it to a rather pretentious Mexican
rancho, where there was a small store kept. Here a second description
of the two men was secured, though neither one was Peg-Leg. He was so
indelibly marked that he was crafty enough to keep out of sight of so
public a place as a store. These two had tried unsuccessfully to buy
horses at this rancho.

The next morning the representative of the express company left
the posse to report progress. He was enabled to give such an exact
description of the robbers that the company, through their detective
system, were not long in locating the leader. The marshal and posse
pushed on with the same unremitting energy. The trail was now almost
due east. The population of the country was principally Mexican,
and even Mexicans the robbers avoided as much as possible. They had,
however, bought horses at several ranches, and were always liberal
in the use of money, but very exacting in regard to the quality of
horseflesh they purchased; the best was none too good for them. They
passed north of old Santa Fe town, and entering a station on the line
of railway by that name late at night, they were liberal patrons of
the gaming tables that the town tolerated. The next morning they had
disappeared.

At no time did the pursuers come within two days of them. This was
owing to the fact that they traveled by night as well as day. At the
last-mentioned point messages were exchanged with the express company
with little loss of time.