over the Blue Earth river and had escaped toward South Bend. The news spread like a prairie fire, and in an incredibly short time the streets were alive with armed men hastening down toward the point at which the fugitives had broken the line of outposts. Sheriff Dill, who, had retired but a few minutes to the well-deserved comfortable bed put at his disposal at the Clifton, was soon up and away with a posse of men. Other leaders were equally alert, but all mentally, and some physically, too, cursed the blundering guard, which had permitted itself to be caught napping. Enquiry soon ascertained the fact that SOME ONE HAD BLUNDERED. It appears that General Pope in arranging for the night guard had provided for a strong body of men being placed upon each of the bridges over the Blue Earth, this being considered the vulnerable point in the line, but a telegram coming to him stating that the railroad bridge would be specially guarded by the railroad officials, he removed his guard from that structure, and, as it proved, opened a direct way for the brigands’ escape. The railroad authorities had placed two men and a boy on the bridge to guard it, and about two o’clock they saw three men approaching in single file. The guard stood on one side and the men advanced and walked deliberately on to the trestle work and passed over, the heroic guard being too much frightened to even breathe. As soon as the fugitives had got fairly past, the boy rushed down to the covered bridge and alarmed the guard there, who at once sent a mounted messenger into the city to tell the miserable tale. Nothing during the whole hunt had such a humiliating effect upon the people as this fiasco, but they were doomed ere long to receive as great a disappointment. The night was one of almost Egyptian darkness, and men could do little good tramping through muddy lanes and through dripping woods without a trail to guide them. The resolve, therefore, was to await the break of day, when at the earliest hour of dawn a close hunt and hot pursuit would commence. Accordingly with the gloaming, Hoy, of Minneapolis, with a number of Mankato men and others, started out and they were soon shown A TRAIL