WEDNESDAY, DEC. 22. We are now carrying the war into the enemy’s camp; the Pacific squadron, under the broad pennant of Com. Shubrick, is in front of Mazatlan. That important position was captured on the twelfth ult., and is now garrisoned by three hundred and fifty seamen and marines. Capt. Lavelette, well qualified by his intelligence, urbanity, and moral firmness for the post, is governor of the town. The country around, and all the great avenues leading through it, are in the hands of the enemy, who can, at any moment, bring two thousand horsemen into the field. They only want a leader of sufficient resolution, and they might force our garrison upon the last resource of their courage and strength. But Gen. Telles is weak and vacillating, and has not the confidence even of the troops which he commands; while many of the citizens, who have property at issue, prefer the protection extended to them under the flag, to the anarchy and confusion into which they might be thrown by the success of their own arms. It was a bold and decisive movement on the part of our commodore, and executed with a vigor that has impressed itself on the apprehensions of Mexico. Our flag now waves from ocean to ocean, through the plains and mountain fastnesses of that dismayed country. FRIDAY, JAN. 7. The captain of a merchant ship complained to me this morning, that one of his crew had taken a package of rich Canton shawls on shore, and clandestinely disposed of them. I had the sailor before me, and wormed out of him the name of every person, as he alleged, with whom he had communicated; but he omitted the name of one suspicious character. I took the constable, and went immediately to her house, and demanded the shawls: she seemed shocked, and denied all knowledge of them. Her manner half staggered me; but I told the constable to take her to prison, not intending, however, to put her in without some evidence of her guilt; but she had not gone many steps from her door before her resolution, which had been as firm as adamant, broke down, and she told where the shawls might be found. They were secreted in the mattress of her bed; and the whole fifteen were recovered. Had the sailor mentioned her name among the rest, I should have been extremely puzzled. A seeming frankness is often the deepest disguise. SATURDAY, JAN. 8. An assistant alcalde, residing at San Juan, in reporting a case that came before him, states that one of the witnesses, not having a good reputation for veracity, he thought it best to swear him pretty strongly; so he swore him on the Bible, on the cross, by the holy angels, by the blessed Virgin, and on the _twelve_ Evangelists. I have written him for some information about eight of his evangelists, as I have no recollection of having met with but four in my biblical readings.