Page:Notes of the Mexican war 1846-47-48.djvu/549

Rh will be watched with great interest on both sides; and we hope there will be nothing like an explosion. If so, if the Puros, the anti-peace and annexation party, are determined upon mischief, they should be made to feel and understand that eighteen or twenty, who style themselves as legislators, have not the power to set aside the popular will of the people, and render all legislation a perfect nullity. As I said before, these men will be marked, and branded cowards.

I learn to-day that the guerillas, who fired upon the diligence from Puebla on Saturday last week at Cordova, were captured at Chalco by a detachment of Col. William Irvine, Fifth Ohio Volunteers, camped at Rio Frio. They were seven in number, and are now in safe custody. Upon one of them being brought out to receive a few shots, his own brother came forward and confessed the whole matter. The soldier who accompanied the diligence as a guard was shot dead, as stated, and his musket was found at Chalco. We hope these murderers and plunderers will receive the punishment which is due them; they have, without a doubt, been at the bottom of most of the recent robberies between this and Puebla City.

The diligence from Puebla came in last evening without being attacked; the driver and guard did not even see a ladrone. The robbers who have so long infested that road are now in close confinement at Rio Frio; also, the four Mexicans recently taken to Rio Frio, on a charge of murdering and mutilating two American soldiers, have been tried, and three of them found guilty, to be hung. Unless the Commander-in-Chief, Gen. William O. Butler, should interpose, they must suffer death. A priest and thirteen others have been arrested in the neighborhood of Guadaloupa on a charge of prompting desertions from our army. Yesterday they were brought before Major Gait, and, after undergoing an examination, the cases were referred to a council of war. They are now all in confinement at the palace. The priest gave his name as Pasqual Pastrato, but his real name is Antonio Triate.

Later news from Queretaro confirms the statement that a