Mike Abrams, _alias_ Big Mike, was a pillar of Chinatown, and added distinctly to the life of that quarter. He was nearly six feet tall, with shoulders as square as the foretopsail yard of a brig. His nervous arms were long and slingy, his bony hands the size of hams. Neither the Dropper nor yet Big Myerson could swap blows with him, and his hug--if it came to rough-and-tumble--was comparable only to the hug of Mersher the Strong Arm, who had out-hugged a bear for the drinks. While he lived, Little Maxie greatly appreciated Big Mike. Little Maxie is dead now. He ranked in the eyes of Mulberry Street as the best tool that ever nailed a leather. To be allowed to join out with his mob was conclusive of one's cleverness as a gon. For Maxie would have no bunglers, no learners about him. And, yet, as he himself said, Big Mike's value Jay not in any deftness of fingers, but in his stout, unflinching heart, and a knock-down strength of fist like unto the blow of a maul. “As a stall he's worse'n a dead one,” Maxie had said. “No one ever put up a worse back. But let a sucker raise a roar, or some galoot of a country sheriff start something--that's where Mike comes on. You know last summer, when I'm followin' Ringling's show? Stagger, Beansey an' Mike's wit' me as bunchers. Over at Patterson we had a rumble. I got a rube's ticker, a red one. He made me; an' wit' that youse could hear th' yell he lets out of him in Newark. A dozen of them special bulls which Ringling has on his staff makes a grab at us. Youse should have lamped Mike! Th' way he laid out them circus dicks was like a tune of music. It's done in a flash, an' every last guy of us makes his get-away. Hock your socks, it's Mike for me every time! I'd sooner he filled in wit' a mob of mine than th' best dip that ever pinched a poke.” Big Mike had been a fixed star in the Gangland firmament for years. He knew he could slug, he knew he could stay; and he made the most of these virtues. When not working with Little Maxie, he took short trips into the country with an occasional select band of yeggs, out to crack a P. O. or a jug. At such times, Mike was the out-side man--ever a post of responsibility. The out-side man watches while the others blow the box. In case things take to looking queer or leary, he is to pass the whistle of warning to his pals. Should an officer show unexpectedly up, he must stand him off at the muzzle of his gatt, and if crowded, shoot and shoot to kill. He is to stand fast by his partners, busy with wedges, fuse and soup inside, and under no circumstances to desert them. Mike was that one of ten thousand, who had the nerve and could be relied upon to do and be these several iron things. Wherefore, he lived not without honor in the land, and never was there a fleet of yeggs or a mob of gons, but received him into its midst with joy and open hearts.