This was too much for Mickey, who said: "Why don't you talk United States and not be springing whole leaves out of a dictionary?" Just then Big Jim came up. He had heard what I said and he joined in: "You know why I got the tenth of a century? I had thousands in my pocket and went to buy some silk underwear at a haberdasher's in New York. But it seemed to me a waste of good coin to buy them, so I stole a dozen pair of silk stockings. They tried to arrest me, I shot, and got ten years. I always did despise a petty thief, but I never felt like kicking him till then. Ten years for a few stockings! Can you blame the judge? I didn't. Even a judge admires a good thief. If I had robbed a bank I'd never have got such a long bit. The old saying is true: Kill one man and you will be hanged. Kill sixteen, and the United States Government is likely to pension you." The tenement-house philosopher began to object again, when the guard, as usual, came along to stop our pleasant conversation. He thought we were abusing our privileges. It was during this bit that I met the man with the white teeth, as he is now known among his friends. I will call him Patsy, and tell his story, for it is an unusual one. He was a good deal older man than I and was one of the old-school burglars, and a good one. They were a systematic lot, and would shoot before they stood the collar; but they were gentlemanly grafters and never abused anybody. The first thing Patsy's mob did after entering a house was to round up all the inmates and put them into one room. There one burglar would stick them up with a revolver, while the others went through the house. On a fatal occasion Patsy took the daughter of the house, a young girl of eighteen or nineteen, in his arms and carried her down stairs into the room where the rest of the family had been put by the other grafters. As he carried the girl down stairs, she said: "Mr. Burglar, don't harm me." Patsy was masked, all but his mouth, and when he said: "You are as safe as if you were in your father's arms," she saw his teeth, which were remarkably fine and white. Patsy afterwards said that the girl was not a bit alarmed, and was such a perfect coquette that she noticed his good points. The next morning she told the police that one of the bad men had a beautiful set of teeth. The flymen rounded up half a dozen grafters on suspicion, among them Patsy; and no sooner did he open his mouth, than he was recognized, and settled for a long bit. Poor Patsy has served altogether about nineteen years, but now he has squared it, and is a waiter in a Bowery saloon, more content with his twelve dollars a week than he used to be with his thousands. I often go around and have a glass with him. He is now a quiet, sober fellow, and his teeth are as fine as ever.