“Fatty halts his Eyetalians, sets them to ma-a-arkin' toime, an' comes sprintin' an' puffin' on ahead.
“'Do a sneak!' he cries, when he comes near enough to pass th' wor-r-rd. 'Mother above! don't yez know phwat these wops av mine is cilibratin'? It's chasin' th' pope out av Rome. Duck, I tell yez, duck!”
“Sure; Hughiy an' th' rist av th' gang took it on th' run. Fatty could ma-a-arch all right, because there's nobody but blackhanders in his dish-trict. But wit' Hughey an' th' others it's different. They might have got his grace, th' archbishop, afther thim.”
“Goin' back to Teddy,” observed old Jimmy, as he called for beer, “them rich lobsters is always stirrin' him up. An' they always gets th' worst of it. They've never brought home th' bacon yet. Tie's put one over on 'em every time.
“Yez can gamble that Tiddy's th' la-a-ad that can fight!” cried the Wop in tones of glee; “he's th' baby that's always lookin' f'r an argument!” Then in a burst, both rapturous and irrelevant: “tie's th' idol av th' criminal illimint!”
“I don't think that's ag'inst him,” interjected the Nailer, defensively.
“Nor me neither,” said old Jimmy. “When it comes down to tacks, who's quicker wit' th' applaudin' mitt at sight of an honest man than th' crim'nal element?—only so he ain't bumpin' into their graft. Who is it hisses th' villyun in th' play till you can hear him in Hoboken? Ain't it some dub just off the Island? Once a Blind Tom show is at Minor's, an' a souse in th' gallery is so carried away be grief at th' death of Little Eva, he falls down two flights of stairs. I gets a flash at him as they tosses him into th' ambulance, an' I hopes to join th' church if it ain't a murderer I asks Judge Battery Dan to put away on Blackwell's for beatin' up his own little girl till she can't get into her frock. Wall Streeters an' college professors, when it comes to endorsin' an honest man, can't take no medals off th' crim'nal element.”
“Phwy has Morgan an' th' rist av thim Wall Street geeks got it in f'r Tiddy?” queried the Wop. “Phwat's he done to 'em?”
“Nothin'; only they claims it ain't larceny if you steal more'n a hundred thousand dollars, an' Teddy won't stand for a limit.”
“If that's phwat they're in a clinch about, then I'm for Tiddy,” declared the Wop. “Ain't it him, too, that says th' only difference bechune a rich man an' a poor man is at th' bank? More power to him!—why not? Would this beer be annythin' but beer, if it came through a spigot av go-o-old, from a keg av silver, an' th' bar-boy had used a dia-mond-shtudded bung-starter in tappin' it?”