Rensselaer Union, Volume 7, Number 30, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 April 1875 — Chopping Mince-Meat. [ARTICLE]

Chopping Mince-Meat.

With the passing away of this sighing and sobbing month, mince-meat receives its death-blow for the season. When the last flush of the March sun shoots athwart the horizon, the mince-meat bowl and chopping-knife will be hung away and the man of the house will gird up his loins anew and tackle afresh the questions of the day. We suppose there never was a chopping-knife which was not in immediate need of sharpening, nor a bowl large enough to keep the contents from slopping over, nor meat with so much gristle as this particular lot contains. Next to churning, chopping mince-meat is the greatest absorbent of the delicate tissues of the brain fiber. If you keep the bowl on your knees, the jar tampers with the varicose veins and the fatty pieces get mashed on your pants; if you lay the bowl on the table the woman from next door comes in to converse with your wife, which causes the latter to suggest that she might better cut the meat herself than to be driven deaf with such a racket. But the one particular phase of cutting mince meat whose evil roots pierce and blight the very foundation of domestic peace and unity is the getting it fine enough. Between the man’s judgment and the woman’s judgment is a broad and yawning chasm. He knows it is fine enough an hour before she arrives at the same conclusion. He is right, of course; but she is obstinate ; and he either merges his opinion into hers, or drops the bowl and goes forth upon the world a changed being. Fortunately for the majority of homes in our land, it is frequently found that some one Of the ingredients is forgotten when the meat is to be dut. We have known a man to be down street four whole hours looking for the best place to procure ten cents’ worth of cinnamon. —Danbury News.

The present rqge for spelling-schools revives an anecdote of Gen. Scott. He had drawn up the rough draft of an order in which the word “ wagon” occurred. The General inserted one “g” too many, and his clerk, on discovering it, timidly asked on what authority he spelled* “ wagon” with two “ g’s.” “On the authority of Lieut.-Gen. Scott, commanding the armies of the United States, sir!” thundered the pompous old General. The clerk, at least, thought the authority sufficient. —Boston Globe. A girl screamed in a lecture audience in Lafayette, Oregon., Then all the other girls screamed. General consternation ensued and a rush for the doors. People were bruisOd, clothes torn and the room at length was emptied. The first screamer had seen a rat —a real one.