The Virginia enterprise. [volume] (Virginia, St. Louis County, Minn.) 1893-19??, 1896-07-24
Mr.. MEEK'S DINNER,

Il wonder, James, said Mrs. Meek,
beautifully, to her husband one morning,
If YOU could get your own dinner to-
night? You sec. I've had to let the
two. and: they want me desperately ut
the Woman's Aid and Relief bazaar, to
help them with their high tea from 4:30
to $50. If YOU thought you could man~
| age by yourself --'
I'm try to survive it," observed Mr..
| Meek, gOOd-naturedly. II don't fancy
| it will prove fatal"
I'll get Il roast and cook it this morn
ing. them" went OH Mrs. Meek, cheer
| fully. land YOU can have it cold for
| dinner"
Thank YOU replied Mr. Meek, "youn
do nothing Of the kind. fancy l
haven't gone camping pretty much every
| can manage hot dinner about as well
as most women
Mrs Meek had her doubts, and, unlike
most wives, expressed them.
Mr.. Meek viewed his wife's doubts
with supreme contempt and, unlike most
husbands, expressed it.
Thus it finally resulted that Mrs. Meek
abandoned all idea of preparing Mr..
Meek's dinner for him, and betook her
self to the bazaar. So it resulted, fur
thermore, that Mr.. Meek left his office
about o'clock that afternoon. and pro-
Ctcuet 10 cQIlect. OIL HIS way nome, Cnc
necessary supplies for dainty little din
| ner.
An allurins display of chickens was the
first thing to catch his eye, and he was
just on the point of securing one of them,
when, ty good luck, or more probably
through the natural sagacity of the man,
he recollected that-well. that you don't
us 4 rule, cook chickens as they are.
In the nlomentary REACTION that followed
this feat of memory, he bought a couple
of mutton chops and three tomatoes.
~. have il good, plain, ol(l-fashioned
English dinner thought he. as he hur-
ried past the deceitful chickens with
something almost akin to reproach.
"None of your tiniky, poultry dinners for
mc!'
by Iove:' he exclaimed moment
later, IN have an apple pudding and
some oyster soup to begin on
He was so tickled with this idea that
he promptly rushed into Il grocery shop
and purchaser half peck of the best
without Il thought of the cab he was to
order for his wife at $50 sharp.
BY o'clock he had the fire going beau
tifully. and everything ready for Il start.
BY q O'Clock he was just beginning to
enjoy the thing: the tomatoes were stew
ing divinely.; the potatoes were boiling to
their hearts content; and the milk for
eddy on the back of the stove. The oys-
tiers. by the by, had not yet arrived:
Dear me- thought the ambitious
gentleman. Il wish had thought of it i'll
time. and I'd have had some oyster pat
ties for Il sort of final dessert. Hello,
what's this? BY thunder, if that ever
lasting pig headed woman hasn't left me
some cold ham and custard pie! BY
the Lord Harry for , cents Id throw
the whole thing out into the back yard!'
The natural docility of his nature,
however, prevailed, and lie left the OBJ
noXious viands unmolested. and proceed
ed with his dinner. At 6:3O he put the
days of yore"-this poetic allusion TO
the style of cooking being occasioned by
one of them accidentally dropping into
the fire. whence he rescued it with great
presence of mind by the joint assistance
of the stove litter and one of the best
table napkins. BY the time the chop was
thus rescued both it and the table nap
ing stronger. This trif1ing difficulty he
got over by putting the erring chop on
the window sill to COOL and the napkin
into the tirc-to do the other thing.
This accomplished and with one chop
gently cooking on the gridiron and the
started to construct the paste for his APP
pie pudding. This proved most fascinat-
ing. He placed II large quantity of
flour in small bowl, emptied IL jug of
water on top of it, added butter to TASTE
and proceeded to mould it deftly into
shape. as he had often seen his wife do.
The flour and water promptly forsook
hands. Then the milk for the soup be-
gan to burn just as the potatoes boiled
dry. He rushed to the rescue and left
the major portion of the paste fairly
evenly divided between the handles of
the two saucepans and the stove litter.
At this juncture the tomatoes started in
to see if they couldn't surpass the milk
which was accustomed to II 6:3O dinner,
walked off with the chop on the window
sill, while the chop on the fire grew
beautifully black OH the ''down side"
SO many things were now burning all at
the same time that Mr.. Meek gave up all
hope of trying to discover just which
one was burning most. LET the dashed
the extremely broad-minded way in
which he summed up the situation. With
the astuteness that characterized him as
distinguished from his fellow men. he at
once gave up all efforts to track the tru-
ant paste. and simply popped his apples
into the oven to bake.
1t was now about 7:30, and the fire
anything OIL earth, unless, perhaps, it
was Mr.. Meek. He turned all the dam
pers. opened all the doors, and took off
all the lids. This resulted most salts
factorily, the fire began to cool. 1t didn't
stop.
It got if anything, a little too low.
After that it got very low. Then it
went out. He rushed for kindling, and
nearly took his head off on Il clothesine.
Just as he had got nicely through express
sing his views Oh clotheslines in general,
and that clothesline in particular, hv
went about twice as far toward taking
mis- head off On the same clothcsline Oh
his way back.
The gentlest of natures when reused
are often the most terrible. Mr.. Meek
became very terrible. He used up
enough kiDdling. profanity and coal oil
to have ignited the pyramids of Egypt.
He stamped and showed, and poked and
banged, and cursed and shook till even
the cat--and it had had it's dinner
was displeased with him. and departed
to the outer kitchen to try the oysters,
which the dilatory grocer had just de-
posted on the table without waiting to
barley with Mr.. Meek. He was wise
grocer and had heard enough
When, about five minutes later. Mr..
Meek discovered that the cat had found
the oysters to it's taste, he became even
less calm Had the cat been around
(but, like the grocer. it had heard enough
and had taken an Tlnobtrusiye departure)
it is highly probable that Il considerable
majority of it's nine lives would have
come to an abrupt termination.
At this stage. to console the unfortun-
ate man. the fire began to go again.
Once started it didn't stop. In about five
minutes it had burnt up what remained
of pretty much everything except
large pot of green tea and a small por-
ton of Mr.. Meek. The chop that the
cat hadn't eaten was especially we'll
done. 1t could be quite safely left on
the window sill with whole legion of
cats around it. Mr.. Meek, however,
simply left it in the coal bin. In point of
either color or hardness it would have
been difficult to have found II more fit
ting resting place for it. y
Then there came over Mr.. Meek's face
terrible expression. He brought in a
pail Git was the scrubbing pail which he
had mistaken for the scrap pail, but no
matter and poured the soup carefully
into it. throwing the nan ah0ut five foot