The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1917-12-21

with crepe paper, twisted tightly. and the ends
fringed. It then resembled the old-fashioned
motto candies. That the motto couplet might not
be lacking, the following lines written and
inserted:
'Those Jell girls may be tart and sweet,
But I've heard that they lack spice
If Of me you'll degn to eat
am sure you'll vote me NICE"
Grandma made wonderful fruit cake-the
kind that lasts year, and improves with age
This was surrounded with white parchment paper.
and covered with white paper dolly, and fancy
edges. This was laid carefully the waxed
paper which covered the frostng, studded thickly
with whole hickory and butternut meats. The
whole was packed into round box, made by
Myrtle's skillful fingers To make it she cut two
disks Of cardboard of the required size, and two
long strips of the cardboard the height Of
the cake, the other narrower, for the cover. She
bound the edges together with gummed tape, and
covered their junction with narrow strips of gold
paper. Then she neatly covered top and sides
with Christmas paper, all holly and mistletoe
Lastly, she tied two bright scarlet ribbons about
the box, each way. She made plump bows,
and gathering the ends of the ribbons, sewed tiny
sleigh bells on them, so that the box when moved,
gave forth sweet musical sound.
Myrtle surveyed the box with satisfaction her
head ooe side.
"YCu ought to please" she said. "You appeal
to the eye, the ear, and the palate"
The box certainly did present an imposing ap-
pearance. On the inside of the cover appeared
the lines:
"Of course this cake made by mother;
She says if it don't suit she'll make you another"
great generous ball of COTTAGE cheese
wrapped in paper and packed in square box,
vii
companying 1t was the legend:
eff Esau had known of the cheese called cottage
He'd have traded for that, instead Of the pottage"
There were two generous loaves of bread one of
"salt rising" the other yeast raised. On card
were the lines:
Grandma says, when you were boy,
And eating salt rising you never could stop;
But in case you tire of the old-fashioned kind,
Here's another loaf, raised with the hop"
Packed about the loaves, and neatly wrapped,
each by itself, in parchment paper, were dozen
little individual butter pats nodded In the form OF
a Myrtle wrote:
eve wonder If, when you eat, you'll mutter:
AHA That tastes like Old Home butterr"
The mince pie concocted with immense care.
gradients to the construction Of the faultless aky
crust just touched with the fantest hint Of golden
brown. This carefully packed between two
wooden plates. tied firmly together. On the top
plate was written:
"When Is 1t true that mans a mince piel
Cannot you take the hint?
Why, a mans Mint Spy Of course, you know,
When he acts as spy in the mint"
The duck was of course, the chef d'oeuvre of
the whole undertaking. When 1t was ready, lying
on its back with its fat legs composed at its plump
sides, 1t surely did look appetizng. The "POet
Larat" as Tim called her. wrote the following:
"Not a porcne sucking, but nice fat duckling
You draw for your Christmas dinner.
You ne'er saw duck
That was nicer to pluck;
We hope you will vote him winner"
Some beautiful red Brother Jonathan apples
were tucked In the corners, and glass Of elder
berry jelly. These were grandma's contribution,
and she wrote, In a somewhat trembling hand, the
following note:
Dear Johnny:
'sThese apples came off from the tree where you
fell and broke your leg that time. Do you re-
they cut the others The elderberry jelly was
made from the elderberries that grow on the
bushes by the old swimming hole.
MOTHER"
When everything was finished and the box
about ready to go, there still remained two things
to be done. One was to put In the old-fashioned
daguerreotype of grandma, with Aunt Myrtle
(taken at sixteen) standing side of her,
and Uncle John the other. This had been
taken many years before, for relative, and had
been sent away. and its existence forgotten Myr-
tie had been named for her aunt, and she looked
very much the latter had done at her age Aunt
Myrtle had died at eighteen Myrtle never saw
her. The other thing to be inclosed was the anna
teur photograph Of grandma and the present
Myrtle. She had posed in imitation of the pose
in the early picture with her arm around grand
mas neck. The resemblance between her picture
and that Of Aunt Myrtle was almost startling.
When grandma looked at the two pictures to-
gether she shook her head:
"Do 1 really look old at that?" she sighed
81 hate to send that to Johnny. I'm afraid it will