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Mince   Listen
verb
Mince  v. i.  
1.
To walk with short steps; to walk in a prim, affected manner. "The daughters of Zion are haughty, and walk with stretched forth necks and wanton eyes,... mincing as they go." "I 'll... turn two mincing steps Into a manly stride."
2.
To act or talk with affected nicety; to affect delicacy in manner.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Mince" Quotes from Famous Books



... incapables. The fact was, farming, as a rule, was conducted on the hand-to-mouth principle, and the least stress or strain caused an outcry. He must be forgiven if he seemed to speak with unusual acerbity. He intended no offence. But it was his duty. In such a condition of things it would be folly to mince matters, to speak softly while everything was going to pieces. He repeated, once for all, it was their own fault. Science could supply the remedy, and science alone; if they would not call in the aid of science they must suffer, and their privations must be upon their own heads. Science said, ...
— Hodge and His Masters • Richard Jefferies

... his own mother had known him. She left him alone until one snowy afternoon, after a prolonged absence in his room, he came into the kitchen with traces of tears about the eyes. Mother Wolf was paring apples for mince meat. Papa Wolf would eat no food not prepared by ...
— The Forbidden Trail • Honore Willsie

... of our Eastern friends owe much to California. She sends the seedless raisins, candied orange and lemon peel, the citron and beet sugar for the mince pies and plum puddings. Her cold-storage cars carry to the winter-bound states the delicious white celery of the peat lands, snow-white heads of cauliflower, crisp string beans, sweet young peas, green squash, cucumbers, and ripe tomatoes. For the salads are her olives ...
— History of California • Helen Elliott Bandini

... you was born with! Now I ain't gwine tell you any more ways to bring truck home. And don't you go see your Auntie, neither. I'll go see her my own self. But I'll just tell you one thing, Epaminondas! You see these here six mince pies I done make? You see how I done set 'em on the doorstep to cool? Well, now, you hear me, Epaminondas, YOU BE CAREFUL HOW YOU STEP ...
— Stories to Tell to Children • Sara Cone Bryant

... pastry an inch thick, and so rich as easily to be pulled down, and roomy enough within for the Court of King Pepin, lay first a thick stratum of mince-meat of two savory hams of Westphalia, and if you cannot get them, of two ...
— The Golden Dog - Le Chien d'Or • William Kirby

... primed from church-going with grave admonition, Mr. Chirgwin was tearful, and hinted at his own sorrow arising from Joan's backsliding, but Mary did not mince language and spoke what ...
— Lying Prophets • Eden Phillpotts

... Mince one-quarter of an onion, one-half a stalk of celery, a few leaves of sweet basil, and a bunch of parsley up fine. Add one-half cup of olive-oil, a pinch of salt and one of pepper, and cut eight or nine tomatoes ...
— Simple Italian Cookery • Antonia Isola

... believe, stingy,—nor ever intentionally unfair. My child is a cripple,—and equally bad-tempered as myself. No one but a mercenary has ever coped with her. And she shows it. We have lived alone for six years. All of our clothes, and most of our ways, need mending. I am not one to mince matters, Miss Malgregor, nor has your training, I trust, made you one from whom truths must be veiled. I am a man with all a man's needs,—mental, moral, physical. My child is a child with all a child's needs,—mental, moral, physical. Our house of life is full of cobwebs. The rooms of affection ...
— The White Linen Nurse • Eleanor Hallowell Abbott

... When mince-pies you can't digest Join with waits to break your rest: When, oh when, to crown your woe, Persons who might better know Think it needful that you should Don a gay convivial mood;— Bear with fortitude and patience These afflicting dispensations: Man was born to suffer ...
— Lyra Frivola • A. D. Godley

... sorry she had not better room; "O! Madam," said my Lady Anson, "I can sit like a nightingale, with my breast against a thorn;") in short, that, not content with so much wit, she proposes to entertain the town to the tune of Doctors' Commons. She does not mince her disappointments: here is an epigram that has been made on ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 • Horace Walpole

... dance for ever!" she said. "They ought to let themselves go more!" she exclaimed. "They ought to leap and swing. Look! How they mince!" ...
— The Voyage Out • Virginia Woolf

... said Mrs. Canterby promptly, "and whatever are you being so mysterious for? There's no mystery about that, for it's her mince-meat recipe." ...
— Philo Gubb Correspondence-School Detective • Ellis Parker Butler

... I am sorry for you. I once thought you a promising young man; but, since your desertion at Aniana—we must not mince matters now—you have become quite an altered character. You seem to have lost all zeal for the service. Zeal for the service is a thing that ought not to be lost; for a young gentleman without zeal for the service is a young gentleman, surely—you ...
— Rattlin the Reefer • Edward Howard

... pork that have been left from sausage meat, or any trimmings of the hams or shoulders; boil them, then chop. Have two heads nicely washed and cleaned, boil, pick out the bones and chop them; mix with the other meat, and season as you do other mince pies, they do not require any suet. The lower crust of mince pies need not be so rich as the top; always cut several places in the top crust with scissors, to keep the juice from wasting. When you warm mince pies, do it gradually, ...
— Domestic Cookery, Useful Receipts, and Hints to Young Housekeepers • Elizabeth E. Lea

... aware that Subconscious Self was addressing him. The occasion was tense, and Subconscious Self did not mince its words. ...
— Uneasy Money • P.G. Wodehouse

... meal, within twenty minutes' time or so, they partook with a hearty relish. What mortal, however delicate, could resist the fare set before them—the plump capon, the delicious grilled ham, the poached eggs, the floury potatoes, home-baked bread, white and brown—custards, mince-pies, home-brewed ale, as soft as milk, as clear as amber—mulled claret—and so forth? The travellers had evidently never relished anything more, to the infinite delight of old Mrs. Aubrey; who observing, soon afterwards, irrepressible ...
— Ten Thousand a-Year. Volume 1. • Samuel Warren

... dry and inviting, with a wood fire crackling in the grate, that our troubles, which had, during the long hours of to-day's tedious drive, assumed really serious proportions, were soon forgotten as we sat down, in an incredibly short time, to a hearty meal of roast turkey and mince pies! We almost fell to wishing each other a Happy Christmas, and instinctively wondered if roast chestnuts would form part of the afternoon's programme. Unfortunately, chestnuts of an allegorical kind did enter into the proceedings. Meanwhile, the rain continued ...
— Argentina From A British Point Of View • Various

... The better cooks they were, the more trying were the limitations. Every woman with a love for her fellow-woman must feel a thrill of keen sympathy for the goodwife of Newport, New Hampshire, who had to make her Thanksgiving mince-pies with a filling of bear's meat and dried pumpkins, sweetened with maple sugar, and her crust of corn-meal. Her husband loyally recorded that they were the best mince-pies ...
— Home Life in Colonial Days • Alice Morse Earle

... shocking climax: Trade Returns were unable to balance properly, and Money (to be absolutely outspoken and no longer to mince matters) ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 159, September 8th, 1920 • Various

... month. Brave youth—in these times! One man has brought his sister and established her as the beauty of the island; one his mother; and one an older sister, a perfect New England housekeeper, who makes his home the paradise of mince-pies and ...
— Letters from Port Royal - Written at the Time of the Civil War (1862-1868) • Various

... mother were mysteriously and unaccountably busy in the parlour (we had only one parlour), and Patty and I were not allowed to go in. We went into the kitchen, but even here was no place of rest for us. Kitty was 'all over the place,' as she phrased it, and cakes, mince pies, and puddings were with her. As she justly observed, 'There was no place there for children and books to sit with their toes in the fire, when a body wanted to be at the oven all along. The cat was enough for HER ...
— The Children's Book of Christmas Stories • Various

... who was never the boy to mince matters in giving his sentiments; "and I wouldn't care if Sunday didn't come ...
— The May Flower, and Miscellaneous Writings • Harriet Beecher Stowe

... McCullough, offering to take the place of leading man in his company to begin with. Mary was sure, she said, that the life of an actor was a hard one; Hector had always been very delicate (I had known him to eat a whole mince pie without apparent distress afterward) and she wanted me to write and urge him to change his mind. She felt sure Mr. McCullough would send for him at once, because Hector had written him that he already knew all the principal Shakespearian roles, could play Brutus, ...
— In the Arena - Stories of Political Life • Booth Tarkington

... the time Mr. Froggatt drove the sisters home, and Wilmet wondered that she could not go out for a night without some one being ill, he had arrived at a state which she could be left to attribute to Mrs. Froggatt's innocent mince-pies. ...
— The Pillars of the House, V1 • Charlotte M. Yonge

... and his father talked politics, and Ralph told stories about his neighbours in Yucca county. Bayliss was pleased that his mother had remembered he liked oyster stuffing, and he complimented her upon her mince pies. When he saw her pour a second cup of coffee for herself and for Claude at the end of dinner, he said, in a gentle, grieved tone, "I'm sorry to see you ...
— One of Ours • Willa Cather

... formerly a student at Salamanca, had occasionally strayed into Luis de Leon's densely-packed lecture-room, and retained an abiding impression of the professor's desenvoltura in his chair.[85] Luis de Leon had not become wholly subdued during the intervening years. He did not mince words in court, and indulged in sweeping denunciations of large groups of men; he branded all Dominicans as 'enemies';[86] he was scarcely more indulgent in speaking of the Jeromites (who resented his opposition to the candidature of their representative, Hector Pinto, for a chair ...
— Fray Luis de Leon - A Biographical Fragment • James Fitzmaurice-Kelly

... Veau.—Cut thin cutlets from a fillet of veal and beat them flat and even. Also mince a small quantity of the veal very fine, mix it with some of the kidney fat, also minced fine, and half a dozen minced anchovies, adding a little salt, ginger and powdered mace. Place this mixture over the slices of veal and ...
— Twenty-four Little French Dinners and How to Cook and Serve Them • Cora Moore

... could any sensible man suppose that peace wasn't really concluded, after we'd actually sung Te Deum for it, sir? I ask you, William, could I suppose that the Emperor of Austria was a damned traitor—a traitor, and nothing more? I don't mince words—a double-faced infernal traitor and schemer, who meant to have his son-in-law back all along. And I say that the escape of Boney from Elba was a damned imposition and plot, sir, in which half the powers of Europe were concerned, to bring the funds down, ...
— Vanity Fair • William Makepeace Thackeray

... good-cheer, good work and an earnest wish to do better tomorrow than he had done today. That Nature occasionally produces such a man should be a cause for gratitude in the hearts of all the rest of us little folk who jig, mince, mouth, amble, run, peek about ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Volume 5 (of 14) • Elbert Hubbard

... kitchen, Stonin' raisins in de hall, Beef a-cookin' fu' de mince meat, Spices groun'—I smell 'em all. Look hyeah, Tu'key, stop dat gobblin', You ain' luned de sense ob feah, You ol' fool, yo' naik 's in dangah, Do' you know Thanksgibbin ...
— The Complete Poems of Paul Laurence Dunbar • Paul Laurence Dunbar

... a nice mince," said Mr. Fairthorn, with a sensual movement of his lips. "One must think of dinner when one lives in the country: so little else to think of! Not that Mr. Darrell does, but then ...
— What Will He Do With It, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... pedestal and do our own housework, cookin', washin' dishes, sweepin', moppin', cleanin' lamps, blackin' stoves, washin', ironin', makin' beds, quiltin' bed quilts, gittin' three meals a day, day after day, biled dinners and bag puddin's and mince pies and things, to say nothin' of custard and pumpkin pies that will slop over on the level, do the best you can; how could you keep 'em inside the crust histin' yourself up and down? And ...
— Samantha at the St. Louis Exposition • Marietta Holley

... had Eden for her larder, heard Adam announce the Archangel's unexpected visit about dinner-time without a momentary qualm as to whether the peaches would go round twice. There'll be enough for Miss Larches and you, Nelly; and we gentlemen will beam smiles upon you as we mince our modest share. Let us go in. Mr. Key, will you commit yourself to Mrs. Grey? Miss Larches, will you lay aside your bonnet? Oh, it's off already! One can't see, unless one stands behind you; and ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 4, No. 24, Oct. 1859 • Various

... Vanity, that I don't mince matters. I take our Doctor as I find him, rough and allopathic; but I am sure he might be improved in the course of two or three generations. We may leave this, however, to Nature and the Army Medical Department. Reform is not my business. I have no proposals ...
— Twenty-One Days in India; and, the Teapot Series • George Robert Aberigh-Mackay

... roughly repulsed by him to whom he made that indecent compliment: "What," said he, "is not that part your own as well as the other?" —[Diogenes Laertius, vi. 89.]—They used to eat fruit, as we do, after dinner. They wiped their fundaments (let the ladies, if they please, mince it smaller) with a sponge, which is the reason that 'spongia' is a smutty word in Latin; which sponge was fastened to the end of a stick, as appears by the story of him who, as he was led along to be thrown to the wild beasts in the sight of the people, asking leave ...
— The Essays of Montaigne, Complete • Michel de Montaigne

... to mince matters in my little room you shall do it. It was Lucius the Praetor that went always accompanied by a carping Stoic to keep him from being puffed up, and ...
— The Fifth Queen Crowned • Ford Madox Ford

... que j'aime! Ensemble nous devenons vieux. Depuis dix ans je te brosse moi-mme, Et Socrate n'et pas fait mieux. Quand le sort ta mince toffe Livrerait de nouveaux combats, Imite-moi, rsiste en philosophe: Mon vieil ami, ...
— French Lyrics • Arthur Graves Canfield

... of time. The forks and the spoons and the two hundred dollars in money was all done up in neat packages, and they'd been through father's desk and the secretary drawers; and they'd had a lunch of cold chicken and mince-pie, and left the marks of their greasy hands on the best damask napkins Bridget had ironed that day and left to air by the kitchen range. And then, you see, while one stayed below to keep watch, the other went up to finish the ...
— Miss Elliot's Girls • Mrs Mary Spring Corning

... I read Aurora Floyd In youth with rapture quite unholy— Not in the way that I enjoyed Mince-pies or roly-poly; While "G.A.S." appeared to me Like a Leonid fresh from starland, Not the young lion that we ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 152, May 2, 1917 • Various

... at this season, and to see the whole Village merry in my great Hall. I allow a double Quantity of Malt to my small Beer, and set it a running for twelve Days to every one that calls for it. I have always a Piece of cold Beef and a Mince-Pye upon the Table, and am wonderfully pleased to see my Tenants pass away a whole Evening in playing their innocent Tricks, and smutting one another. Our Friend Will Wimble is as merry as any of them, and shews a thousand ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele

... again—doing anything to please!—Generous Lark!—his face covered with a white handkerchief, a portion tucked in his mouth, over all wearing a pair of spectacles, with pupils (currants abstracted from a mince-pie) stuck thereon, causing the Lark to look very curious and odd—the children wondering what he will be at next!—for now, you must know, he has gone to prepare another excitement; being in the drawing-room, whilst the visitors are in the parlour—curious beyond all description, beseeching ...
— Christmas Comes but Once A Year - Showing What Mr. Brown Did, Thought, and Intended to Do, - during that Festive Season. • Luke Limner

... eating—a fellow can't always tell which particular thing did him good, but he can usually tell which one did him harm. After a square meal of roast beef and vegetables, and mince pie and watermelon, you can't say just which ingredient is going into muscle, but you don't have to be very bright to figure out which one started the demand for painkiller in your insides, or to guess, next morning, which one made you believe in a personal devil the night before. And so, ...
— Letters from a Self-Made Merchant to His Son • George Horace Lorimer

... white with rage, but before he could speak our employer waved us aside and said, "Tom, you and Quince clear right out of here and I'll settle this matter. Arch, there's your remuda. Take it and go about your business or say you don't want to. Now, we know each other, and I'll not mince or repeat any words with ...
— The Outlet • Andy Adams

... over several articles, among which were cake and mince-pie, neither of which could Oscar ...
— Oscar - The Boy Who Had His Own Way • Walter Aimwell

... I wish for turkey and sausages. It may be a weakness, but I own I am partial to sausages. My deceased mother was. Such tastes are hereditary. As to the sweets—whether plum-pudding or mince-pies—I leave such considerations to you; I only beg you not to mind expense. Christmas comes but ...
— The Grey Woman and other Tales • Mrs. (Elizabeth) Gaskell

... itself, and affords much valuable, and perhaps rare information, which the reader may need, concerning the famous town, to which I made my first voyage. And I think that with regard to a matter, concerning which I myself am wholly ignorant, it is far better to quote my old friend verbatim, than to mince his substantial baron-of-beef of information into a flimsy ragout of my own; and so, pass it off as original. Yes, I will render unto my honored ...
— Redburn. His First Voyage • Herman Melville

... faithful on its weakest side. She invited the thirty seditious husbands with their wives to a beefsteak dinner, where she heaped their plates with planked sirloin, garnished the sirloin with big, fat, fresh mushrooms, and topped off the meal with a mince pie of her own concoction, which would make a man leave home to follow it. She passed cigars at the table, and after the guests went into the music-room ten old men with ten old fiddles appeared and contested with old-fashioned ...
— Americans All - Stories of American Life of To-Day • Various

... He laid a table in the sitting-room. He materialised a cold turkey, a brown loaf, and some tomatoes; and he even achieved table-napkins. Gerald and Donkin on their part disappeared into the nether regions, and returned bearing mince-pies and cider. Some one else found champagne and opened it; and in a quarter of an hour we were left to ourselves by the benignant waiter round a comfortably loaded table, in a snug room with the fire burning and the ...
— The Right Stuff - Some Episodes in the Career of a North Briton • Ian Hay

... "or we might as well scratch to Ripton at once. There's a jolly sight too much of the mince-pie and Christmas pudding about their play at present." There was a pause. Then Paget brought out the question towards which he had been moving all ...
— The Gold Bat • P. G. Wodehouse

... idea. Some fateful hour love would flash across her horizon, a living flame. She could visualize the tragedy if it should be too late, if it found her already bound—sold for a mess of pottage at her ease. She did not mince words to herself when she reflected on this matter. She knew herself as a creature of passionate impulses, consciously resenting all restraint. She knew that men and women did mad things under the spur of emotion. She wanted ...
— Big Timber - A Story of the Northwest • Bertrand W. Sinclair

... Hallijohn, was certain; but the act was committed in a moment of wild rage; it had not been premeditated. The sentence was commuted to transportation. A far more disgraceful one in the estimation of Sir Francis; a far more unwelcome one in the eyes of his wife. It is no use to mince the truth, one little grain of comfort had penetrated to Lady Levison; the anticipation of the time when she and her ill-fated child should be alone, and could hide themselves in some hidden nook of the wide world; he, ...
— East Lynne • Mrs. Henry Wood

... special edition at once charging Harley with murder. Run the word as a red headline clear across the page. Show that Vance Edwards and the other boys were killed while on duty by an attack ordered by Harley. Point out that this is the logical result of his course. Don't mince words. Give it him right from the shoulder. Rush it, and be sure a copy of the paper is on the desk of every legislator before the session opens this morning. Have a reliable man there to see that every man gets ...
— Ridgway of Montana - (Story of To-Day, in Which the Hero Is Also the Villain) • William MacLeod Raine

... lovely," they said, "and we'll have a perfectly scrumptious time. Do you like pie? We've got a whole big jar full of mince meat." ...
— Roy Blakeley's Camp on Wheels • Percy Keese Fitzhugh

... would not mince words. His scorpion tongue, set on fires of hell, might start a conflagration that would light the Nation with its glare. Would not his name be a terror for every man and woman born under Southern skies? The sickening feeling stole over her that he was wrong, and his policy ...
— The Clansman - An Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan • Thomas Dixon

... Meschini. "We are alone. It is of no use to mince matters here. The only away to accomplish what you desire is to forge the words in both parchments. The thing can be done, and I can do it. It will be successful, without a shadow of a doubt. But I must have my price. There must be no misunderstanding. I do not think much of your considerations ...
— Sant' Ilario • F. Marion Crawford

... father, as I'm unlike mine, 300 Which is not his fault, as you may divine. Though we eat little flesh and drink no wine, Yet let's be merry: we'll have tea and toast; Custards for supper, and an endless host Of syllabubs and jellies and mince-pies, 305 And other such lady-like luxuries,— Feasting on which we will philosophize! And we'll have fires out of the Grand Duke's wood, To thaw the six weeks' winter in our blood. And then we'll talk;—what shall we talk about? 310 Oh! there are themes enough for ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley

... for No. 9. See that when the meat is cooked there is plenty of liquid. Thicken this mince and gravy with bread crumbs and let stand. Cut the eggplant in half lengthwise, and steam or bake in a very slow oven. When about half cooked, scoop out the center of about each half. Be careful to save the vegetable that you scoop out ...
— The Khaki Kook Book - A Collection of a Hundred Cheap and Practical Recipes - Mostly from Hindustan • Mary Kennedy Core

... proceeding if ever there was one. Everybody, in the first place, knows everybody else, and creditor and debtor being bound to meet each other daily all their lives long, nobody likes to take this odious course. When a defaulter—to use the provincial term for a debtor, for they do not mince their words in the provinces when speaking of this legalized method of helping yourself to another man's goods—when a defaulter plans a failure on a large scale, he takes sanctuary in Paris. Paris is a kind of City ...
— Eve and David • Honore de Balzac

... say in his old age, ruminating over the past, "Our standard is high. Our demand is hard; aye, very hard. Yes, we don't mince matters in soul-saving. We demand the whole of a man, not a little bit of him, or three-fourths of him, or two-thirds of him; we demand every drop of his blood and every beat of his heart and every thought of his brain. Yes, ...
— Painted Windows - Studies in Religious Personality • Harold Begbie

... meadows in childhood: in youth Through the same silent gateways, to manhood. In truth, There is none that can know me as you do; and none To whom I more wish to believe myself known. Speak the truth; you are not wont to mince it, I know. Nor I, shall I shirk it, or shrink from it now. In despite of a wanton behavior, in spite Of vanity, folly, and pride, Jack, which might Have turn'd from me many a heart strong and true As your own, I have never turn'd round and miss'd YOU From my ...
— Lucile • Owen Meredith

... than this we have huskings in the barns, seated around a heap of corn. Husking over, we eat pudding, baked beans, mince, apple, and pumpkin pie, and top off with pop-corn, apples, and cider. After supper the girls clear away the dishes; then we push the table into one corner of the kitchen, Julius Caesar mounts it with his fiddle, and we dance ...
— Daughters of the Revolution and Their Times - 1769 - 1776 A Historical Romance • Charles Carleton Coffin

... rich, and few folks know How rich mince pie can be; But I have eaten it—and, oh, ...
— The Re-echo Club • Carolyn Wells

... have made mince meat of Mr. Robin. There would not have been so much as a feather left. I tell you what I mean to do. Nurse him ...
— Baby Pitcher's Trials - Little Pitcher Stories • Mrs. May

... once having given vent to her feeling of injustice, was not concerned to mince her words: "You seem perfectly pleased with our separation, and indifferent how long it continues.... When I reflect on your behaviour, I am ashamed of my own: I think I am playing the part of my Lady Winchester. At least be as generous ...
— Lady Mary Wortley Montague - Her Life and Letters (1689-1762) • Lewis Melville

... things. After all the presents were distributed, it was time to begin to get dinner, and to decorate the great table laid for sixteen. There was a turkey, of course, and a huge chicken pie as well, not to mention mince pies and squash pies and apple pies, a plum pudding and vanilla ice-cream; angel cakes and fruit cakes and chocolate cakes; coffee and cider and blackberry cordial; and after they had all eaten until they could not hold another ...
— The Old Gray Homestead • Frances Parkinson Keyes

... est beau en effet. Sa taille est haute, mais quelques-uns la trouveraient mince; sa chevelure noire est bouclee et tombe jusqu'a la nuque; ses yeux noirs sont profonds et bien fendus; le front est noble; la levre superieure, couverte par une moustache naissante et noire, est parfaitement modelee; ...
— Hindu Literature • Epiphanius Wilson

... "Don't mince words!" shouted Kerry. "You've kidnapped my boy. If I have to tear your house down brick by brick I'll find him. And if you've hurt one hair of his ...
— Tales of Chinatown • Sax Rohmer

... least he would have one good meal, he too would have his Christmas dinner before the end came. He switched the light on and turned eagerly to the table. His eyes ravenously scanned the contents. Turkey, mince-pies, plum-pudding— all was there as in the ...
— The Holiday Round • A. A. Milne

... ease and peace, Polly came along, but, finding the stairs rather stiff work, was carried up by Barbox Brothers. The dinner was a most transcendent success, and the Barbox sheepishness, under Polly's directions how to mince her meat for her, and how to diffuse gravy over the plate with a liberal and equal ...
— Mugby Junction • Charles Dickens

... Withdrew his hand, and clos'd the pompous page: But (happy for him as the times went then) Appear'd Apollo's may'r and aldermen, On whom three hundred gold-capt youths await, To lug the pond'rous volume off in state. "When Dulness, smiling—'Thus revive the wits! But murder first, and mince them all to bits! As erst Medea (cruel, so to save!) A new edition of old AEson gave; Let standard authors thus, like trophies borne, Appear more glorious as more hack'd and torn. And you my Critics! in the chequer'd shade, Admire new light through holes yourselves have made. "'Leave not a foot ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 58, Number 358, August 1845 • Various

... if you mince the matter once and go back of your word you are not the person I took you for. Come, come, go on boldly.—What, don't be ashamed of your profession.—Confess, confess; I shall love thee the better for't. I shall, i'feck. ...
— The Comedies of William Congreve - Volume 1 [of 2] • William Congreve

... schulein' for nothin', he says the Yankees want to interfere with our niggers. Now, thet han't so, and they couldn't ef they would, 'cause it's agin the Constitution—and they stand on the Constitution a durned sight solider nor we do. Didn't thar big gun—Daniel Webster—didn't he make mince-meat o' South-Carolina Hayne on that ar subject? But I tell you they han't a mind to meddle with our niggers; they're a goin' ter let us go ter h—l our own way—and we're goin' thar mighty fast, or I ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. II. July, 1862. No. 1. • Various

... practical statements that he can weigh and consider. Put all your proposed plans into writing. Put down hard, concrete facts in terse English. Make it as brief as possible. Don't be afraid to criticise if you can suggest improvements. Don't mince words. He loves simplicity and frankness. And if you do as I say in that regard, and make plain to him the ideas you've made plain to me—you'll get the job, and we'll make a success because I'll work with you to make it succeed. I believe in the ...
— Mixed Faces • Roy Norton

... the relatives were invited to come and be convinced, once and for all, of Uncle Roswell's prosperity and be filled with envy and reconciled with jelly and preserves and roast turkey with sage dressing and mince and chicken pie. What an amount of preparation we had made for the journey, and how long we had talked about it! When we had shut the door and were ready to get into the sleigh our dog Shep came whining around us. I shall never forget how Uncle Peabody ...
— The Light in the Clearing • Irving Bacheller

... cut in slices or mince, season it with pepper, salt, sweet marjoram and thyme, cloves, mace and nutmeg, make holes in the beef and stuff it the night before cooked; put some bones across the bottom of the pot to keep from burning, ...
— American Cookery - The Art of Dressing Viands, Fish, Poultry, and Vegetables • Amelia Simmons

... unwilling to impart. There is a good deal of Polonius in Hesiod, who addresses his Works and Days to his brother Perses, a bad lot. Perses in fact had diddled him out of his patrimony, or part of it, by bribing the judges at Thespiae; and the poet, who doesn't mince matters, loses no opportunity of telling him what he thinks of him. Indeed, one of Hesiod's reasons for instructing him in good farming was that thereby he might perhaps prevent him from spunging on his relations. So the injured bard got a sad, exalted pleasure out of his griefs, ...
— In a Green Shade - A Country Commentary • Maurice Hewlett

... there. America had not yet, hoodwinked, signed the licence to kill, which she handed to Leopold on the 22d of April, 1884. Germany had not been roped in. England and France were still aloof, and Berselius, arriving at the psychological moment, did not mince matters. ...
— The Pools of Silence • H. de Vere Stacpoole

... didn't mean to hurt your feelings," she said soothingly. "I—I was only fooling. Will you have a piece of hot mince pie? It's just out ...
— The Rover Boys on the Ocean • Arthur M. Winfield (Edward Stratemeyer)

... somethin'," said Mrs. Hand, in her usual tone. "For me, I 've got a couple o' my mince pies. I thought the old lady might like 'em; one we can eat for our dinner, and one she shall have to keep. But were n't you unwise to sacrifice your poultry, Abby? You always need eggs, and hens ...
— The Queen's Twin and Other Stories • Sarah Orne Jewett

... upon your back." "Certes," said he, "therein shall be no lack, Might I you helpe with mine hearte's blood." He stooped down, and on his back she stood, And caught her by a twist,* and up she go'th. *twig, bough (Ladies, I pray you that ye be not wroth, I cannot glose,* I am a rude man): *mince matters And suddenly anon this Damian Gan pullen up the smock, and in he throng.* *rushed And when that Pluto saw this greate wrong, To January he gave again his sight, And made him see as well as ever he might. And when he thus had caught his ...
— The Canterbury Tales and Other Poems • Geoffrey Chaucer

... beans and "red flannel" hash, and acted charades from the Bible. They held innumerable guessing contests, where one might surmise as to the identity of a baby's photograph or conjecture as to the cook of a mince pie. These heroic efforts brought the fund up to eight hundred dollars. Two hundred yet to be found—and it ...
— The Tangled Threads • Eleanor H. Porter

... that you have received, and as I told you all along, though the surgeon said that it was a serious wound, he did not say that it was likely to be fatal, as he did in the case of Cuthbert Hartington. These army surgeons do not mince matters, and there was no reason why he should not have said at once to me that the American was likely to die if he thought it would ...
— A Girl of the Commune • George Alfred Henty

... her dark, fun-loving eyes from a problem in Euclid, "I saw Mrs. Mumbles baking mince pies, and custards and ...
— Eventide - A Series of Tales and Poems • Effie Afton

... other phrase, if, by so doing, I could make myself intelligible; but as the case is, it is impossible to mince the matter—fashion has not yet, thank God, invaded the "Dictionary of Sea-Terms;" and ladies, when off soundings, must still be content to have "legs" like other folks—on shore they may vote it indecent to have even "ankles," for aught ...
— An Old Sailor's Yarns • Nathaniel Ames

... in a frying pan; mince a large onion, and fry it in the butter until nicely browned, and add to the stock in which the head was cooked. Return the bones to the stock; simmer the soup, removing the scum until no more rises. Put in a carrot, a turnip, a bunch of parsley, ...
— Fifty Soups • Thomas J. Murrey

... of life. The daughter of a Rural Dean, she appeared at her best when seated, having rather short legs. Her face was well-coloured, her mouth, firm and rather wide, her nose well-shaped, her hair dark. She spoke in a decided voice, and did not mince her words. It was to her that her husband, Sir James, owed his reactionary principles on the ...
— Forsyte Saga • John Galsworthy

... was placed at each plate a dear little mince pie, hot, and covered with a drift of powdered sugar. In the middle of each pie ...
— Marjorie's Busy Days • Carolyn Wells

... such a cheese for the pan, each Rabbit hound may have a preference all his own, for here the question comes up of how it melts best. Do you shave, slice, dice, shred, mince, chop, cut, scrape or crumble it in the fingers? This will vary according to one's temperament and the condition of the cheese. Generally, for best results it is coarsely grated. When it comes to making all this into a rare bit of Rabbit ...
— The Complete Book of Cheese • Robert Carlton Brown

... for frank and plain speaking; and that is highly conducive to frank and plain thinking. She now began to see clearly why she had quit the general. Said she: "Mamma, to be honest and not mince words, I've left him because there's nothing ...
— The Price She Paid • David Graham Phillips

... satisfactory manner, just the right colour; now it stood in a neat array of jars on a side table, waiting to be sealed and labelled when cold. Then, after lunch, Norah had plunged into the mysteries of pastry, and was considerably relieved when her mince pies turned out very closely akin to those of Brownie, which were famous. Puddings for dinner had followed, and were now cooling in the dairy. Finally, the joint being in the oven, and vegetables prepared, the cook had compounded Jim's favourite cake, which was now baking; during which delicate ...
— Mates at Billabong • Mary Grant Bruce

... than usually full and busy this year immediately after Christmas. It seemed as though it were admitted by all the Liberal party generally that the sadness of the occasion ought to rob the season of its usual festivities. Who could eat mince pies or think of Twelfth Night while so terribly wicked a scheme was in progress for keeping the real majority out in the cold? It was the injustice of the thing that rankled so deeply,—that, and a sense of inferiority to the cleverness displayed by Mr. Daubeny! It was ...
— Phineas Redux • Anthony Trollope

... giving the order for his execution the Tartar ladies and women interposed, and begged that he might be made over to them. Having got hold of the prisoner they boiled him alive, and cutting his body up into mince-meat gave it to eat to the whole army, as an example to others." Vincent of Beauvais makes a like statement: "When they capture any one who is at bitter enmity with them, they gather together and eat him in vengeance of his revolt, and like infernal leeches suck his blood," a custom ...
— The Travels of Marco Polo Volume 1 • Marco Polo and Rustichello of Pisa

... looked a little dazed, but they didn't have time to comment. The toss-up was rushed through and the two teams lined up, our team with the ball. It would have done your eyes good to see Rearick adjust it carefully on a small doily in the exact center of the field, mince up to it and kick it like an old lady urging a setting hen off the nest. A Kiowa halfback caught it and started up the field. Right at him came Birdie Andrews, hat in hand, and when the halfback arrived he bowed and asked him to stop. The runner declined. McMurty was right behind and ...
— At Good Old Siwash • George Fitch

... young teacher got home from school that evening he found the yellow house full of all sorts of delectable odours. Miss Cornelia herself was concocting mince pies after the famous family recipe, while her ancient and faithful handmaiden, Hannah, was straining into moulds the cranberry jelly. The open pantry door revealed a ...
— Lucy Maud Montgomery Short Stories, 1896 to 1901 • Lucy Maud Montgomery

... you before that it was their business to dress and prepare whatever was presented to them, but the reception they bestow is not one which would suit every body's taste, for it consists in being made mince-meat of And in order to do their work in the best way possible they divide their labor; some cut up, others ...
— The History of a Mouthful of Bread - And its effect on the organization of men and animals • Jean Mace

... despatch to his army, Mahmoud II turned his attention to Asia Minor, where Ali's sons would probably have been forgotten in their banishment, had it not been supposed that their riches were great. A sultan does not condescend to mince matters with his slaves, when he can despoil them with impunity; His Supreme Highness simply sent them his commands to die. Veli Pacha, a greater coward than a woman-slave born in the harem, heard his sentence kneeling. The wretch who had, in his palace ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - ALI PACHA • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE

... in the drawing-room; it stopped the cackle incident to cork-pool in the billiard-room; it even stopped a good deal of the whispering under the Chinese lanterns beneath the stairs and in the alcove at the top of the stairs. What it did not stop was the consumption of mince-pies and claret-cup in the small breakfast-room; people mumbled about ...
— The Matador of the Five Towns and Other Stories • Arnold Bennett

... be, but my pashints? Ay, ye may lauch, Miss Julee, but wait till ye see them." He was then seized with a fit of candour, and admitted that some, even of his pashints, were colourless; indeed, not to mince the matter, six or seven of that sacred band were nullity in person. "I can compare the beggars to nothing," said he, "but the globules of the Do-Nothings; dee——d insipid, and nothing in 'em. But the ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade

... behaviour might have convinced Mr. Pickle that I do not regard him as a common acquaintance."—"My charming Emily," cried the impatient lover, throwing himself at her feet, "why will you deal out my happiness in such scanty portions? Why will you thus mince the declaration which would overwhelm me with pleasure, and cheer my lonely reflection, while I sigh amid the solitude of separation?" His fair mistress, melted by this image, replied, with the tears gushing from her eyes, "I'm afraid I shall feel that ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett

... scenes are passe; law settles everything; and here there is scarcely ground for action for libel. But be comforted, coz, for if this comes to Uncle Hurricane's ears, he'll make mince-meat of him in no time. It is all in his line; he'll ...
— Capitola's Peril - A Sequel to 'The Hidden Hand' • Mrs. E.D.E.N. Southworth

... Christmas gambols to support them. I love to rejoice their poor hearts at this season, and to see the whole village merry in my great hall. I allow a double quantity of malt to my small beer, and set it running for twelve days to every one that calls for it. I have always a piece of cold beef and a mince-pie upon the table, and am wonderfully pleased to see my tenants pass away a whole evening in playing their innocent tricks, and smutting one another. Our friend Will Wimble is as merry as any of them, and shows a thousand roguish tricks ...
— Christmas: Its Origin and Associations - Together with Its Historical Events and Festive Celebrations During Nineteen Centuries • William Francis Dawson

... countries think of this? Is this the moyen to advance the Prince's grandeur and to turne the hearts of the people towards his Hienesse?' Spirited protests were made by the Commissioners of the Church; they did not mince their language—'We deteast that Act ... making the King head of the Kirk ... as High Treason and sacriledge against Christ the onlie King and Head of the Kirk.' The magistrates did not show the same mettle, but made submission on all ...
— Andrew Melville - Famous Scots Series • William Morison

... this time had blockaded Scargate, impounded Jordas, and compelled Mr. Jellicorse to rest and be thankful for a hot mince-pie, although it had visited this eastern coast as well, was not deep enough there to stop the roads. Keeping head-quarters at the "Hooked Cod" now, and encouraging a butcher to set up again (who had dropped all ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore

... Delemer, that moving writer; and to a few recently founded magazines. The editor of "Les Humbles" goes on to clear the ground of what he terms "the false literary vanguard," telling the chauvinist writers what he thinks of them. This lettered poilu, a blunt fellow, does not mince matters: ...
— The Forerunners • Romain Rolland

... Circassians who were presented for sale to Nicolas Ernest Kleeman (see his Voyage de Vienne, etc., 1780, pp. 142, 143) at Kaffa, in the Crimea. Of the first he writes, "Elle me baisa la main, et par l'ordre de son maitre, elle se promena en long et en large, pour me faire remarquer sa taille mince et aisee. Elle avoit un joli petit pied.... Quand elle a en ote son voile elle a presente a mes yeux une beaute tres-attrayante; ses cheveux etoient blonds argentes; elle avoit de grands yeux bleux, le nez un peu long, et les levres appetissantes. Sa figure etoit reguliere, son teint ...
— The Works of Lord Byron, Volume 6 • Lord Byron

... Does he mean to speak ill of Christmas—to stab it? We look again. No—it is that Christmas without roast Turkeys and Mince pies will be very bad. The "bare name"—that is what he will none of. But on the contrary the real thing he will have, with Roasts and bakes, and—possibly—Cordial Liquor to "Comfort up" the day. What a good word that "Comfort up" is. We ...
— The Galaxy - Vol. 23, No. 1 • Various

... a walk. It was a different Priorsford that he had come back to. A large draper's shop with plate-glass windows occupied the corner where Jenny Baxter had rolled her toffee-balls and twisted her "gundy," and where old Davy Linton had cut joints and weighed out mince-collops accompanied by wise weather prophecies, a smart fruiterer's shop now stood furnished with a wealth of fruit and vegetables unimagined in his young days. There were many handsome shops, the streets were wider ...
— Penny Plain • Anna Buchan (writing as O. Douglas)

... Queen Sandwiches—Mince finely two parts of cooked chicken or game to one part of cooked tongue, and one part minced cooked mushrooms or truffles. Add seasoning and a little lemon juice, and place between thin slices ...
— Breakfasts and Teas - Novel Suggestions for Social Occasions • Paul Pierce

... Leeuwarden," went on Sir Alec. He was never a man to mince words, as I noticed when visiting my aunt. Poor, pretty, ...
— The Chauffeur and the Chaperon • C. N. Williamson

... season them with pepper and salt, dip into clarified butter and cover with very fine crumbs or cracker meal. Broil them carefully, turning often. Make a sauce of a scant tablespoonful of finely chopped parsley, a shallot, two spoonfuls of pickled gherkins, and a boned anchovy. Mince all finely and separately. Squeeze over them the juice of a lemon; add half a tablespoonful of water and six of oil, and a little pepper. Mix all very well, and just before serving rub in ...
— Choice Cookery • Catherine Owen

... VEAL PATTIES.—Mince some veal that is not quite done with a little parsley, lemon-peel, a scrape of nutmeg, and a bit of salt; add a little cream and gravy just to moisten the meat; and add a little ham. do not warm it till the ...
— Burroughs' Encyclopaedia of Astounding Facts and Useful Information, 1889 • Barkham Burroughs

... I mean marrying well. You have no prejudices: I need not mince matters. This is the position: A young lady has got into trouble; her mother knows nothing of even a kiss. Her father is an honest notary, a man of honor; he has been wise enough to keep it dark. He wants to get his daughter married within a fortnight, ...
— The Muse of the Department • Honore de Balzac

... of me. You've naught to fear from me. Tell all you ken of me right out: no word Of yours can hurt me now: I'm shameless, now: I'm in the ditch, and spattered to the neck. Come, don't mince matters: your tongue's not so modest It fears to make your cheeks burn—I ken that; And when the question is a woman's virtue, It rattles like a reaper round a wheatfield, And as little cares if it's cutting grain or poppies. So, it's too ...
— Krindlesyke • Wilfrid Wilson Gibson

... wi' you, sirs, yince, But I've thocht better of it since; The maitter I will nowise mince, But tell ye true: I'll service wi' some ither prince, An' ...
— New Poems • Robert Louis Stevenson

... spike trade trash steam fresh smile skate slash stream whelp while brisk drove blush cheap carve quilt grove flush peach farce filth stove slush teach parse pinch clove brush reach barge flinch smote crush bleach large mince store ...
— McGuffey's Eclectic Spelling Book • W. H. McGuffey

... to carry the tiny infants to church. How to get them there, was a question. The whole house had been rummaged to provide things to carry the little folks in: but the supply of trays, and mince pie dishes, and crocks, was exhausted at the three hundred and sixtieth baby. So there was left only a Turk's Head, or round glazed earthen dish, fluted and curved, which looked like the turban of a Turk. Hence its name. Into this, the last batch of babies, or extra six girls, ...
— Dutch Fairy Tales for Young Folks • William Elliot Griffis

... went to the convention with my brothers and cousins, in a four-wheeled lumber wagon, drawn by four horses, with a white banner, having the words 'Boscawen Whig Delegation.' We had flags, and the horses' heads labelled 'Harrison and Tyler.' We had a roasted pig, mince pies, cakes, doughnuts and cheese, and a keg of cider. Before reaching Concord we were joined by the log cabin from Franklin, with coon skins, bear traps, etc., dangling from its sides. Boscawen sent nearly every Whig voter to the meeting. I hurrahed and sung, and was ...
— Charles Carleton Coffin - War Correspondent, Traveller, Author, and Statesman • William Elliot Griffis

... me," said the grocery man, as he thought that his trade in cider for mince pies would be cut off. "So you got him into the Good ...
— Peck's Bad Boy and His Pa - 1883 • George W. Peck

... least a living wage. Now, made rebellious by a fearful looking forward to the risks they were called upon to incur, they had to be met by more effective measures. Faced by this emergency, Power did not mince matters. It laid violent hands upon the unwilling subject and forced him, nolens volens, to sail its ships, to man its guns, and to fight its battles by sea as he already, under less overt compulsion, did its bidding ...
— The Press-Gang Afloat and Ashore • John R. Hutchinson

... apple through a fine food-chopper. Add the sugar, grated lemon rind, and nutmeg. Lastly, melt the nutter and add. Stir the mixture well, put it into clean jars, and tie down with parchment covers until needed for mince pies. ...
— The Healthy Life Cook Book, 2d ed. • Florence Daniel

... philosopher, to say nothing of the father of a family, crazy. Naturally I wish my daughters to become all that they ought to be. On the other hand, if a paterfamilias cannot trust his better half on this particular subject, he may as well imitate the example of certain savage tribes, and make mince-meat of the girls. Perhaps I seem to be worked up on the subject? Well, I am. The din of the moralists, and of the people who have never had a chance to go anywhere, is in my ears, and I cannot get altogether rid of it. Let us start afresh ...
— The Opinions of a Philosopher • Robert Grant

... The aunts had anticipated their Christmas turkey for that goodly company to help them eat it, but afterwards there was only time for a mince pie all round; for more than half the work remained to be done by all except mamma, who would stay and rest with Aunt Ada, having finished all that ...
— The Two Sides of the Shield • Charlotte M. Yonge

... Provins and form an opposition to them. You would soon see how popular that would make you; you would have a society about you at once. The Tiphaines would be furious at an opposition salon. Well, well, why not laugh at others, if others laugh at you?—and they do; the clique doesn't mince ...
— The Celibates - Includes: Pierrette, The Vicar of Tours, and The Two Brothers • Honore de Balzac

... itself, while the press and magazines are beginning to raise an occasional and troubled voice. Two leagues of class-conscious capitalists have been formed for the purpose of carrying on their side of the struggle. Like the socialists, they do not mince matters, but state boldly and plainly that they are fighting to subjugate the opposing class. It is the barons against the commons. One of these leagues, the National Association of Manufacturers, is stopping short of nothing in what it conceives ...
— War of the Classes • Jack London

... vice rice lace city since nice trice dice farce fence slice pace mice voice lance price trace grace pence mince truce mace cease hence prince place brace fleece dance thence space twice peace glance chance ...
— The Beacon Second Reader • James H. Fassett

... Mister Robinson he dident say ennymore you bet. after brekfast they went away, and Mister Fernald he shook hands with us all and he asked mother to let Cele and Keene come down to shake hands and she did. after they had went mother she gave us a peace of mince pie apeace and we all hoorayed for mother. none of us ...
— 'Sequil' - Or Things Whitch Aint Finished in the First • Henry A. Shute

... all the same, especially the hats of the fellows who were under some sort of obligation to Allegre. You would be astonished to hear the names of people, of real personalities in the world, who, not to mince matters, owed money to Allegre. And I don't mean in the world of art only. In the first rout of the surprise some story of an adopted daughter was set abroad hastily, I believe. You know 'adopted' with a peculiar accent on the word—and it was ...
— The Arrow of Gold - a story between two notes • Joseph Conrad

... Mr. Starr did not mince matters. "Jerry," he said abruptly, "did you and Prudence have a quarrel? She declines to tell me anything about it, and after the conversations you and I have had, I think I have a right to know what ...
— Prudence of the Parsonage • Ethel Hueston

... crushing and smashing every thing in its path—eternally splintered and scattered a wood pile at the foot of the hill, and then sprang from the high bank clear over a dray in the road—the negro glanced up once and dodged—and the next second it made infinitesimal mince-meat of a frame cooper-shop, and the coopers swarmed out like bees. Then we said it was perfectly magnificent, and left. Because the coopers were starting up ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... when he had finished. "Here we've been banking on an offer for some position in the syndicate, at least, something that would help clear the road to Wall Street where I should be able to strike out for myself without being dependent on any one—I didn't mince matters that day of the dinner when I told him what I wanted, either! And here I get an offer to go to Europe for five years and study banking systems and the Lord knows what in London, Paris, and Berlin, and act as a ...
— Flamsted quarries • Mary E. Waller

... her consent, and a few minutes later, Jessie was trotting along at the side of her uncle, in the road which led toward the village. A hired man followed them at a little distance, bearing a large basket well filled with mince-pies, and other Thanksgiving luxuries for the table. Mr. Morris was going to distribute them among certain poor families, to whom he had sent turkeys the day before. It was part of his religion to do what he could to enable the virtuous poor to share in the pleasures ...
— Jessie Carlton - The Story of a Girl who Fought with Little Impulse, the - Wizard, and Conquered Him • Francis Forrester

... persistently strict in sticking to the things which didn't agree with me until one or the other of us got the best of it. Until lately I got the best of it myself. But last spring I stopped frolicking with mince-pie after midnight; up to then I had always believed it wasn't loaded. For thirty years I have taken coffee and bread at eight in the morning, and no bite nor sup until seven-thirty in the evening. Eleven hours. That is all right for me, and is wholesome, because I have ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain

... and French-fried potatoes and gallons of ale (a repast which he may have been ignorant in assigning to the African jungles, but which seemed peculiarly well chosen, after a lunch-room dinner of watery corned-beef hash, burnt German-fried potatoes, and indigestible hot mince-pie). His thoughts drifted off to Plato. But Carl had a certain resoluteness even in these loose days. He considered the manoeuvers for a new job. He desired one which would permit him to go to theaters with the girl in ...
— The Trail of the Hawk - A Comedy of the Seriousness of Life • Sinclair Lewis

... in prose—in the prose especially of sous and francs; she talked of rents, of the price of food, of the state of wages in her husband's trade. Yet every here and there came an exquisite word, a flash. It seemed that she had been very ill with her first child. She did not mince matters much even with this young man, and David gathered that she had not only been near dying, but that her illness had made a moral epoch in her life. She was laid by for three months; work was slack for her husband; her own earnings, for she was a skilled embroideress working for a great ...
— The History of David Grieve • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... man and brutally frank like many old soldiers he had kept in private life the tone and ways of barracks and camps. As he said himself, he did not mince the truth to anybody, and he repeated readily, without understanding it, the saying of Gonsalvo of Cordova, the great captain, "The cloth of ...
— The Grip of Desire • Hector France

... take pleasure in wild adventure and useless fatigue. In this satire, which is the most condensed of all, the literary defects of the author are at their height. His moral taste is not irreproachable; in his desire not to mince matters he offends needlessly against propriety. [16] The picture he draws of the fashionable rhetorician with languishing eyes and throat mellowed by a luscious gargle, warbling his drivelling ditties to an excited audience, is powerful and lifelike. From assemblies like ...
— A History of Roman Literature - From the Earliest Period to the Death of Marcus Aurelius • Charles Thomas Cruttwell

... ever bothers me he'll catch it warm," came from Tom. "I shan't attempt to mince matters with him. Everybody at this school knows what a bully he was, and they know, too, what a rascal he's been since he left. So I say, let him beware!" And so bringing the conversation to an end for the time being, Tom Rover ...
— The Rover Boys In The Mountains • Arthur M. Winfield

... of veal, of eels, of bream and salmon, of young rabbits, of pigeons, of small birds, of geese, and of narrois" (a mixture of cod's liver and hashed fish). We may mention also the small pies, which were made of minced beef and raisins, similar to our mince pies, and which were hawked in the streets of Paris, until their sale was forbidden, because the trade encouraged greediness on the one hand and laziness on ...
— Manners, Custom and Dress During the Middle Ages and During the Renaissance Period • Paul Lacroix

... the ham. Their usual bill of fare was composed of potatoes and corn-bread, and sometimes corn-bread alone. My wife had put up a lunch for me, fearing that I might not be able to get anything to eat, in which there was a small mince-pie turnover; and the children had slipped a small box of candy in my bag as a Christmas gift. I produced the turnover which by common consent was divided between the astonished children. Such a glistening of eyes and smacking of small ...
— A Little Book for Christmas • Cyrus Townsend Brady

... generosity wanting. Mahomet makes no apology for the one, no boast of the other. They were each the free dictate of his heart; each called-for, there and then. Not a mealy-mouthed man! A candid ferocity, if the case call for it, is in him; he does not mince matters! The War of Tabuc is a thing he often speaks of: his men refused, many of them, to march on that occasion: pleaded the heat of the weather, the harvest, and so forth; he can never forget that. Your harvest? It lasts for a day. What will ...
— Sartor Resartus, and On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History • Thomas Carlyle

... answered; "and, not to mince the matter, it needed it confoundedly. Some of our officers who have seen the hardest service of the last war, declare, that taking the march, and the popping work, and the distance, altogether, it was the warmest day they remember. ...
— Wyandotte • James Fenimore Cooper

... the only one who did not attempt to mince matters. When a little boy he had openly declared he hated Aunt Salina; when he grew up he as openly defied her, and it was a most difficult matter to keep even decent peace between them. Hilary's wrath had never gone further than wishing Selina was married, that appearing ...
— Mistress and Maid • Dinah Craik (aka: Miss Mulock)

... remainder of the A la mode BEEF; make a suet crust, (cost five cents,) as directed for SUET DUMPLINGS, roll it out quarter of an inch thick, cut it out with a round tin cutter, lay a tablespoonful of the mince-meat on each round, wet the edges of the crust, and fold it over in the shape of an old-fashioned turn-over; pinch the edges together, put the patties on a floured baking-pan, and bake them about half an hour in a moderate oven. When you put them in the oven, put one quart of potatoes, (cost three ...
— Twenty-Five Cent Dinners for Families of Six • Juliet Corson

... flirting her fan and tossing her head, on which she wore a great pink turban, contrasting oddly with her blue brocade dress and yellow quilted petticoat. She was obliged to walk carefully, for she had on highheeled shoes, and, as Laurie told Jo afterward, it was a comical sight to see her mince along in her gay suit, with Polly sidling and bridling just behind her, imitating her as well as he could, and occasionally stopping to laugh or exclaim, "Ain't we fine? Get along, you fright! Hold your tongue! ...
— Little Women • Louisa May Alcott

... this Journal it is chronicled that John Bunyan scrupled to eat mince-pies, because of the superstitious character popularly attached to them; but it would appear from an anecdote sent to us by a correspondent, that if this was true at all of the author of the Pilgrim's Progress, he must have received new light ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 424, New Series, February 14, 1852 • Various

... to see you, sorry to see you. The odious newspapers were the cause of your discovering the crime—don't stop me—the crime of that wretch downstairs—" Belle started. "I sha'n't mince words with you. Sig was a scamp, a gifted rascal; his singing and artistic love-making the cause of many ...
— Melomaniacs • James Huneker

... there was no fear of our repeating what he said, Surajah. He is a frank, outspoken old soldier, and has evidently been so disgusted at the treatment of the prisoners that he could not mince his words; and yet, you know, he did not absolutely say that he had ...
— The Tiger of Mysore - A Story of the War with Tippoo Saib • G. A. Henty

... worthy of a passing notice, was a lady of a very different stamp. Who or what she had been in former years, I could not ascertain, but she appeared before us in the character of a middle-aged mince-pie monomaniac, and jam-tart amateur. The poor harmless creature was clad in the veriest shreds of dusky feminine attire, which barely shielded her limbs from the inclemency of the weather. She had a notion that she, too, was a lady, and that, being ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 432 - Volume 17, New Series, April 10, 1852 • Various

... entitled to the truth," said he. "Tell us frankly all you know about me, and do not mince words—whatever the ...
— Aunt Jane's Nieces on Vacation • Edith Van Dyne

... pocket—a golden half guinea in a little box, with three shillings and a few coppers, including a farthing. The pence she gave to three of her little brothers and sisters. One boy, however, 'had huffed her,' and got no penny. But she relented, and, when she went out, bought for him a mince-pie. Her visit of New Year's Day was to her maternal aunt, Mrs. Colley, living at Saltpetre Bank (Dock Street, behind the London Dock). She meant to return in time to buy, with her mother, a cloak, but the Colleys had a ...
— Historical Mysteries • Andrew Lang

... often occurs that a can of salmon is not all used at a meal, and yet there is not quite enough for another meal without other dishes or ingredients added to it. Should this occur, mince the salmon, heat, and season it and serve it on toast. A poached egg added to ...
— Breakfast Dainties • Thomas J. Murrey

... Kate, my wooing is fit for thy understanding: I am glad thou canst speak no better English; for if thou couldst, thou wouldst find me such a plain king that thou wouldst think I had sold my farm to buy my crown. I know no ways to mince it in love, but directly to say, "I love you"; then if you urge me farther than to say, "Do you in faith?" I wear out my suit. Give me your answer; i' faith, do; and so clap hands and a ...
— The Life of King Henry V • William Shakespeare [Tudor edition]

... Arithmetic, ma'am?" she asked timidly. "Colburn's Fiddlestick!" said the old woman, shortly. "Here's another for you. Put a boy up an apple-tree, and divide him by a good sized bull-dog; what will remain? hey?" "I'm sure I don't know," said poor Polly, faintly. "Mince-meat, of course," said the old woman. "You don't know much, evidently." "What a dreadful looking cat!" thought Polly. And indeed, he did not look like an amiable animal. His green eyes shone with an uncanny ...
— Five Mice in a Mouse-trap - by the Man in the Moon. • Laura E. Richards

... blacksmithing profession. Not exactly at the forge in the Lafittes' famous smithy, among the African Samsons, who, with their shining black bodies bared to the waist, made the Rue St. Pierre ring with the stroke of their hammers; but as a—there was no occasion to mince the word in ...
— Madame Delphine • George W. Cable

... sitting at the table this clear Thanksgiving noon; I smell the crispy turkey, the pies will come in soon,— The golden squares of pumpkin, the flaky rounds of mince, Behind the barberry syrups, ...
— Our Young Folks, Vol 1, No. 1 - An Illustrated Magazine • Various

... and how "it made my heart rejoice to see the wonderful justice my travellers did to everything set before them." All this and much more, including "a jug of wassail" and the "hot plum-pudding and mince pies," which "a wall-eyed young man connected with the fly department at the hotel was, at a given signal, to dash into the kitchen, seize, and speed with to Dr. Watts's Charity," was painted with a warmth and colour that made my mouth water, even after the plate of cold beef, ...
— Faces and Places • Henry William Lucy

... were soused all over.-Come, come, don't mince the matter, never spoil a good story; you know you hadn't a dry thread about you-'Fore George, I shall never think on't without hollooing! such a poor forlorn draggle-tailed-gentlewoman! and poor Monseer French, here, like a drowned rat, ...
— Evelina • Fanny Burney

... to carry a much heavier load than his basket of mince-pies and roast chickens; for as Nannie skipped along, her foot slipped, and down she came, basket and all, while grannie's nice mince-pies tumbled out, and rolled down ...
— Nanny Merry - or, What Made the Difference • Anonymous

... The machine was provided with a fly-wheel and double crank, with connecting rods which worked a cross head. It contained a dozen knives crossing each other at right angles in such a way as to enable them to mince or divide the meat on a revolving block. Another part of the apparatus accomplished the filling of the sausages in a very expert manner, to the entire satisfaction ...
— Industrial Biography - Iron Workers and Tool Makers • Samuel Smiles



Words linked to "Mince" :   mince pie, nutrition, nourishment, alimentation, change, chop up, alter, mincer, soften, moderate, chop, victuals, aliment, nutriment, modify



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