  Ground-state scalar isoscalar mesons and a scalar glueball are described in a
U(3)xU(3) chiral quark model of the Nambu--Jona-Lasinio (NJL) type with 't
Hooft interaction. The latter interaction produces singlet-octet mixing in the
scalar and pseudoscalar sectors. The glueball is introduced into the effective
meson Lagrangian as a dilaton on the base of scale invariance. The mixing of
the glueball with scalar isoscalar quarkonia and amplitudes of their decays
into two pseudoscalar mesons are shown to be proportional to current quark
masses, vanishing in the chiral limit. Mass spectra of the scalar mesons and
the glueball and their main modes of strong decay are described.
