CHAPTER IV

CORN

_Planting_

Corn planting began the second month after sunflower-seed was planted,

that is in May; and it lasted about a month. It sometimes continued

pretty well into June, but not later than that; for the sun then begins

to go back into the south, and men began to tell eagle-hunting stories.

We knew when corn planting time came by observing the leaves of the wild

gooseberry bushes. This bush is the first of the woods to leaf in the

spring. Old women of the village were going to the woods daily to gather

fire wood; and when they saw that the wild gooseberry bushes were almost

in full leaf, they said, “It is time for you to begin planting corn!”

Corn was planted each year in the same hills.

Around each of the old and dead hills I loosened the soil with my hoe,

first pulling up the old, dead roots of the previous year’s plants; these

dead roots, as they collected, were raked off with other refuse to one

end of the field outside of the cultivated ground, to be burned.

This pulling up of the dead roots and working around the old hill with

the hoe, left the soil soft and loose for the space of about eighteen

inches in diameter; and in this soft soil I planted the corn in this

manner:

I stooped over, and with fingers of both hands I raked away the loose

soil for a bed for the seed; and with my fingers I even stirred the soil

around with a circular motion to make the bed perfectly level so that the

seeds would all lie at the same depth.

A small vessel, usually a wooden bowl, at my feet held the seed

corn. With my right hand I took a small handful of the corn, quickly

transferring half of it to my left hand; still stooping over, and plying

both hands at the same time, I pressed the grains a half inch into the

soil with my thumbs, planting two grains at a time, one with each hand.

[Illustration: Figure 7]

I planted about six to eight grains in a hill[7] (figure 7). Then with my

hands I raked the earth over the planted grains until the seed lay about

the length of my fingers under the soil. Finally I patted the hill firm

with my palms.

The space within the hill in which the seed kernels were planted should

be about nine inches in diameter; but the completed hill should nearly

cover the space broken up by the hoe.

The corn hills I planted well apart, because later, in hilling up, I

would need room to draw earth from all directions over the roots to

protect them from the sun, that they might not dry out. Corn planted in

hills too close together would have small ears and fewer of them; and the

stalks of the plants would be weak, and often dried out.

If the corn hills were so close together that the plants when they grew

up, touched each other, we called them “smell-each-other”; and we knew

that the ears they bore would not be plump nor large.

_A Morning’s Planting_

We Hidatsa women were early risers in the planting season; it was my

habit to be up before sunrise, while the air was cool, for we thought

this the best time for garden work.

Having arrived at the field I would begin one hill, preparing it, as I

have said, with my hoe; and so for ten rows each as long as from this

spot to yonder fence—about thirty yards; the rows were about four feet

apart, and the hills stood about the same distance apart in the row.

The hills all prepared, I went back and planted them, patting down each

with my palms, as described. Planting corn thus by hand was slow work;

but by ten o’clock the morning’s work was done, and I was tired and ready

to go home for my breakfast and rest; we did not eat before going into

the field. The ten rows making the morning’s planting contained about two

hundred and twenty-five hills.

I usually went to the field every morning in the planting season, if the

weather was fine. Sometimes I went out again a little before sunset and

planted; but this was not usual.

_Soaking the Seed_

The very last corn that we planted we sometimes put into a little tepid

water, if the season was late. Seed used for replanting hills that had

been destroyed by crows or magpies we also soaked. We left the seed in

the water only a short time, when the water was poured off.

The water should be tepid only, so that when poured through the fingers

it felt hardly warmed. Hot water would kill the seeds.

Seed corn thus soaked would have sprouts a third of an inch long within

four or five days after planting, if the weather was warm. I know this,

because we sometimes dug up some of the seeds to see. This soaked seed

produced strong plants, but the first-planted, dry seeds still produced

the first ripened ears.

If warm water was not convenient, I sometimes put these last planted

corn seeds in my mouth; and when well wetted, planted them. But these

mouth-wetted seeds produced, we thought, a great many wi´da-aka´ta, or

goose-upper-roof-of-mouth, ears.

_Planting for a Sick Woman_

It was usual for the women of a household to do their own planting; but

if a woman was sick, or for some reason was unable to attend to her

planting, she sometimes cooked a feast, to which she invited the members

of her age society and asked them to plant her field for her.

The members of her society would come upon an appointed day and plant her

field in a short time; sometimes a half day was enough.

There were about thirty members in my age society when I was a young

woman. If we were invited to plant a garden for some sick woman, each

member would take a row to plant; and each would strive to complete her

row first. A member having completed her row, might begin a second, and

even a third row; or if, when each had completed one row, there was but a

small part of the field yet unplanted, all pitched in miscellaneously and

finished the planting.

_Size of Our Biggest Field_

When our corn was in, we began planting beans and squashes. Beans we

commonly planted between corn rows, sometimes over the whole field, more

often over a part of it. Our bean and squash planting I will describe

later; and I speak of it now only because I wish to explain to you how a

Hidatsa garden was laid out.

The largest field ever owned in my father’s family was the one which I

have said my grandmother Turtle helped clear, at Like-a-fishhook village,

or Fort Berthold, as the whites called it. The field, begun small, was

added to each year and did not reach its maximum size for some years.

The field was nearly rectangular in shape; at the time of its greatest

size, its length was about equal to the distance from this spot to yonder

fence—one hundred and eighty yards; and its width, to the distance from

the corner of this cabin to yonder white post—ninety yards.

The size of a garden was determined chiefly by the industry of the family

that owned it, and by the number of mouths that must be fed.

When I was six years old, there were, I think, ten in my father’s family,

of whom my two grandmothers, my mother and her three sisters, made six. I

have said that my mother and her three sisters were wives of Small Ankle,

my father. It was this year that my mother and Corn Sucker died, however.

My father’s wives and my two grandmothers, all industrious women, added

each year to the area of our field; for our family was growing. At the

time our garden reached its maximum size, there were seven boys in the

family; three of these died young, but four grew up and brought wives to

live in our earth lodge.

_Na´xu and Nu´cami_

In our big garden at Like-a-fishhook village, nine rows of corn, running

lengthwise with the field, made one na´xu, or Indian acre, as we usually

translate it. There were ten of these na´xus, or Indian acres, in the

garden.

[Illustration: Figure 8]

Some families of our village counted eight rows of corn to one na´xu,

others counted ten rows.

The rows of the na´xus always ran the length of the garden; and if the

field curved, as it sometimes did around a bend of the river, or other

irregularity, the rows curved with it.

In our garden a row of squashes separated each na´xu from its neighbor.

Four rows of corn running widthwise with the garden made one nu´cami; and

as was the na´xu, each nu´cami was separated from its neighbor by a row

of squashes, or beans, or in some families, even by sunflowers.

Like those of the na´xus, the rows of the nu´camis often curved to follow

some irregularity in the shape of the garden plot. (See figure 8.)

_Hoeing_

Hoeing time began when the corn was about three inches high; but this

varied somewhat with the season. Some seasons were warm, and the corn and

weeds grew rapidly; other seasons were colder, and delayed the growth of

the corn.

Corn plants about three inches high we called

“young-bird’s-feather-tail-corn,” because the plants then had blunt ends,

like the tail feathers of a very young bird.

Corn and weeds alike grew rapidly now, and we women of the household were

out with our hoes daily, to keep ahead of the weeds. We worked as in

planting season, in the early morning hours.

I cultivated each hill carefully with my hoe as I came to it; and if the

plants were small, I would comb the soil of the hill lightly with my

fingers, loosening the earth and tearing out young weeds.

We did not hoe the corn alone, but went right through the garden, corn,

squashes, beans, and all. Weeds were let lie on the ground, as they were

now young and harmless.

We hoed but once, not very many weeds coming up to bother us afterwards.

In my girlhood we were not troubled with mustard and thistles; these

weeds have come in with white men.

In many families hoeing ended, I think, when the corn was about seven or

eight inches high: but I remember when my mothers finished hoeing their

big field at Like-a-fishhook village, the corn was about eighteen inches

high, and the blossoms at the top of the plants were appearing.

A second hoeing began, it is true, when the corn silk appeared, but was

accompanied by hilling, so that we looked upon it rather as a hilling

time. Hilling was done to firm the plants against the wind and cover the

roots from the sun. We hilled with earth, about four inches up around the

roots of the corn.

Not a great many weeds were found in the garden at hilling time, unless

the season had been wet; but weeds at this season are apt to have seeds,

so that it was my habit to bear such weeds off the field, that the seeds

might not fall and sprout the next season.

With the corn, the squashes and beans were also hilled; but this was an

easier task. The bean hills, especially, were made small at the first,

and hilling them up afterwards was not hard work. If beans were hilled

too high the vines got beaten down into the mud by the rains and rotted.

_The Watchers’ Stage_

Our corn fields had many enemies. Magpies, and especially crows, pulled

up much of the young corn, so that we had to replant many hills. Crows

were fond of pulling up the green shoots when they were a half inch or

an inch high. Spotted gophers would dig up the seed from the roots of

young plants. When the corn had eared, and the grains were still soft,

blackbirds and crows were destructive.

Any hills of young corn that the birds destroyed, I replanted if the

season was not too late. If only a part of the plants in a hill had been

destroyed, I did not disturb the living plants, but replanted only the

destroyed ones. In the place of each missing plant, I dug a little hole

with my hand, and dropped in a seed.

We made scarecrows[8] to frighten the crows. Two sticks were driven

into the ground for legs; to these were bound two other sticks, like

outstretched arms; on the top was fastened a ball of cast-away skins, or

the like, for a head. An old buffalo robe was drawn over the figure and a

belt tied around its middle, to make it look like a man. Such a scarecrow

would keep the crows away for a few days but when they saw that the

figure never moved from its place, they lost their fear and returned.

A platform, or stage, was often built in a garden, where the girls and

young women of the household came to sit and sing as they watched that

crows and other thieves did not destroy the ripening crop. We cared for

our corn in those days as we would care for a child; for we Indian people

loved our gardens, just as a mother loves her children; and we thought

that our growing corn liked to hear us sing, just as children like to

hear their mother sing to them.[9] Also, we did not want the birds to

come and steal our corn. Horses, too, might break in and crop the plants,

or boys might steal the green ears and go off and roast them.

Our Hidatsa name for such a stage was adukati´ i´kakĕ-ma´tsati, or field

watchers’ stage; from adukati´, field; i´kakĕ, watch; and ma´tsati,

stage. These stages, while common, were not in every garden. I had one in

my garden where I used to sit and sing.

A watchers’ stage resembled a stage for drying grain, but it was built

more simply. Four posts, forked at the top, supported two parallel

beams, or stringers; on these beams was laid a floor of puncheons, or

split small logs, at about the height of the full grown corn. This floor

was about the length and breadth of Wolf Chief’s table—forty-three by

thirty-five inches—and was thus large enough to permit two persons to sit

together. A ladder made of the trunk of a tree rested against the stage.

Such stages we did not value as we did our drying stages, nor did we use

so much care in building them. If the posts were of green wood, we did

not trouble to peel off the bark; at least, I never saw such posts with

the bark peeled off. The beams in the forks of the posts often lay with

the bark on. The puncheons that made the floor of the stage were free of

bark, because they were commonly split from old, dead, floating logs,

that we got down at the Missouri River; if the whole stage was built of

these dead logs, as was often done, the bark would be wanting on every

beam.

A watchers’ stage, indeed, was usually of rather rough construction; wood

was plentiful and easy to get, and the stage was rebuilt each year.

As I have said, it was our custom to locate our gardens on the timbered,

bottom lands, and when we cleared off the timber and brush, we often

left a tree, usually of cottonwood, standing in the field, to shade the

watchers’ stage. The stage stood on the north, or shady, side of the tree.

Cottonwood seedlings were apt to spring up in newly cleared ground. If

there was no tree in the field, one of these seedlings might be let grow

into a small tree. Cottonwoods grew very rapidly.

The tree that shaded the watchers’ stage in our family field, and which

I have indicated on the map, was about as high as my son Goodbird’s

cabin, and had a trunk about four inches in diameter. The cottonwood

tree standing in Wolf Chief’s corn field this present summer, is perhaps

about the height of the trees that used to stand in our fields at

Like-a-fishhook village.

_Explanation of Sketch of Watchers’ Stage_

My son Goodbird has made a sketch, under my direction, of a watchers’

stage (figure 9).

The stage was placed close to the tree shading it, about a foot from the

trunk. Holes for the posts were dug with a long digging stick; and the

posts were set firm, like fence posts.

The stage was made nearly square, so that the watchers could sit facing

any side with equal ease. The beams supporting the floor might be laid

east and west, or north and south; but as the tree stood always on the

south side of the stage, the floor beams lay always in one of these two

ways.

[Illustration: Figure 9

Redrawn from sketch by Edward Goodbird.]

In the sketch a skin[10] is seen lying on the stage floor. This is a

buffalo calf skin, folded fur out, to make a seat for the watcher. The

skin might be folded tail to head, or side to side; and sometimes it was

folded flesh side out. It never hung down over the edges of the stage

floor, but was folded up neatly to make a kind of cushion. The puncheon

floor, at best never very smooth, was rather hard to sit upon; and

letting a part of the skin hang down over the side would have been waste

of good cushion material.

The three poles on the right of the stage support another calf skin, used

as a shield against the sun. The poles merely rested on the ground; they

were not thrust into the soil. They could be shifted about with the sun,

so that the watcher had shade in any part of the day.

The calf skin used for a sun shade hung on the poles head downward;

whether it lay fur or flesh side down did not matter.

Skins dressed by Indians have holes cut along the edges for the wooden

pins by which they are staked out on the ground to dry. The poles

upholding the skin shade we cut of willows; and we were careful to trim

off the branches, leaving little stubs sticking out on the trunk of the

pole. These little stubs we slipped through some of the holes in the edge

of the skin shade to uphold it and stay it in place. It was not necessary

to bind the skin down with thongs; just slipping the stubs through the

holes was enough.

Poles for a sun shade were cut indifferently of dry or green wood; and

they lasted the entire season.

The ladder by which we mounted a watchers’ stage rested against either of

the corners next the tree, against one of the two beams supporting the

floor; however we did not consider a watchers’ stage to be sacred, and we

placed the ladder anywhere it might be convenient.

The ladder was a cottonwood trunk, cut with three steps; more were not

needed, as the stage floor was not high.

_Sweet Grass’s Sun Shade_

If the tree sheltering a stage had scant foliage, we often cut thick,

leafy cottonwood boughs and thrust them horizontally through the branches

of the tree to increase its shade. It was a common thing for the watchers

to tie a robe across the face of the tree for the same purpose.

If no tree grew in the garden, a small cottonwood with thick, leafy

branches was cut and propped against the south or sunny side of the stage.

There was an old woman named Sweet Grass who had no tree in her garden.

She built a stage just like that in Goodbird’s sketch (figure 9). To

shade it I remember she cut several small cottonwood trees and set them

in holes made with her digging stick, along the south side of her stage.

They stood there in a row and shaded the stage quite effectively. Her

stage stood rather close to the edge of her garden.

_The Watchers_

The season for watching the fields began early in August when green corn

began to come in; for this was the time when the ripening ears were apt

to be stolen by horses, or birds, or boys. We did not watch the fields in

the spring and early summer, to keep the crows from pulling up the newly

sprouted grain; such damage we were content to repair by replanting.

Girls began to go on the watchers’ stage to watch the corn and sing, when

they were about ten or twelve years of age. They continued the custom

even after they had grown up and married; and old women, working in the

garden and stopping to rest, often went on the stage and sang.

Two girls usually watched and sang together. The village gardens were

laid out close to one another; and a girl of one family would be joined

by the girl of the family who owned the garden adjoining. Sometimes

three, or even four, girls got on the stage and sang together; but never

more than four. A drum was not used to accompany the singing.

The watchers sometimes rose and stood upon the stage as they looked to

see if any boys or horses were in the field, stealing corn. Older girls

and young married women, and even old women, often worked at porcupine

embroidery as they watched. Very young girls did not embroider.

Boys of nine to eleven years of age were sometimes rather troublesome

thieves. They were fond of stealing green ears to roast by a fire in the

woods. Sometimes—not every day, however—we had to guard our corn alertly.

A boy caught stealing was merely scolded. “You must not steal here

again!” we would say to him. His parents were not asked to pay damage for

the theft.

We went to the watchers’ stage quite early in the day, before sunrise, or

near it, and we came home at sunset.

The watching season continued until the corn was all gathered and

harvested. My grandmother, Turtle, was a familiar figure in our family’s

field, in this season. I can remember her staying out in the field daily,

picking out the ripening ears and braiding them in a string.

_Booths_

There were a good many booths in the gardens that lay west of the

village. Usually a booth stood at one side of every field in which was a

watchers’ stage.

To make a booth, we cut diamond willows, stood them in the ground in a

circle, and bending over the leafy tops, tied them together. A few leafy

branches were interwoven into the top to increase the shade; but there

was no further covering.

A booth had a floor diameter of nine or ten feet, and was as high as I

can conveniently reach with my hands—six feet.

The girls who sang and watched the ripening corn cooked in these booths.

I often did so when I was a young girl; for cooking at the booth was done

by all the watchers, even young girls of ten or twelve years. I have

often seen my grandmother, Turtle, also, in her booth very early in the

morning, in the corn season.

_Eating Customs_

A meal was eaten sometimes just after sunrise, or a little later; but we

never had regular meal hours in the field. We cooked and ate whenever

we got hungry, or when visitors came; or we strayed over to other

gardens and ate with our friends. If relatives came, the watchers often

entertained them by giving them something to eat.

To cook the meal a fire was made in the booth. Meat had been brought out

from the village, dried or fresh buffalo meat usually. Fresh meat was

laid on the coals to broil; dried meat was thrust on the end of a stick

that leaned over the coals; and when one side was well toasted it was

turned over.

Fresh squashes we boiled in clay or iron pots; a good many brass or

copper kettles also were in use when I was young. We were fond of

squashes.

A common dish was green corn and beans. The corn was shelled off the cob

and boiled with green beans that were shelled also; sometimes the beans

were boiled in the pod.

[Illustration: Figure 10

Redrawn from sketch by Goodbird of specimen made by Buffalobird-woman.]

To serve the corn and beans we poured the mess into a wooden bowl and ate

with spoons made from the stems of squash leaves. Figure 10 is a sketch

of such a spoon. The squash stem was split at one end and the split was

held open by a little stick. Stems of leaves of our native squashes have

tiny prickles on them, but these did not hurt the eater’s lips. Leaf

stems of native squashes I think are firmer and stronger than those of

white men’s squashes, such as we now raise.

My grandmother, Turtle, was a faithful watcher in our family field in the

watching season. I remember she used to bring home in the evening all the

uneaten corn she had boiled that day.

_Youths’ and Maidens’ Customs_

We always kept drinking water at the stage; and if relatives came out, we

freely gave them to drink. But boys and young men who came were offered

neither food nor drink, unless they were relatives.

Our tribe’s custom in such things was well understood.

The youths of the village used to go about all the time seeking the

girls; this indeed was almost all they did. Of course, when the girls

were on the watchers’ stage the boys were pretty sure to come around.

Sometimes two youths came together, sometimes but one. If there were

relatives at the watchers’ stage the boys would stop and drink or eat;

they did not try to talk to the girls, but would come around smiling and

try to get the girls to smile back.

To illustrate our custom, if a boy came out to a watchers’ stage, we

girls that were sitting upon it did not say a word to him. It was our

rule that we should work and should not say anything to him. So we sat,

not looking at him, nor saying a word. He would smile and perhaps stop

and get a drink of water.

Indeed, a girl that was not a youth’s sweetheart, never talked to him.

This rule was observed at all times. Even when a boy was a girl’s

sweetheart, or “love-boy” as we called him, if there were other persons

around, she did not talk to him, unless these happened to be relatives.

Boys who came out to the watchers’ stage, getting no encouragement from

the girls there, soon went away.

A very young girl was not permitted to go to the watchers’ stage unless

an old woman went along to take care of her. In olden days, mothers

watched their daughters very carefully.

_Watchers’ Songs_

Most of the songs that were sung on the watchers’ stage were love songs,

but not all.

One that little girls were fond of singing—girls that is of about twelve

years of age—was as follows:

You bad boys, you are all alike!

Your bow is like a bent basket hoop;

You poor boys, you have to run on the prairie barefoot;

Your arrows are fit for nothing but to shoot up into the sky!

This song was sung for the benefit of the boys who came to the near-by

woods to hunt birds.

Here is another song; but that you may understand it I shall first have

to explain to you what ikupa´ means.

A girl whom another girl loves as her own sister, we call her ikupa´. I

think your word chum, as you explain it, has about the same meaning. This

is the song:

“My ikupa´, what do you wish to see?” you said to me.

What I wish to see is the corn silk coming out on the growing ear;

But what _you_ wish to see is that naughty young man coming!

Here is a song that we sang to tease young men that were going by:

You young man of the Dog society, you said to me,

“When I go to the east on a war party, you will hear news of me how

brave I am!”

I have heard news of you;

When the fight was on, you ran and hid!

And you think you are a brave young man!

Behold you have joined the Dog society;

Therefore, I call you just plain dog!

These songs from the watchers’ stage we called mi´daxika, or gardeners’

songs. The words of these I have just given you we called love-boy words;

and they were intended to tease.

There was another class of songs sung from the watchers’ stage that did

not have love-boy words. I will give you one of these, but to make it

intelligible, I must first explain a custom of my tribe.

_Clan Cousins’ Custom_

Let us suppose that a woman of the Tsi´stska Doxpa´ka marries a man of

the Midipa´di clan. Their child will be a Tsi´stska; for we Hidatsas

reckon every child to belong to the clan of his mother; and the members

of the mother’s clan will be clan sisters and clan brothers to her child.

Another woman of the tribe, of what clan does not matter, also marries a

Midipa´di husband; and they have a child. The child of the first mother

and the child of the second we reckon as makutsati, or clan cousins,

since their fathers being of the same clan, are clan brothers.

In old times these clan cousins had a custom of teasing one another;

especially was this teasing common between young men and young women.

For example, a young man, unlucky in war, might be passing the gardens

and hear some mischievous girl, his clan cousin, singing a song taunting

him for his ill success. From any one else this would be taken for the

deepest insult; but seeing that the singer was his clan cousin, the young

man only called out good humoredly, “Sing louder, cousin!”

I can best explain this custom by telling you a story.

_Story of Snake-head-ornament_

A long time ago, in one of our villages at Knife River, there lived a man

Mapuksao´kihec, or Snake-head-ornament. He was a great medicine man; and

in his earth lodge he kept a bull snake, whom he called “father.”

When Snake-head-ornament started to go to a feast he would say to the

bull snake, “Come, father, let us go and get something to eat!”

The snake would crawl up the man’s body, coil about his neck and thrust

his head forward over the man’s crown and forehead; or he would coil

about the man’s head like the head cloth a hunter used to wear, with his

head thrust forward as I have said.

Bearing the snake thus on his head, Snake-head-ornament would enter some

man’s lodge and sit down to eat. The snake however never ate with him,

for his food was not the same as the man’s; the bull snake’s food was

hide scrapings which the women of the lodge fed to him.

When Snake-head-ornament came home again he would say to the bull snake,

“Father, get off.”

The snake would creep down from the man’s head, but before he entered

his hole he would roll himself about on the earth lodge floor.

Snake-head-ornament would say to him, “What are you doing? Do you think I

am bad smelling, and do you want to wash off the smell from your body? It

is you who are bad smelling; yet I do not despise _you_!”

The snake, hearing this, would creep into his hole as if ashamed.

Snake-head-ornament made up a war party and led it against enemies on

the Yellowstone River. The party not only failed to kill any of the

enemy, but lost three of their own men. This was a kind of disgrace to

Snake-head-ornament; for as leader of the war party he was responsible

for it. He thought his gods had deserted him; and when he came home he

went about crying and mourning and calling upon his gods to give him

another vision. He was a brave man and had many honor marks; and his ill

success made his heart sore.

In old times, when one mourned, either man or woman, he cut off his hair,

painted his body with white clay and went without moccasins; he also cut

himself with some sharp instrument.

In those days also, when a man went out to seek his god, he went away

from the village, alone, into the hills; and thus it happened that

Snake-head-ornament, on his way to the hills, went mourning and crying

past a garden where sat a woman, his clan cousin, on her watchers’ stage.

Seeing him, she began to sing a song to tease him:

He said, “I am a young bird!”

If a young bird, he should be in a nest;

But he comes around here looking gray,

And wanders aimlessly everywhere outside the village!

He said, “I am a young snake!”

If a young snake, he should stay in the hills among the red buttes;

But he comes around here looking gray and crying,

And wanders aimlessly everywhere!

When the woman sang, “he comes around here looking gray,” she meant that

the man was gray from the white clay paint on his body.

Snake-head-ornament heard her song, but knowing she was his clan cousin,

cried out to her:

“My elder sister, sing louder! You are right; let my fathers hear what

you say. I do not know whether they will feel shame or not; but the snake

and the white eagle both called me ‘son’!”

What he meant was that the snake and the white eagle were his dream gods;

and that they had both called him “son,” in a vision. In her song the

woman had taunted him with this. If she had been any one but his clan

cousin, he would have been beside himself with anger. As it was, he kept

his good humor, and did her no hurt.

But the woman had sung her song for a cause. Years before, when

Snake-head-ornament was quite a young man and as yet had won few honors

he went on a war party and killed a Sioux woman. When he came home he

was looked upon as a successful warrior; and he was, of course, proud

that people now looked up to him. Not long after this, he joined the

Black Mouth society. It happened, one day, that the women were erecting

palisades around the village to defend it, and Snake-head-ornament, as a

member of the Black Mouths, was one of those overseeing the work. This

woman, his clan cousin, was rather slow at her task and did not move

about very briskly. Snake-head-ornament, seeing this, approached her and

fired off his gun close by her legs. She looked around, but seeing that

it was Snake-head-ornament that had shot, and knowing he was her clan

cousin, she did not get angry. Just the same she did not forget; and

years after she had a good humored revenge in the taunting song I have

given you.

GREEN CORN AND ITS USES

_The Ripening Ears_

The first corn was ready to be eaten green early in the harvest moon,

when the blossoms of the prairie golden rod are all in full, bright

yellow; or about the end of the first week in August. We ate much green

corn, boiling the fresh ears in a pot as white people do; but every

Hidatsa family also put up dried green corn for winter. This took the

place with us of the canned green corn we now buy at the trader’s store.

I knew when the corn ears were ripe enough for boiling from these signs:

The blossoms on the top of the stalk were turned brown, the silk on the

end of the ear was dry, and the husks on the ear were of a dark green

color.

I do not think the younger Indians on this reservation are as good

agriculturists as we older members of my tribe were when we were young. I

sometimes say to my son Goodbird: “You young folks, when you want green

corn, open the husk to see if the grain is ripe enough, and thus expose

it; but I just go out into the field and pluck the ear. When you open an

ear and find it too green to pluck, you let it stand on the stalk; and

birds then come and eat the exposed kernels, or little brown ants climb

up the stalk and eat the ear and spoil it. I do not think you are very

good gardeners in these days. In old times, when we went out to gather

green ears, we did not have to open their faces to see if the grain was

ripe enough to be plucked!”

_Second Planting for Green Corn_

Our green corn season lasted about ten days, when the grain, though not

yet ripe, became too hard for boiling green.

To provide green corn to be eaten late in the season, we used to make a

second planting of corn when June berries were ripe; and for this purpose

we left a space, not very large, vacant in the field. In my father’s

family this second planting was of about twenty-eight hills of corn. It

came ready to eat when the other corn was getting hard; but it often

got caught by the frost. Nearly every garden owner made such a second

planting; it was, indeed, a usual practice in the tribe.

_Cooking Fresh Green Corn_

Our usual way of cooking fresh, green corn, was to boil it in a kettle on

the cob.

Fresh, green corn, shelled from the cob, was often put in a corn mortar

and pounded; and then boiled without fats or meat. Prepared thus, it had

a sweet taste and smell; much like that of the canned corn we buy of the

traders.

Shelled green corn, in the whole grain, was also boiled fresh, mixed with

beans and fats.

_Roasting Ears_

Green ears were sometimes roasted, usually by an individual member of

the family who wanted a little change of diet. The women of my father’s

family never prepared a full meal of roasted ears that I remember; if any

one wanted roasted, fresh, green corn, he prepared it himself.

When I wanted to roast green corn I made a fire of cottonwood and

prepared a bed of coals. I laid the fresh ear on the coals with the husk

removed. As the corn roasted, I rolled the ear gently to and fro over the

coals. When properly cooked I removed the ear and laid on another.

As the ear roasted, the green kernels would pop sometimes with quite a

sharp sound. If this popping noise was very loud, we would laugh and say

to the one roasting the ear, “Ah, we see you have stolen that ear from

some other family’s garden!”

Green corn was regularly taken out of the garden to roast until frost

came, when it lost its fragrance and fresh taste. To restore its

freshness, we would take the green corn silk of the same plucked ear and

rub the silk well into the kernels of the ear as they stood in the cob.

This measurably restored the fresh taste and smell.

We did not do this if the ear was to be boiled, only if we intended to

roast it.

For green corn, boiled and eaten fresh, we used all varieties except the

gummy; for when green they tasted alike. But for roasting ears we thought

the two yellow varieties, hard and soft, were the best.

_Mätu´a-la´kapa_

A common dish made from green corn was mätu´a-la´kapa, from mätu´a, green

corn; and la´kapa, mush, or something mushy; thus, wheat flour mixed with

water to a thick paste we call la´kapa, even if unboiled.

Ripening green corn, with the grain still soft, was shelled off the cob

with the tip of the thumb or with the thumb nail. The shelled corn was

pounded in a mortar and boiled with beans; it was flavored with spring

salt.

_Corn Bread_

We also made a kind of corn bread from green corn.

Green ears were plucked and the corn shelled off with the thumb nail, so

as not to break open the kernels. Boiled green corn could be shelled with

a mussel shell because boiling toughened the kernels; but unboiled green

corn was shelled with the thumb nail.

Two or three women often worked at shelling the corn as it was rather

tedious work.

When enough of the corn had been shelled, it was put in a corn mortar and

pounded.

Some of the ears were naturally longer than others: a number of these had

been selected and their husks removed. Some of these husks were now laid

down side by side, but overlapping like shingles, until a sheet was made

about ten inches wide.

Another row of husks was laid over the first, transversely to them; and

so until four or five layers of the green husks were made, each lying

transversely to the layer of husks beneath.

The shelled corn, pounded almost to a pulp, was poured out on this husk

sheet, and patted down with the hand to a loaf about seven or eight

inches square, and an inch or two thick. However, this varied; a girl

would make a much smaller loaf than would a woman preparing a mess for

her family.

The ends of the uppermost layer of husks were now folded over the top

of the loaf, leaf by leaf; then the next layer of husks beneath; and so

until the ends of all the husks were folded over the top of the loaf,

quite hiding it.

Two or three husk leaves had been split into strips half an inch to three

quarters of an inch in width. These strips were tied together to make

bands to bind the loaf. Three bands passed around the loaf each way, or

six bands in all.

No grease nor fat, nor any seasoning, had been added to the loaf; the

pounded green corn pulp was all that entered into it.

The loaf made, now came the baking. The ashes in the fire place in an

earth lodge lay quite deep. A cavity was dug into these ashes about as

deep as my hand is long. Into the bottom of this cavity live coals and

hot ashes were raked, and upon these the loaf was laid; a few ashes were

raked over the top, and upon these ashes live coals were heaped. The loaf

baked in about two hours.

We called this loaf naktsi´, or buried-in-ashes-and-baked. Soft white

and soft yellow corn were good varieties from which to make this

buried-and-baked corn, as we called it.

_Drying Green Corn for Winter_

Every Hidatsa family put up a store of dried green corn for winter. This

is the way in which I prepared my family’s store.

In the proper season I went out into our garden and broke off the ears

that I found, that were of a dark green outside. Sometimes I even broke

open the husks to see if the ear was just right; but this was seldom, as

I could tell very well by the color and other signs I have described. I

went all over the garden, plucking the dark green ears, and putting them

in a pile in some convenient spot on the cultivated ground. If I was

close enough I tossed each ear upon the pile as I plucked it; but as I

drew further away, I gathered the ears into my basket and bore them to

the pile.

I left off plucking when the pile contained five basketfuls if I was

working alone. If two of us were working we plucked about ten basketfuls.

Green corn for drying was always plucked in the evening, just before

sunset; and the newly plucked ears were let lie in the pile all night,

in the open air. The corn was not brought home on the evening of the

plucking, because if kept in the earth lodge over night it would not

taste so fresh and sweet, we thought.

The next morning before breakfast, I went out to the field and fetched

the corn to our lodge in the village. As I brought the baskets into the

lodge, I emptied them in a pile at the place marked _B_ in figure 11,

near the fire.

Sitting at _A_, I now began husking, breaking off the husks from each ear

in three strokes, thus: With my hand I drew back half the husk; second, I

drew back the other half; third, I broke the husk from the cob. The husks

I put in a pile, _E_, to one side. No husking pegs were used, such as you

describe to me; I could husk quite rapidly with my bare hands.

As the ears were stripped, they were laid in a pile upon some of the

discarded husks, spread for that purpose. The freshly husked ears made a

pretty sight; some of them were big, fine ones, and all had plump, shiny

kernels. A twelve-row ear we thought a big one; a few very big ears had

fourteen rows of kernels; smaller ears had not more than eight rows.

Two kettles, meanwhile, had been prepared. One marked _D_ in figure 11,

was set upon coals in the fireplace; the other, _C_, was suspended over

the fire by a chain attached to the drying pole. The kettles held water,

which was now brought to a boil.

When enough corn was husked to fill one of these kettles, I gathered

up the ears and dropped them in the boiling water. I watched the corn

carefully, and when it was about half cooked, I lifted the ears out with

a mountain sheep horn spoon and laid them on a pile of husks.

[Illustration: Figure 11]

When all the corn was cooked, I loaded the ears in my basket and bore

them out upon the drying stage, where I laid them in rows, side by side,

upon the stage floor. There I left them to dry over night.

The work of bringing in the five basketfuls of corn from the field and

boiling the ears took all day, until evening.

In the morning the corn was brought into the lodge again. A skin tent

cover had been spread on the floor and the half boiled ears were laid

on it, in a pile. I now sat on the floor, as an Indian woman sits, with

ankles to the right, and with the edge of the tent cover drawn over my

knees, I took an ear of the half boiled corn in my left hand, holding it

with the greater end toward me. I had a small, pointed stick; and this

I ran, point forward, down between two rows of kernels, thus loosening

the grains. The right hand row of the two rows of loosened kernels I now

shelled off with my right thumb. I then shelled off all the other rows of

kernels, one row at a time, working toward the left, and rolling the cob

over toward the right as I did so.

There was another way of shelling half boiled corn. As before, I would

run a sharpened stick down two rows of kernels, loosening the grains; and

I would then shell them off with smart, quick strokes of a mussel shell

held in my right hand. We still shell half boiled corn in this way, using

large spoons instead of shells. There were very few metal spoons in use

in my tribe when I was a girl; mussel shells were used instead for most

purposes.

If while I was shelling the corn, a girl or woman came into the lodge

to visit, she would sit down and lend a hand while we chatted; thus the

shelling was soon done.

The shelling finished, I took an old tent cover and spread it on the

floor of the drying stage outside. On this cover I spread the shelled

corn to dry, carrying it up on the stage in my basket.

At night I covered the drying corn with old tent skins to protect it from

dampness.

The corn dried in about four days.

When the corn was well dried, I winnowed it. This I sometimes did on the

floor of the drying stage, sometimes on the ground.

Having chosen a day when a slight wind was blowing, I filled a wooden

bowl from the dried corn that lay heaped on the tent cover; and holding

the bowl aloft I let the grain pour slowly from it, that any chaff might

be winnowed out.

The corn was now ready to be put in sacks for winter.

Corn thus prepared we called maada´ckihĕ, from ada´ckihĕ,

treated-by-fire-but-not-cooked, a word also used to designate food that

has been prepared by smoking.

All varieties of corn could be prepared in this way.[11]

The Arikaras on this reservation have a different way of preparing and

drying green corn. They make a big heap of dried willows, and upon these

lay the ears, green and freshly plucked, in the husk. When all is ready,

they set fire to the willows, thus roasting the corn; and they often

roast a great pile of corn at one time, in this way. The roasted ears are

husked and shelled, and the grain dried, for storing. Corn that has been

roasted in the Arikara way, dries much more quickly than that prepared by

boiling.

Of late years some Mandan and Hidatsa families occasionally roast their

corn in imitation of the Arikara way; but I never saw this done in my

youth.

I do not like to eat food made of this dried, roasted corn; it is dirty!

MAPË´DI (CORN SMUT)

_Mapë´di_

Mapë´di is a black mass that grows in the husk of an ear of corn; it is

what you say white men call corn smut fungus. Sometimes an ear of corn

appears very plump, or somewhat swelled; and when the husk is opened,

there is no corn inside, only mapë´di, or smut; or sometimes part of the

ear will be found with a little grain at one end, and mapë´di at the

other. These masses of mapë´di, or corn smut, that we found growing on

the ear, we gathered and dried for food.

There is another mapë´di that grows on the stalk of the corn. It is not

good to eat, and was not gathered up at the harvest time. The mapë´di

that grows on the stalk is commonly found at a place where the stalk, by

some accident, has been half broken.

We looked upon the mapë´di that grew on the corn ear as a kind of corn,

because it was borne on the cob; it was found on the ears the grain of

which was growing solid, or was about ready to be eaten as green corn. We

did not find many mapë´di masses in one garden.

_Harvest and Uses_

We gathered the black masses and half boiled and dried them, still on

the cob. When well dried, they were broken off the cob. These broken off

pieces we mixed with the dried half boiled green corn, and stored in the

same sack with them.

Mapë´di was cooked by boiling with the half-boiled dried corn. We did

not eat mapë´di fresh from the garden, nor did we cook it separately.

Mapë´di, boiled with corn, tasted good, not sweet, and not sour.

I still follow the custom of my tribe and gather mapë´di each year at the

corn harvest.

THE RIPE CORN HARVEST

_Husking_

As the corn in the fields began to show signs of ripening, the people of

Like-a-fishhook village went hunting to get meat for the husking feasts.

This meat was usually dried; but if a kill was made late in the season,

the meat was sometimes brought in fresh.

When the corn was fully ripened, the owners of a garden went out with

baskets, plucked the ears from the stalks and piled them in a heap ready

for the husking. The empty stalks were left standing in the field.

A small family sometimes took as many as three days to gather and husk

their ripe corn; this was because there were not many persons in the

family to do the work.

In a big family, like my fathers, harvesting was more speedily done. We

had a large garden, but we never spent more than one day gathering up the

corn, which we piled in a heap in the middle of the field.

The next day after the corn was plucked, we gave a husking feast. We took

out into the field a great deal of dried meat that my mothers had already

cooked in the lodge; or we took the dried meat into the field and boiled

it in a kettle near the corn pile. We also boiled corn on a fire near by.

The meat and corn were for the feast.

Instead of dried meat, a family sometimes took out a side of fresh

buffalo meat and roasted it over a fire, near the corn pile.

Having then arrived at the field, and started a fire for the feast, all

of our family who had come out to work sat down and began to husk. Word

had been sent beforehand that we were going to give a husking feast, and

the invited helpers soon appeared. There was no particular time set for

their coming, but we expected them in one of the morning hours.[12]

For the most part these were young men from nineteen to thirty years of

age, but a few old men would probably be in the company; and these were

welcomed and given a share of the feast.

There might be twenty-five or thirty of the young men. They were paid for

their labor with the meat given them to eat; and each carried a sharp

stick on which he skewered the meat he could not eat, to take home.[13]

The husking season was looked upon as a time of jollity; and youths and

maidens dressed and decked themselves for the occasion.

Of course each young man gave particular help to the garden of his

sweetheart. Some girls were more popular than others. The young men were

apt to vie with one another at the husking pile of an attractive girl.

Some of the young men rode ponies, and when her corn pile had been

husked, a youth would sometimes lend his pony to his sweetheart for her

to carry home her corn. She loaded the pony with loose ears in bags,

bound on either side of the saddle, or with strings of braided corn laid

upon the pony’s back.

The husking season, like the green corn season, lasted about ten days.

The young men helped faithfully each day, and when they had husked all

the corn in one field, they moved to another. Thus all the corn piles

were speedily husked.

The husking was always done in the field. We never carried the corn to

the village to be husked, as the husks would then have dried, and hurt

the hands of the husker. As we plucked the ears, we piled them in a heap

in the field, to keep the husks moist and soft.[14]

_Rejecting Green Ears_

As the huskers worked they were careful not to add any green ears to

the husked pile. A green ear would turn black and spoil, and be fit for

nothing.

Every husker knew this; and if a young man was helping another family

husk, he laid in a little pile beside him, any green ears that he found.

These green ears belonged to him, to eat or to feed to his pony.

Last year a white man hired me to gather the corn in his field and husk

it; and I kept all the green ears for myself, for that is my custom. I

do not know whether that white man liked it or not. It may be he thought

I was stealing that green corn; but I was following the custom that I

learned of my tribe.

I am an Indian; if a white man hires me to do work for him, he must

expect that I will follow Indian custom.

_Braiding Corn_

Most of the corn as it was husked was tossed into a pile, to be borne

later to the village. This was true of all the smaller and less favored

ears: the best of the larger ears were braided into strings.

As we husked, if a long ear of good size and appearance was found, it was

laid aside for braiding. For this purpose the husk was bent back upon

the stub of the stalk on the big end of the ear, leaving the three thin

leaves that cling next to the kernels still lying on the ear in their

natural position. The part of the husk that was bent back was cut off

with a knife; the three thin leaves that remained were now bent back on

the ear, and the ear was laid aside. Another ear was treated in the same

way and laid beside the first, also with its thin leaves bent back. And

thus, until a row of ears lay extended side by side upon the ground, all

the ears lying point forward.

Another row was started; and the ears, also lying point forward and

leaned against the first row, were laid so as to cover the thin bent-back

leaves of the first row, to protect them from the sun. As the braiding

was done with these thin leaves, if they were too dry—as the sun was very

apt to make them—they would break.

When a quantity of these ears, all with thin husk leaves bent back, had

accumulated, one of the huskers passed them to someone of the young men,

who braided them; or one of the women of the family owning the field

might braid them.

Even with care the thin leaves were sometimes too dry for the braider to

handle safely; and he would fill his mouth with water and blow it over

the leaves.

Fifty-four or fifty-five ears were commonly braided to a string; but

the number varied more or less. In my father’s family, we often braided

strings of fifty-six or fifty-seven ears.

I do not know why this number was chosen; but I think this number of ears

was about of a weight that a woman could well carry and put upon the

drying stage.

When the string was all braided, the braider took either end in his hand,

and placing his right foot against the middle of the string, gave the

ends a smart pull. This stretched and tightened the string, and made it

look neater and more finished; it also tried if there might be any weak

places in it.

We braided all varieties of corn but two, atạ´ki tso´ki, or hard white,

and tsï´di tso´ki, or hard yellow. These varieties we reckoned too hard

to parch, and for this reason they were not braided. We did, however,

sometimes parch hard yellow to be pounded up into meal for corn balls.

The strings of braided corn were borne to the village on the backs of

ponies. Some families laid ten strings on a pony; but in my father’s

family we never laid on so many, believing it made too heavy a load for

the poor beast.

The braided strings were hung to dry on the drying stage upon the railing

that lay in the upper forks; and if there was need, poles or drying rods

were laid across the rails and strings were hung over these also.[15]

These drying rods were laid across only where the forks supported the

rails (at the same places the staying thongs were tied), for at these

places the stage could better bear the weight of the heavy strings of

corn; the drying rods were bound at either end to the railing, to stay

them.

_The Smaller Ears_

Meanwhile the smaller and less favored ears were being carried home in

baskets. It took the members of my father’s family a whole day, and the

next day following until late in the afternoon, to get this work done.

Each carrier, as she brought in a basket of corn, ascended the log ladder

of the stage and emptied the corn on the stage floor. Here the corn lay

in a long heap, in the middle of the floor; for a free path was always

left around the edge for us women; having this path for our use, we did

not have to tread on the corn as we moved about. Also, if a pony came in

with a load of braided corn, the heavy strings could be handed up to us

women on the stage as we moved around in this free path.

As I now remember, our family’s husked corn when piled on the stage

floor, made a heap about eight yards long and four yards wide, and about

four feet high in the middle, from which point the pile sloped down on

all sides. This was the loose corn, the smaller ears; and besides these

there were about one hundred strings of braided corn hung on the railing

above the heap. I give these measurements, judging as nearly as I can

from the size of our drying stage, and from our average yearly corn

yield, when I was a young woman. I think the figures are approximately

accurate.

For about eight days the corn lay thus in a long heap upon the stage.

At the end of that time the ears on the top of the heap had become dry

and smooth and threatened to roll down the sides of the pile. We now

took drying rods and laid them along the floor against the posts, two or

three of them, for the whole length of the stage on either side, and on

the ends of the stage. Planks split from cottonwood trunks were leaned

against these drying rods, on the side next the corn. The corn heap

was now spread evenly over the floor of the drying stage for the depth

of about a foot; the split planks prevented the dry smooth ears from

sliding off the stage. The dry ears had a tendency to roll or slide down

the sides of the corn pile, as fresh ears did not.

This spreading out the corn heap evenly had also the effect of stirring

up the underlying ears and exposing them to the air.

If rain fell while the corn was thus drying on the stage, it gave us no

concern. The corn soon dried again, and no harm was done it.

The corn, spread thus in an even heap, took about three more days to dry,

or eleven days in all. Then we began threshing.

_Drying the Braided Ears_

The strings of braided corn hanging on the rails at the top of the posts

of the drying stage, dried much more quickly than the loose ears heaped

on the stage floor. The wind, rattling the dry ears of the strings

together, was apt to shell out the drying kernels; it was therefore usual

for us before threshing time to tie these braids together so that the

wind could not rattle them.

To do this I would ascend the ladder and make my way along the edge of

the stage floor, making places in the corn with my feet as I walked, so

that my feet would be on the stage floor and not tread on the drying

corn. I would push ten of the braided strings together on the rail or the

drying rod on which they hung, and tie them by passing around them a raw

hide thong.

These braided strings, bound thus in bundles of ten, hung on the stage

until we were ready to store them in the cache pit; and this we could not

do until we had our main harvest, the loose ears, threshed and ready to

store also.

SEED CORN

_Selecting the Seed_

I have said that for braiding corn we chose the longest and finest ears.

In my father’s family we used to braid about one hundred strings, some

years less, some years more, as the season had been wet or dry; for

the yield of fine ears was always less in a dry year. Of these braided

strings we selected the very best in the spring for seed.

My mothers reckoned that we should need five braided strings of soft

white, and about thirty ears of soft yellow, for seed. Of ma´ikadicakĕ,

or gummy, we raised a little each year, not much; ten ears of this, for

seed, my mothers thought were a plenty.

Hard white and hard yellow corn, I have said, were not braided, because

not used for parching. For seed of these varieties, some good ears were

taken from the drying pile on the corn stage and stored in the cache pit

for the next year with loose grain of the same variety. The ears were not

put in a sack, but thrown in with the loose grain.

When I selected seed corn, I chose only good, full, plump ears; and I

looked carefully to see if the kernels on any of the ears had black

hearts. When that part of a kernel of corn which joins the cob is black

or dark colored, we say it has a black heart. This imperfection is caused

by plucking the ear when too green. A kernel with a black heart will not

grow.

An ear of corn has always small grains toward the point of the cob, and

large grains toward the butt of the ear. When I came to plant corn, I

used only the kernels in the center of the cob for seed, rejecting both

the small and the large grains of the two ends.

Seed corn was shelled from the cob with the thumb; we never threshed it

with sticks. Sometimes we shelled an ear by rubbing it against another

ear.

_Keeping Two Years’ Seed_

Corn kept for seed would be best to plant the next spring; and it would

be fertile, and good to plant, the second spring after harvesting. The

third year the seed was not so good; and it did not come up very well.

The fourth year the seed would be dead and useless.

Knowing that seed corn kept good for at least two years, it was my

family’s custom to gather enough seed for at least two years, in seasons

in which our crops were good. Some years, in spite of careful hoeing, our

crops were poor; the ears were small, there was not much grain on them,

and what grain they bore was of poor quality. We did not like to save

seed out of such a crop. Also, frost occasionally destroyed our crop, or

most of it.

When, therefore, we had a year of good crops, we put away seed enough to

last for two years; then, if the next year yielded a poor crop, we still

had good seed to plant the third season.

In my father’s family we always observed this custom of putting away seed

for two years; and we did this not only of our corn, but of our squash

seeds, beans, sunflower seeds, and even of our tobacco seeds; for if I

remember rightly, the tobacco fields were sometimes injured by frost just

as were our corn fields.

Not all families in our village were equally wise. Some were quite

improvident, and were not at all careful to save seed from their crops.

Such families, in the spring, had to buy their seed from families that

were more provident.

Saving a good store of seed was therefore profitable in a way. In my

father’s family we often sold a good deal of seed in the spring to

families that wanted. The price was one tanned buffalo skin for one

string of braided seed corn.

[Illustration: Corn stage of Butterfly’s wife

This stage lacks railings, and is floored Arikara fashion with a willow

mat. A pile of drying corn is seen on the stage floor. In the ancient

villages, where the lodges were crowded together, the railings were

always present.]

[Illustration: Owl Woman pounding corn into meal in a corn mortar]

Even to-day, families on this reservation come to me to buy seed corn and

seed beans. A handful of beans, enough for one planting, I sell for one

calico—enough calico, that is, to make an Indian woman a dress, or about

ten yards.

THRESHING CORN

_The Booth_

The threshing season was always a busy one, for all the families of the

village would be threshing their corn at the same time.

Corn was threshed in a booth, under the drying stage.

[Illustration: Figure 12

The figure has been redrawn from sketches by Goodbird. The original is

a stage now standing on the reservation, but with mat of willows for

floor; to this Goodbird added a threshing booth as he saw used by his

grandmother when he was a boy. Goodbird’s sketches are closely followed,

excepting that the floor of slabs is restored. The figure tallies in

every respect with Buffalobird-woman’s description, and the model made by

her for the American Museum of Natural History.]

To make the booth, I began with the section at one end of the stage. As

is shown in figure 12, on the posts _A_ and _D_, and _B_ and _C_, were

bound two poles, _e_ and _f_, at about two feet below the stage floor;

upon these were bound two other poles, _g_ and _h_; the poles _e_, _f_,

and _h_ were bound outside of the posts that supported them.

A long raw hide thong was used for the corner ties. The first pole was

raised in position and bound firmly to the post; and if a second pole was

to be laid over the first—as was done at two of the corners—the thong was

drawn up and made to bind it also to the post. We always kept a number of

these raw hide thongs in the lodge against just such uses as this; they

were strong, and served every purpose of ropes; we oiled them to keep

them soft.

A tent cover was now fetched out of the lodge. Tents were of different

sizes, from those of seven, to those of sixteen buffalo cow hides. A

woman used whatever sized tent cover she owned; but a cover of thirteen

skins was of convenient size.

[Illustration: Figure 13]

Around the curved bottom of the tent cover was a row of holes, through

which wooden pins were driven to peg the tent to the ground. The tent

cover was bound to the four over-hanging poles, inside of the four posts,

by means of a long thong woven in and out through the holes, as shown in

figure 13.

[Illustration: Figure 14]

Bound thus to the poles, and quite enclosing the space within them, the

tent cover made a kind of booth. The upper parts of the cover, including

the smoke flaps, that now hung sweeping the ground, were drawn in and

spread flat on the ground to make a floor for the booth; and stones laid

upon them weighted the cover against the wing.

In figure 12 the four posts, _A_, _B_, _C_, and _D_, enclose one section

of the drying stage; the booth did not enclose the whole ground space of

this section, but about three fifths of it.

Figure 14, I think, will explain the arrangement of the booth. The

end corners, _X_ and _Y_, were bound to opposite posts, _M_ and _N_,

respectively, the lapping edges, at _O_, forming a door through which

the threshers entered the booth; _P_ and _P´_ were bound to posts at _p_

and _p´_; the final corner, _M_, was left untied until the threshers had

entered and were ready to begin their task. (Compare with figure 12, in

which, however, the posts are differently lettered.)

Before they did this they went above and removed the planks and drying

rods laid around the edge of the stage floor, and pushed the corn back

toward the middle of the floor into a long heap again, that it might not

fall over the edge, now that the planks were taken away. One of the floor

planks was now removed, at _R_. Through the aperture thus made, corn was

pushed down to left and right of _R_; this was continued until there was

a pile of corn just under the aperture, and running the width of the

booth, about eighteen or twenty inches high.

The threshers now entered the booth and tied the corner at _M_, closing

the door. In my father’s family there were usually three threshers,

women; and they sat in a row on the floor of the booth, facing the pile

of corn. Each woman had a stick for a flail, with which she beat the corn.

[Illustration: Figure 15]

Flails were of ash or cottonwood. An ash flail would be about three

and a half feet long and from three quarters of an inch to an inch in

diameter, and was cut green. A cottonwood flail was seldom used green;

and as it was therefore lighter than the green ash, a cottonwood flail

was a little greater in diameter, but of the same length. We were careful

that a flail should not be too heavy, lest it break the kernels in the

threshing. Kinikinik sticks were sometimes used for flails.

A diagram (figure 15) has been drawn to illustrate how I worked in a

threshing booth when I was a young woman. As shown, I sat on the extreme

left; one of my mothers and my sister sat as indicated, on my right. More

than three seldom worked in a threshing booth at the same time, at least

in our family; however, I have known my sister, Not-frost, to make a

fourth. I have even known five to be threshing in the booth of some other

family in the village, but never more than five.

To thresh the corn, I raised my flail and brought it down smartly, but

not severely, upon the pile of corn. The grain as it was thus beaten off

the dry cobs would fall by its own weight into the pile, and work its way

to the bottom; while the lighter cobs would come to the top of the pile.

Beating the ears with the flails caused many of the kernels to leap and

fly about; but the tent cover, enclosing the booth, caught all these

flying kernels. It was, indeed, for this that the booth was built.

As the cobs, beaten empty of grain, accumulated on the pile, we drew them

off and cast them out of the door of the booth upon a tent cover, spread

to receive them, under the middle section of the stage. Many of these

cobs had a few small grains clinging to them; and these must be saved,

for we wasted nothing.

Having paused then to throw out the cobs, we returned to the pile and

thrust our flails in under it, drawing them upward through the corn, thus

working the unthreshed ears to the top. As much as we could, we tried

to keep the unthreshed ears in the middle of the pile, and the threshed

grain pushed to right and left, as will be seen by studying the diagram.

To thresh one pile, or filling of corn in a booth, took a half day’s work.

_Order of the Day’s Work_

Our habit was to begin quite early in the morning, enclose the booth with

the tent cover, and set to work threshing; finishing the first filling,

or pile, about midday. In the afternoon we began a second pile, first

heaping the already threshed grain to right and left, and behind the

threshers.

I have said that on the ground under the second section of the stage, a

second tent cover was spread to catch the cobs. A part of this tent cover

was drawn in under the edge of the booth to help carpet the floor of the

booth.

At the end of the day we turned our attention to the pile of cobs; and

with our thumbs we shelled off every grain that clung to the cobs. From

the cobs of a day’s threshing we collected about as many grains of corn

as would fill a white man’s hat. This was taken into the booth and thrown

on the pile of threshed grain.

We now disposed of the grain for the night. If we had gotten through

threshing rather early in the day, we bore the newly threshed grain in

baskets into the lodge, and emptied it into a bull boat.

If we had gotten through our threshing rather late in the day, we made

the door of the booth tight, and left the grain on the booth floor

throughout the night.

_The Cobs_

The day’s threshing over, we attended to the cobs. I have said that we

shelled off any kernels that clung to them after threshing, so that they

were now quite clean of grain.

All day long, as we threshed, we had watched that no horses got at the

cobs to trample and nibble them, or that any dog ran over them, or any

children played in them. Then, in the evening, if the weather was fine,

and there was little wind, one of my mothers or I carried the cobs

outside of the village to a grassy place and heaped them in a pile about

five feet high. A pile of cobs of such a height I usually gathered from a

day’s threshing.

In our prairie country, on a fair day, the wind usually dies down about

sunset; and now, when the air was still, I fired the cob pile. As the

pile began to burn, I could usually see the burning cob piles of two or

three other families lighting up the gathering dusk.

I had to stay and watch the fire, to keep any mischievous boys from

coming to play in the burning heap. Children of from ten to fifteen years

of age were quite a pest at cob-firing time. They had a kind of game

they were fond of playing. Each would cut a long, flexible, green stick,

and at the edge of the Missouri he would get a ball of wet mud and stick

it on his stick. He would try to approach one of the burning piles, and

with his stick, slap the mud ball smartly into the burning coals, some of

which, still glowing, would stick in the wet mud. Using the stick as a

sling, the child would throw the mud ball into the air, aiming often at

another child. Other children would be throwing mud balls at one another

at the same time, and these, with the bits of glowing charcoal clinging

to them, would go sailing through the air like shooting stars. Knowing

very well that the children would get into my burning cobs if I even

turned my back, I was careful to stay by to watch.

At last the fire had burned down and the coals were dead; and nothing was

left but a pile of ashes. It was now night, and I would go home. Early

the next morning, before the prairie winds had arisen, I would go out

again to my ash heap. On the top of the ashes, if nothing had disturbed

them in the night and an unexpected wind had not blown them about, I

would find a thin crust had formed. This crust I carefully broke and

gathered up with my fingers, squeezing the pieces in my hand into little

lumps, or balls. Sometimes I was able to gather four or five of these

little balls from one pile of ashes; but never more than five.

These balls I carried home. There were always several baskets hanging in

the lodge, ready for any use we might want of them; and it was our habit

to keep some dried buffalo heart skins, or some dried buffalo paunch

skins, in the lodge, for wrappers, much as white families keep wrapping

paper in the house. The ash balls I wrapped up in one of these skins,

into a package, being careful not to break the balls. I put the package

in one of the baskets, to hang up until there was occasion for its use.

These ash balls were used for seasoning. I have explained elsewhere how

we used spring salt to season our boiled corn; and that every day in the

lodge, we ate mä´dạkạpa, or pounded dried ripe corn boiled with beans.

But in the fall, instead of seasoning this dish with spring salt, or

alkali salt as you call it, we preferred to use this seasoning of ash

crust.

In my father’s family, for each meal of mä´dạkạpa we filled the corn

mortar three times, two-and-a-half double handfuls of corn making one

filling of the mortar. Each time we filled the mortar, we dropped in with

the corn a little of the ash crust, a bit about as big as a white child’s

marble. Finally, a piece about as big, or perhaps a little larger, was

also dropped into the boiling pot.

We Indians were fond of this seasoning; and we liked it much better than

we did our spring salt. We did not use spring salt, indeed, if we had ash

balls in the lodge.

We called these ash balls mä´dạkạpa isĕ´pĕ, or mä´dạkạpa darkener.

We did not make ash balls if the dogs or horses had trampled on the cobs;

or if children had mussed in the fire; nor would we make ash balls if the

day had not been rather calm, for a high wind was sure to blow dust into

the cobs.

We burned cobs and collected ash balls after every threshing day, unless

hindered by storm or high wind. But even if the harvest was a good one,

the ash balls that we got from the burned cobs for seasoning never lasted

long. We were so fond of seasoning our food with them that every family

had used up its store before the autumn had passed.

_Winnowing_

I have said that after the day’s threshing we stored the newly threshed

grain for the night, either in the booth or in a bull boat in the earth

lodge; and that we then fired the cobs that had accumulated during the

day.

The next morning we spread an old tent cover outside the lodge, near

the drying stage; and we fetched the loose grain of the previous day’s

threshing out of the booth, or the earth lodge and spread it evenly and

thinly upon the tent cover. The grain was here left to dry until evening.

A little before sunset, and before the prairie wind had died down, we

fetched baskets and winnowed the grain. The basket was half filled with

grain, held aloft, and the grain poured gently out in the wind. Wooden

bowls were often used for winnowing, instead of baskets; but they did not

hold as much grain.

The winnowing over, I would take up a few grains of the corn to test with

my teeth. If, when I bit a kernel in two, it broke with a sharp, snappy

sound, I knew it was quite dried; if it broke dull and soft, I knew the

grain needed another day’s drying; but at the most, this second day’s

drying was enough.

[Illustration: Figure 16]

The winnowed grain, now well dried, was borne into the earth lodge and

stored temporarily in bull boats. In the diagram (figure 16), is shown

where the bull boats full of grain used to stand in my father’s lodge.

Some years our harvest filled three bull boats of threshed grain; some

years it filled five. In the year illustrated by this diagram, there were

three bull boats standing between the planks at the left of the door, and

the fire; and two bull boats on the other side of the fire, all full of

grain.

The threshed grain, I have said, received its final drying and winnowing

upon a tent cover (or covers) spread on the ground near the earth lodge.

It was my own habit always to spread these tent covers beside the drying

stage on the side farthest away from the lodge. However, the particular

spot where the winnowing was done, was determined by the convenience of

the household.

We did not usually thresh consecutive days. We threshed one day; dried

the grain and winnowed it the second; and threshed again the third day.

_Removing the Booth_

During these days the booth did not remain always in one place. When the

corn on the floor of the first section had all been threshed, the booth

was removed to another section. I will now explain how this was done.

In figure 17 my son has diagramed the floor plan of my mothers’ stage and

threshing booth, as I remember them.

The stage stands in front of Small Ankle’s lodge, which faces toward the

west. The stage is divided into three sections, _A_, _B_, _C_. The posts

upon which the floor of the stage rests are _d_, _e_, _f_, _g_, _h_, _i_,

_j_, _k_.

The booth was first raised under section _A_, based upon _fg_ and

enclosing ground space _lmfg_.

Sometimes we got up early, bound the poles to the posts and erected our

booth before breakfast; then after we had eaten, three or four of us

would go out to thresh, one first going up to push down the corn. She

raised a plank along the side, _fg_, just within the booth; this, if the

door of the booth was on the side _lm_. The corn on the floor of the

stage in section _A_ was then shoved down as wanted.

[Illustration: Figure 17

Ground plan of earth lodge here accompanies that of stage to show

relative positions of the two structures. The stage always stood, as

here, directly before the lodge entrance. The figures are drawn to scale.]

The corn pushed down for one threshing, made a pile running the width of

the booth, and about forty inches wide and twenty inches high. When the

pile was threshed one of the women went up and shoved down another pile.

The corn in one section was threshed in about three such piles.

Sometimes, if we worked hard and had plenty of help, we threshed one

whole section in one day; but the beating, beating, beating of the corn

was hard work, and we more often stopped when wearied and rested until

the next day. I have already said that we often spent the next day at the

lighter work of drying and winnowing.

When the corn in section _A_ was all threshed, the booth was moved over

under the floor of section _B_, enclosing _fgno_; and again a plank was

taken up to let down the corn. Now this plank was always taken up above

the side of the booth opposite the door; and the door was always placed

down wind. Thus, if the wind was from the north, the door would be placed

on the south side of the booth, and the plank was taken up on the north

side, just within the booth. Corn was always threshed in the booth on the

side opposite the door.

Sections _A_ and _B_ of my mothers’ stage, as shown in diagram (figure

17) contained only yellow corn. Section _C_, or a part of it, contained

white corn. Braided strings of corn were also hung all around the railing

above, but these were not to be threshed.

Section _B_ having been threshed, the booth was removed to section _C_,

enclosing _hiqp_. I have said that this section had white corn. Now this

white corn was piled toward the south end of the stage; and between it

and the yellow corn was left a narrow vacant place on the floor. Above

this vacant place, meat was often dried; but this meat was removed when

we were ready to thresh.

Placing the booth to enclose _hiqp_, directly under the vacant place,

made it easy for us to raise a plank here to push down the white corn. If

we had placed the booth on the south end of this section, we should have

had to dig into the corn piled here, in order to raise a plank.

Our family’s threshing lasted about five days in a year of good yield; if

the year was a poor one, threshing lasted only two or three days.

_Threshing Braided Corn_

The strings of braided corn were stored in the cache pit (which I will

describe later) in the whole ear. If, during the winter, or the following

spring, I wanted to thresh a string of braided corn, I put the whole

string into a skin sack; and this sack I beat and shook, turning it over

and around until all the grain had fallen off the cobs. The sack was then

emptied.

_Amount of Harvest_

Our harvested corn, in a good year, lasted my father’s family until the

next harvest, with a small quantity even then unused. Some years we ran

out of corn before the harvest came, but not often. We ate our corn as

long as it lasted, not husbanding it toward the last, because we knew

there were elk and buffalo and antelope to be had for the hunting. If we

ran out of corn at all, it was about the first of August; sometimes a

little earlier. Sometimes when we had eaten all our last year’s harvest

there was a small quantity from the previous season’s harvest with which

we eked out our shortage.

My mothers, however, were industrious women, and our shortage, if any,

was never for long. Some families, not very provident, had consumed all

their harvest as early as in the spring; but such never happened in my

father’s family.

_Sioux Purchasing Corn_

The Standing Rock Sioux used to buy corn of us, coming up in midsummer,

or autumn. They came not because they were in need of food, but because

they liked to eat our corn, and had always meat and skins to trade to us.

For one string of braided corn they gave us one tanned buffalo robe.

VARIETIES OF CORN

_Description of Varieties_

We raised nine well marked varieties of corn in our village. Following

are the names of the varieties:

Atạ´ki tso´ki Hard white

(White hard)

Atạ´ki Soft white

(White)

Tsï´di tso´ki Hard yellow

(Yellow hard)

Tsï´di tapa´ Soft yellow

(Yellow soft)

Ma´ïkadicakĕ Gummy

(Gummy)

Do´ohi Blue

(Blue)

Hi´ci cĕ´pi Dark red

(Red dark)

Hi´tsiica Light red

(Light-red)

Atạ´ki aku´ hi´tsiica Pink top

(White, kind of light red)

Our Hidatsa word for corn is ko´xati; but in speaking of any variety of

corn, the work ko´xati is commonly omitted. In like manner, atạ´ki means

white; but if one went into a lodge and asked for “atạ´ki” it was always

understood to mean soft white corn.

Of the nine varieties, the atạ´ki, or soft white, was the kind most

raised in our village. The ma´ïkadicakĕ, or gummy, was least raised, as

almost its only use was in making corn balls.

In my father’s family, we raised two kinds of corn, tsï´di tso´ki, or

hard yellow; and atạ´ki, or soft white.

The names of the varieties suggest pretty well their characteristics. The

atạ´ki aku´ hi´tsiica, or white-with-light-red, was marked by a light red

or pink color toward the top or beard end of the ear. The name pink-top

which you suggest for this variety will, I think, do for an English name,

if the literal translation of the Indian term is, as you say, rather

clumsy.

We planted each variety of corn separately. We Indians understood

perfectly the need of keeping the strains pure, for the different

varieties had not all the same uses with us.

_How Corn Travels_

We Indians knew that corn can travel, as we say; thus, if the seed

planted in one field is of white corn, and that in an adjoining field is

of some variety of yellow corn, the white will travel to the yellow corn

field, and the yellow to the white corn field.

Perhaps you do not understand what I mean by corn traveling. Well, let us

suppose that there are two fields lying side by side, the one in yellow,

the other in white corn. When the corn of the two fields is ripe, and the

ears are opened, it will be found that many of the ears in the yellow

rows that stand nearest the white field will have white kernels standing

in the cob; also, in the rows of white corn that stand nearest the yellow

field, there will be many ears with yellow kernels mixed in with the

white kernels.

We Indians did not know what power it was that causes this. We only knew

that it was so. We also knew that when a field stands alone, away from

other fields, and is planted with white corn, it will grow up in white

corn only; there will not be any yellow grains in the ears. And so of any

other variety.

[Illustration: Figure 18]

Sometimes two women, owning adjoining fields, would make an agreement;

they would divide their fields into sections and plant the corresponding

sections on opposite sides of the division line alike. Thus in the

diagram (figure 18), _A_ and _A´_ may be planted in a variety of yellow

corn; _B_ and _B´_ may be planted in beans and squashes; and _C_ and _C´_

may be planted in a variety of white corn; but even this did not make so

very much difference; still the corn traveled.

We thought that perhaps the reason of this was that the ground here was

soft, or mellowed and broken by cultivation. We thought corn could not

travel readily over hard, or unbroken ground; and as you notice in the

diagram, although the two patches of yellow corn are separated from the

white corn by the two patches of squashes and beans, yet the beans and

squashes are in soft, or cultivated ground. We thought corn traveled more

easily over soft ground.

However, we really did not know what made corn travel; we just knew that

it did.

USES OF THE VARIETIES

_Atạ´ki Tso´ki_

I think that perhaps at first, there was but one variety of corn, atạ´ki

tso´ki, or hard white; and that all other varieties have sprung from

it. I know that when we plant hard white seed, ears often develop that

show color in the grain. Sometimes ears are produced bearing pink grains

toward the beard end of the cob; such ears we call i´puta (top) hi´tsiica

(pink); that is, pink top, or light-red top. In color these ears differed

in no wise from atạ´ki aku´ hi´tsiica.

Hard white was very generally raised, nearly every family in the tribe

having a field of it.

There were two chief dishes chiefly prepared from hard white corn; these

I will now describe.

_Mäpi´ Nakapa´._ I put water in a pot, and in this I dropped a section

of a string of dried squash, with some beans. Dried squash was always

strung on long grass strings; and having, from one of these strings, cut

off a piece I tied the ends together, making a wreath, or ring, four or

five inches in diameter. It was this ring of dried squash slices that I

dropped into the pot. When well boiled, I lifted the squash slices out

by the string and dropped them into a wooden bowl, where I mashed them

and chopped them fine with a horn spoon. The mashed squash I dropped back

into the kettle again, with the beans; the now empty string I threw away.

Meanwhile corn had been parched, and some buffalo fats had been held over

the coals on a stick, to roast. The parched corn and roast fats I pounded

together in the corn mortar; and the pounded mass I stirred into the

kettle. The mess was now ready to be eaten.

This dish we called mäpi´-nakapa´, or pounded-meal mush; from mäpi,´

something pounded, and nakapa´, mush, something mushy.

The dish was especially a morning meal; after eating it we started to

work.

_Mä´nakapa._ A second way of preparing hard white corn was as follows: I

pounded the corn in a mortar to a meal, but without first parching it.

Most of this meal was fine, but there were many coarser bits in it, some

of them as big as quarter grains of corn.

Water was put in a kettle; I added the pounded meal, and when it boiled

put in beans. No fats were added.

As the mess boiled. I stirred it with a wooden paddle to prevent

scorching; I did not stir with a horn spoon as the hot water softened and

spoiled the horn.

When well boiled, the mess was served.

We called this dish mä´nakapa´.[16]

A seasoning of spring salt, as we called it, was often added. A small

palmful of the salt was mixed with a little water in a horn spoon; this

dissolved the salt and let the sand and dirt drop to the bottom. The

dissolved salt was poured off through the fingers, held to the mouth of

the horn spoon; this strained out the sand and dirt. The salt turned the

mush slightly yellow.

As the soft mush boiled up in the cooking, we were fond of dipping a horn

spoon into it, and licking off the back of the spoon. This was especially

a children’s habit.

Also at morning and evening meals we ate hard white corn parched and

mixed with fats; or mạdạpo´zi i’ti´a, boiled whole corn.

_Atạ´ki_

This is a soft, or as you call it, a flour corn, and was perhaps the

favorite variety grown by us. The word atạ´ki means white; but when

applied to corn we translate soft white, to distinguish from atạ´ki

tso´ki, or hard white.

The use of atạ´ki, or soft white, was very general, since it could be

made into almost every kind of corn food used by us. “It is the one

variety,” we used to say, “that can be used in any and every way.”

Soft white corn, parched and pounded into a meal, was boiled with squash

and beans to make mäpi´ nakapa´. The unparched grain was pounded for meal

to make mä´nakapa; but although good, we did not think the mush made from

soft white meal was as good as that from the hard white corn meal.

_Boiled Corn Ball._ A less frequent dish made from soft white corn was

boiled corn balls; it was made only from the dried ripe grain.

I pounded a quantity of grain into meal, and poured the meal into a pot

having hot water—but not too much water—stirring it well about. I now

lifted out some of the mass into my left palm and patted it down with my

right, making a cake about as big around as a baking powder biscuit, but

not so thick. This cake I dropped into a pot of boiling water, where it

sank to the bottom. I continued until the pot was full, or until I had

all I wished to cook.

No salt or other seasoning was added.

As the pot boiled, one could see the corn cakes move around in the water;

but they never floated, nor did they break apart. The boiling lasted

about an hour.

In olden days we ate these corn balls alone; now we more often eat them

with coffee.

_Tsï´di Tso´ki and Tsï´di Tapä´_

The two varieties of tsï´di, or golden yellow corn, could be pounded and

boiled to make mush, or mä´dakapa; or they could be boiled whole, to make

mạdạpo´zi i’ti´a.

_Mạdạpo´zi I’ti´a._ For this dish I put the shelled ripe grain, with

fats, in a pot and boiled them until I saw the kernels break open; then I

added beans, and when these were boiled, the mess was served. This dish

we called mạdạpo´zi i’ti´a. I do not know the derivation of mạdạpo´zi;

i’ti´a means large. I think you can translate “corn boiled whole.”

Hard yellow and soft yellow corn, roasted in the green ear, tasted sweet,

as if a little sugar were in them. Especially was this true at the time

when kernels were beginning to turn yellow. At this time each kernel

shows a little yellow spot on the very top. For this reason this season

was called tsi´dotsxĕ, or yellow-drop time; for the little yellow spot

looked like a drop on the top of the kernel.

_Other Soft Varieties_

Do´ohi, or blue, hi´ci cĕ´pi, dark red, and hi´tsiica, light red, were

all soft corns and were cooked and prepared and stored just like atạ´ki;

these four varieties tasted exactly alike, if cooked in the same way.

_Ma´ikadicakĕ_

Ma´ikadicakĕ, or gummy corn, is of different colors; some is of a light

red; some yellow flaked with red; and some is in color like hard white;

but all these slightly differing strains are alike in this, that when

the kernels dry they shrink up and become rough, or wrinkled. The name,

ma´ikadicakĕ, comes from kadi´cakĕ, or gum-like.

Ma´ikadicakĕ was the least grown of our five principal varieties of corn;

however, a good deal of this variety is still raised on this reservation.

Ma´ikadicakĕ was sometimes roasted green, when the kernels chewed up

gummy in the mouth; but the one recognized use of this variety was to

make corn balls.

_Mä´pĭ Mĕĕ´pĭ I’´kiuta_, or _Corn Balls_. Into a clay pot while yet

cold, I put shelled corn and set it on the fire. As the grain parched, I

stirred it with a stick. The heat made the kernels pop open somewhat, but

not much.

Meanwhile fats were roasted over the coals on the point of a stick; and

these and the parched grain were dropped into the corn mortar and pounded

together. I then reached into the mortar and took out a handful of the

meal, which being oily with the fats, held together in a lump. This lump

I squeezed in my fingers and then tapped it gently on the edge of the

mortar, making a slight dent or groove, lengthwise, in one side of the

lump. The lump or ball—it was not exactly round—I dropped into a wooden

bowl. The process was repeated until the bowl was full.

Our native name for corn ball is mä´pi mĕĕ´pĭ i’´kiuta, from mä´pi,

something pounded, mĕĕ´pĭ, mortar, and i’´kiuta, hit or pressed against;

that is pounded meal pressed against the mortar; but we translate, just

corn ball.

Corn balls were an acceptable present for a woman to give her daughter to

take to her husband; the son-in-law might himself eat the corn balls, or

share them with his parents or sisters.

As I have said, the one recognized use of gummy corn was for parching to

make corn balls; but any of the soft corns could be used to make corn

balls, as soft yellow, soft white, blue, light red, and the like.

_Parched Soft Corn._ Corn of any of the soft varieties parched in a

pot as just described, was often carried by hunters or travelers to be

eaten as a lunch. The corn was carried in a little bag made by drying a

buffalo’s heart skin.

_Parching Whole Ripe Ears._ We parched the whole ears, sometimes, of ripe

soft white and soft yellow corn. We had many squash spits piled up in the

rear of the lodge behind the beds; these made excellent roasting sticks.

The ear was stuck on the end of the stick and held over the coals.

Parching ripe corn on the ear was a winter custom; but boys herding

horses in the summer also parched whole ears sometimes for their midday

lunch.

We did parch other kinds of corn thus, besides soft white and soft

yellow, but they were not so good.

The gummy was not cooked in this way.

_Parching Hard Yellow Corn with Sand._ We sometimes parched hard yellow

corn in a clay pot of our own make, with sand. Down on the sand bars by

the Missouri we found clean, pure sand; if I wanted to parch hard yellow,

I put a handful of this sand in my clay pot.

The pot I now set on the coals of the fire place until the sand within

was red hot. With a piece of old tent skin to protect my hand, I drew

the pot a little way from the coals and dropped a double handful of corn

within. I stirred the corn back and forth over the sand with a little

stick.

When I thought the corn was quite heated through, I put the pot back on

the coals again, still stirring the corn with the stick. Very soon all

the kernels cracked open with a sharp crackling noise; they burst open

much as you say white man’s popcorn does.

Hard yellow corn parched in this way was softer than even the soft corns

parched in a pot without sand.

No variety of corn was good cooked in this way, except hard yellow; no

other kind would do.

_Mạdạpo´zi Pạ´kici, or Lye-Made Hominy._ There was another way in which

we prepared hard and soft yellow and hard and soft white; this was to

make it into hominy with lye.

I collected about a quart of ashes; only two kinds were used, cottonwood

or elm wood ashes. When I was cooking with such wood and thought of

making hominy, I was careful to collect the ashes, raking away the other

kinds first.

I put on an iron kettle nearly full of water, and brought it to a boil.

Into the boiling water I put the ashes, stirring them about with a stick.

Then I set the pot off to steep for a short time.

When the ashes had settled I poured the lye off into a vessel and cleaned

the pot thoroughly.

In earlier times the ashes were boiled in an earthen pot as indeed I have

often seen it done when I was a girl. I was not quite twenty when we

bought an iron pot for cooking. Before that we used only earthen pots for

cooking in our family.

Having cleaned the pot I poured the lye back into it, put the pot on the

fire, and added shelled, ripe, dried corn. This I boiled until the hulls

came off the grain and the corn kernels appeared white.

I added a little water, and took the pot off the fire; I drained off the

lye.

I poured water into the pot and washed the corn, rubbing the kernels

between my palms; I drained off the water.

I poured in water and washed the corn a second time, in the same way; I

drained off the water.

Again I put water in the pot and boiled the corn in it. As the corn was

already soft, this boiling did not take long. I now added fats, and

beans, and sometimes dried squash, all at the same time; and the pot I

replaced on the fire. When the beans and squash were cooked, the mess was

ready to eat.

Corn so prepared we call mạdạpo´zi pạ´kici, or boiled-whole-corn rubbed.

It is so called because the hulls of the kernels were rubbed off between

the palms at the time the corn was washed in water after the lye was

poured off.

_General Characteristics of the Varieties_

We Hidatsas thought that our five principal varieties of corn, hard and

soft white, hard and soft yellow, and gummy, had characteristics that

marked them quite distinctly one from the other.

For one thing, they had each a distinct taste. If at night I were given

to eat of hard white corn, or hard yellow or soft yellow, I could at once

tell each from any of the others. If I were given mush at night made from

these three varieties, each by itself, I could distinguish each variety,

not by its smell, but in my mouth by taste.

Meal made by pounding ripe hard white corn became thick and mushy when

boiled in a pot.

Tsï´di tapa´, or soft yellow corn, was quite soft to pound when we made

meal of it; and the boiled meal, or mush, seemed to contain a good deal

of water in it—that is, it seemed thin and gruel-like when we came to eat

it.

To pound tsï´di tso´ki, or hard yellow corn, into meal took a long time;

but when it had been pounded and the meal boiled into food, it was very

good to eat and had an appetizing smell.

Of the nine varieties I have named, the atạ´ki, or soft white, was the

earliest maturing. If seeds of all nine varieties were planted at the

same time, the soft white would always be the first to ripen in the fall;

and the tsï´di tso´ki, or hard yellow, would be the last to ripen.

Although the blue, light red, dark red, pink top, and soft white were

all soft or flour corns, yet the soft white was the earliest to ripen. I

reckon the soft white, also, to be the softest of all our varieties of

corn.

I also rate the hard yellow and hard white as equal in value. Both are

equally hard, and can not be pounded up into the fine flour or meal which

we get from the soft varieties.

The hard yellow and soft yellow we thought were the best varieties from

which to prepare half-boiled dried corn for winter storing. The dark and

light reds were also used, and if not quite so good, were but little

inferior. Indeed, for half-boiled dried corn, all varieties were used,

even the ma´ikadicakĕ, or gummy; but this last we did not think a good

variety for this way of putting up corn. Our gummy corn had but one well

recognized use; it was good for parching to make corn balls.

[Illustration: Figure 19]

[Illustration: Figure 20]

_Fodder Yield_

I do not think there was any perceptible difference in the fodder yield

of the various races of corn which we Hidatsas cultivated; but the fodder

yield was always much heavier in rainy years. In a dry season, the stalks

of the corn would be small and weak; and the leaves would be smaller than

in seasons of good rainfall.

_Developing New Varieties_

We Hidatsas knew that slightly differing varieties could be produced

by planting seeds that varied somewhat from the main stock. A woman

named Good Squash used to raise a variety of corn that tasted just like

soft white. This corn had large swelling kernels with deep yellow,

almost reddish, stripes running down the sides of the grain. We called

it Adaka´-dahu-ita ko´xati, or Arikaras’ corn, though it was not

Arikara corn at all. Good Squash’s daughter, Hunts Water, lives on this

reservation; she may have some of the seed of this variety.

SPORT EARS

_Names and Description_

Quite often ears of corn appear that are marked by some unusual form; and

for the more marked of these forms, we had special names. Following are

some of them:

_Na’´ta-tawo´xi._ From na’´ta, grain; and tawo´xi, a name applied to

youth, or the young, and conveying the idea of small. This is an ear of

corn having seventeen or eighteen rows of very small kernels. Our largest

ears of corn had usually but fourteen rows of kernels of normal size.

In the old legends of my tribe appear many women bearing this name

Na’´ta-tawo´xi.

_Wi´da-Aka´ta._ From wi´da, goose; and aka´ta, roof of the mouth. This is

an ear having two rows of corn on either side, with vacant spaces on the

cob between the double rows; often, toward the larger end of the ear, the

two rows will expand into three. Goodbird has made a drawing of such an

ear (figure 19). A wi´da-aka´ta ear, we thought, looks like the roof of

the mouth of a goose.

_I´ta-Ca´ca._ Forked face, or cloven face; from i´ta, face. A kind of

double ear. Goodbird has made a drawing of one (figure 20).

_Okĕi´jpita._ From o´kĕ, or o´ki, head-ornament, plume; i´jpu, top; and

i´ta, fruit. This is a small ear that sometimes appears at the top, on

the tassel of the plant.

Okĕi´jpita ears, if large enough, we gathered and put in with the rest

of the harvest; but smaller ears of this kind, hardly worth threshing,

we gathered and fed to our horses. Sometimes, if the harvesters were in

haste, these ears were left in the field on the stalk; a pony was then

led into the field to crop the ears.

_I´tica´kupadi._ I´tica´kupadi, or muffled head; so called because the

kernels come down and cover the face or bearded end of the cob quite to

the point. We thought such an ear looked like a man with his head muffled

up in his robe.

Muffled-head ears were more numerous in good crop years than in poor

years; and we thought such ears, if otherwise well favored, made good

seed corn.