Chapter IV: Corn (2)

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.

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.]

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

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.