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Titles included in this collection are listed in the volumes published by the Cornell University Press in the series The Literature of the Agricultural Sciences, 1991-1996, Wallace C. Olsen, series editor. ollj? Ilttterattg of iMmnwota STUDIES IN THE SOCIAL SCIENCES NUMBER 9 AGRICULTURE OF THE HIDATSA INDIANS AN INDIAN INTERPRETATION BY GILBERT LIVINGSTONE WILSON, Ph.D. MINNEAPOLIS Bulletin of the University of Minnesota' - November 1917 Pricb: 75 Cents RESEARCH PUBLICATIONS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA These publications contain the results of research work from various depart- ments of the University and are offered for exchange with universities, scientific societies, .and other institutions. Papers will be published' as separate monographs numbered in several series. There is no stated interval of publication. Application for any of these publications should be made to the University Librarian. STUDIES IN THE SOCIAL SCIENCES 1. Thompson and Warber, Social and Economic Survey of a Rural Township in Southern Minnesota. 1913. $0.50. 2. Matthias Nordberg Orfield, Federal Land Grants to the States, with Special Reference to Minnesota. 1915. §1.00. 3. Edward Van Dyke Robinson, Early Economic Conditions and the Develop- ment of Agriculture in Minnesota. 1915. $1.50. 4. L. D. H. Weld and Others, Studies in the Marketing of Farm Products. 1915. $0.50. 5. Ben Palmer, Swamp Land Drainage, with Special Reference to Minnesota. 1915. $0.50. 6. Albert Ernest Jenks, Indian-White Amalgamation: An Anthropometric Study. 1916. $0.50. 7. C. D. Allin, A History of the Tariff Relations of the Australian Colonies. In press. 8. Frances H. Relf, The Petition of Right. In press. 9. Gilbert L. Wilson, Agriculture of the Hidatsa Indians: An Indian Inter- pretation. 1917. $0.75. 10. Notestein and Relf, Editors, Commons Debates for 1629. In press. 11. Raymond A. Kent, State Aid to Public Schools. In press. STUDIES IN THE PHYSICAL SCIENCES AND MATHEMATICS 1. Frankforter and Frary, Equilibria in Systems Containing Alcohols, Salts, and Water. 1912. $0.50. 2. Frankforter and Kritchevsky, A New Phase of Catalysis. 1914. $0.50. STUDIES IN ENGINEERING 1. George Alfred Maney, Secondary Stresses and Other Problems in Rigid Frames: A New Method of Solution. 1915. $0.25. 2. Charles Franklin Shoop, An Investigation of the' Concrete Road-Making Properties of Minnesota Stone and Gravel. 1915. $0.25. 3. Franklin R. McMillan, Shrinkage and Time Effects in Reinforced Con- crete. 1915. $0.25. (Continued inside back cover) Maxi'diwiac, or Buffalobird-woman Photographed in 1910 Copyright 1917 BY THE University of Minnesota PREFACE The field of primitive economic activity has been largely left imculti- vated by both economists and anthropologists. The present study by Mr. Gilbert L. Wilson is an attempt to add to the scanty knowledge already at hand on the subject of the economic life of the American Indian. The work was begun without theory or thesis, but solely with the object of gathering available data from an old woman expert agriculturist in one of the oldest agricultural tribes accessible to a student of the University of Minnesota. That the study has unexpectedly revealed certain varieties of maize of apparently great value to agriculture in the semi-arid areas west of Minnesota is a cause of satisfaction to both Mr. Wilson and myself. This fact again emphasizes the wisdom of research work in our universities. When, now and then, such practical dollar- and-cent results follow such purely scientific researches, the wonder is that tmiversity research work is not generously endowed by businesses which largely profit by these researches. It is the intention of those interested in the anthropological work of the University of Minnesota that occasional publications wiU be issued by the University on anthropological subjects, although at present there is no justification for issuing a consecutive series. The present study is the second one in the anthropological field published by the University. The earlier one is number 6 in the Studies in the Social Sciences, issued March. 1916. Albert Ernest Jenks Professor of Anthropology CONTENTS PAGES Foreword ^~^ Chapter I— Tradition 6-8 Chapter II — Beginning a garden 9-15 Turtle 9 Clearing fields ' Dispute and its settlement 10 Turtle breaking soil 11 Turtle's primitive tools 12 Beginning a field in later times 13 Trees in the garden 15 Our west field 15 Burning over the field , 15 Chapter III — Sunflowers 16-21 Remark by Maxi'diwiac 16 Planting sunflowers 16 Varieties .' 16 Harvesting the seed 17 Threshing 18 Harvesting the mapi'-na'ka 18 Efiect of frost 18 Parching the seed 19 Four- vegetables-mixed 19 Sunflower-seed balls 21 Chapter IV— Corn 22-67 Planting 22 A morning's planting 23 Soaking the seed 23 Planting for a sick woman 24 Size of our biggest field 24 Na'xu and nu'cami 25 Hoeing 26 The watchers' stage 26 Explanation of sketch of watchers' stage 28 Sweet Grass's sun shade 30 The watchers 30 Booths 31 Eating customs 32 Youths' and maidens' customs 33 Watchers' songs 33 Clan cousins' custom 34 Story of Snake-head-ornament 35 Green corn and its uses 36-41 The ripening ears 36 Second planting for green com 37 Cooking fresh green com 37 CONTENTS V Roasidng ears 37 Matu'a-la'kapa 38 Com bread 38 Drying green com for winter 39 Mape'di (com smut) 42 Mape'di 42 Harvest and uses 42 The ripe com harvest 42-47 Husking 42 Rejecting green ears 44 Braiding com 45 The smaller ears 46 Drying the braided ears 47 Seed corn 47-49 Selecting the seed 47 Keeping two years' seed 48 Threshing corn 49-58 The booth 49 Order of the day's work 52 The cobs S3 Winnowing 54 Removing the booth 55 Threshing braided com 57 Amount of harvest 57 Sioux purchasing com 58 Varieties of corn 58-60 Description of varieties 58 How com travels 59 Uses of the varieties 60-67 Ata'ki tso'ki 60 Mapi' nakapa' 60 Ma'nakapa 61 Ata'ki 62 Boiled com ball 62 Tsi'di tso'ki and tsi'di tapa' 62 M^d^po'zi i'ti'a 63 Other soft varieties 63 Ma'ikadicake 63 Ma'pi meg'pi i"kiuta, or corn balls 63 Parched soft com 64 Parching whole ripe ears 64 Parching hard yellow com with sand 64 M^d^po'zi p^'kici, or lye-made hominy 64 General characteristics of the varieties 65 Fodder yield 66 Developing new varieties 66 Sport ears 67 Names and description 67 Na"ta-tawo'xi 67 vi CONTENTS Wi'da-aka'ta ^^ I'ta-ca'ca -■ "57 Okei'jpita ^^ I'tica'kupadi • • ■ ^"^ Chapter V— Squashes 68-81 Planting squashes "^ Sprouting the seed "° Planting the sprouted seed 69 Harvesting the squashes 69 Slicing the squashes '0 Squash spits ' ^ Spitting the slices '2 In case of rain ' ^ Drying and storing '3 Squash blossoms ' S Cooking and uses of squash 76 The first squashes 76 Boiling fresh squash in a pot 76 [ [ '■ ^ Squashes boiled with blossoms 77 Other blossom messes 77 Boiled blossoms 77 Blossoms boiled with madapo'zi i'ti'a 77 Blossoms boiled with mapi' nakapa' 78 Seed squashes 78-81 Selecting for seed 78 Gathering the seed squashes 78 Cooking the ripe squashes 79 Saving the seed 79 Eating the seeds 80 Roasting ripe squashes 80 Storing the unused seed squashes 80 Squashes, present seed 81 Squash dolls 81 Chapter VI — Beans 82-86 Planting beans 82 Putting in the seeds 82 Hoeing and cultivating 83 Threshing 83 Varieties 84 Selecting seed beans 85 Cooking and uses 85 Ama'ca di'he, or beans-boiled 86 Green beans boiled in the pod 86 Green com and beans 86 Chapter VII — Storing for winter 87-97 The cache pit 87 Grass for lining 88 Grass bundles 89 The grass binding rope 89 Drjdng the grass bundles 89 CONTENTS vii The willow floor 89 The grass lining 90 Skin bottom covering 90 Storing the cache pit 90 The puncheon cover 93 Cache pits in Small Ankle's lodge 95 First account 95 A second account on another day 96 Diagram of Small Ankle's lodge 97 Chapter VIII — The making of a drying stage 98-104 Stages in Like-a-fishhook village 98 Cutting the timbers 98 Digging the post holes 99 Raising the frame 100 The floor 100 Staying thongs 101 Ladder 101 Enlarging the stage 102 Present stages 102 Building, women's work 102 Measurements of stage 103 Drying rods 104 Other uses of the drying stage 104 Chapter IX— Tools 105-106 Hoe 105 Rakes 105 Squash knives 106 Chapter X — Fields at Like-a-fishhook village 108-112 East-side fields 108 East-side fences 108 Idikita'c's garden 110 Fields west of the village HO West-side fence Ill- Crops, our first wagon 112 Chapter XI — Miscellanea 113-118 Divisions between gardens 113 Fallowing, ownership of gardens 113 Frost in the gardens US Maxi'diwiac's philosophy of frost 115 Men helping in the field 115 Sucking the sweet juice 116 Corn as fodder for horses H^ Disposition of weeds H" The spring clean-up H^ Manure '■'■' Worms ^^"l Wild animals ^^' About old tent covers 11° viii CONTENTS Chapter XII — Since white men came 1 19-120 How we got potatoes and other vegetables. . ., 119 The new cultivation 120 Iron kettles 120 Chapter XIII— Tobacco 121-127 Observations by Maxi'diwiac 121 The tobacco garden 121 Planting 122 Arrow-head-earring's tobacco garden 122 Small Ankle's cultivation 122 Harvesting the blossoms 123 Harvesting the plants 124 Selling to the Sioux 125 Size of tobacco garden 126 Customs 126 Accessories to the tobacco garden 126-127 Fence 126 The scrotum basket 127 Old garden sites near Independence 129 HIDATSA ALPHABET a as a in what e ai air i i pique o tone u u rule a a father e ey they i i machine a u hut e e met 1 i tin c " sh " shun X " ch " machen (German) j " ch " mich (German) z " z " azure b, d, h, k, 1, m, n, p, r, s, t, w, as in English b, w, interchangeable with m n, 1, r, interchangeable with d , An apostrophe (') marks a short, nearly inaudible breathing. Native Hidatsa words in this thesis are written in the foregoing alphabet. This does not apply to the tribal names Hidatsa, Mandan, Dakota, Arikara, Minitari. AGRICULTURE OF THE HIDATSA INDIANS AN INDIAN INTERPRETATION FOREWORD The Hidatsas, called Minitaris by the Mandans, are a Sioiian Ungmstic tribe. Their language is closely akin to that of the Crows with whom they claim to have once formed a single tribe ; a separation, it is said, followed a quarrel over a slain buffalo. The name Hidatsa was formerly borne by one of the tribal villages. The other villages consolidated with it, and the name was adopted as that of the tribe. The name is said to mean "willows," and it was given the village because the god Itsikama'hidic promised that the villagers shoxild become as numerous as the willows of the Missouri river. Tradition says that the tribe came from Miniwakan, or Devils Lake, in what is now North Dakota; and that migrating west, they met the Man- dans at the mouth of the Heart River. The two tribes formed an alliance and attempted to live together as one people. Quarrels between their yotmg men catised the tribes to separate, but the Mandans loyally aided their friends to build new villages a few miles from their own. How long the two tribes dwelt at the mouth of the Heart is not known. They were found there with the Arikaras about 1765. In 1804 Lewis and Clark found the Hidatsas in three villages at the mouth of the Knife River, and the Man- dans in two villages a few miles lower down on the Missouri. In 1832 the artist Catlin visited the two tribes, remaining with them several months. A year later Maximilian of Wied visited them with the artist Bodmer. Copies of Bodmer's sketches, in beautiful lithograph, are found in the library of the Minnesota Historical Society. Catlin's sketches, also in lithograph, are in the Miimeapohs Public Library. Smallpox nearly exterminated the Mandans in 1837-8, not more than 150 persons surviAdng. The same epidemic reduced the Hidatsas to about 500 persons. The remnants of the two tribes united and in 1845 removed up the Missouri and built a village at Like-a-fishhook bend close to the trading post of Fort Berthold. They were joined by the Arikaras in 1862. Neighboring lands were set apart as a reservation for them; and there the three tribes, now settled on allotments, still dwell. The Mandans and Hidatsas have much intermarried. By ctistom children speak usually the language of their mother, but understand per- fectly the dialect of either tribe. In 1877 Washington Matthews, for several years government physician to the Fort Berthold Reservation Indians, published a short description of 2 GILBERT LIVINGSTONE WILSON Hidatsa-Mandan culture and a grammar and vocabulary of the Hidatsa language.^ More extensive notes intended by him for publication were destroyed by fire. In 1902 the writer was called to the pastorate of the Presbyterian church of Mandan, North Dakota. In iU health, he was advised by his physician to purchase pony and gun and seek the open; but spade and pick plied among the old Indian sites in the vicinity proved more interesting. A con- siderable collection of archaeological objects was accumulated, a part of which now rests in the shelves of the Minnesota Historical Society; the rest will shortly be placed in the collections of the American Museum of Nattu-al History. In 1906 the writer and his brother, Frederick N. Wilson, an artist, and E. R. Steinbrueck drove by wagon from Mandan to Independence, Fort Berthold reservation. The trip was made to obtain sketches for illustrat- ing a volume of stories, since published.'' At Independence the party made the acquaintance of Edward Goodbird, his mother Maxi'diwiac, and the latter's brother Wolf Chief. A friendship was thus begun which has been of the greatest value to the writer of this paper. A year later Mr. George- G. Heye sent the • writer to Fort Berthold reservation to collect objects of Mandan-Hidatsa culture. Among those that were obtained was a rare old medicine shrine. Description of this shrine and Wolf Chief's story of its origin have been pubUshed.' In 1908 the writer and his brother, both now resident in Minneapolis, were sent by Dr. Clark Wissler, curator of anthropology, American Mu- seum of Natural History, to begin cultural studies among the Hidatsas. This work, generously supported by the Museum, has been continued by the writer each succeeding simimer. His reports, preparations to edit which are now being made, will appear in the Museum's pubhcations. In February, 1910, the writer was admitted as a student in the Graduate School, University of Minnesota, majoring in Anthropology. At sugges- tion of his adviser. Dr. Albert E. Jenks, and with permission of Dr. Wissler, he chose for his thesis subject. Agriculture of the Hidatsa Indians: An In- dian Interpretation. It was the adviser's opinion that such a study held promise of more than usual interest. Most of the tribes in the eastern area of what is now the United States practiced agriculture. It is well known that maize, potatoes, pumpkins, squashes, beans, sweet potatoes, cotton, tobacco, and other familiar plants were cultivated by Indians cen- turies before Columbus. Early white settlers learned the value of the new 'Washington Matthews. Ethnography and Philology of the Bidalsa Indians. U. S. Geolorical and Geographical Survey. ' Gilbert L. Wilson. Myths of the Red Children. Ginn and Company. 1907. 'George H. Pepper and GUbert L. WUson. An Hidatsa Shrine and the Beliefs Respecting It. Memoirs CI the American Anthropological Association, 1908. AGRICULTURE OF THE HID ATS A INDIANS 3 food plants, but have left tis meager accounts of the native methods of till- age; and the Indians, driven from the fields of their fathers, became roving himters; or adopting iron tools, forgot their primitive implements and methods. The Hidatsas and Mandans, shut in their stockaded villages on the Missouri by the hostile Sioux, were not able to abandon their fields if they would. Living quite out of the main lines of railroad traffic, they remained isolated and with cultiue almost unchanged tmtil about 1885, when their village at Fort Berthold was broken up. It seemed probable that a carefully prepared account of Hidatsa agricultttre might very nearly describe the agriculture practiced by our northern tribes in pre-Columbian days. It was hoped that this thesis might be such an account. But the writer is a student of anthropology; and his interest in the prep- aration of his thesis could not be that of an agriculturist. The question arose at the beginning of his labors, Shall the materials of this thesis be presented as a study merely in primitive agriculture, or as a phase of ma- terial culture interpreting something of the inner life, of the soul, of an Indian? It is the latter aim that the writer endeavors to accomplish. But again came up a question. By what plan may this best be done? The more usual way would be to collect exhaustively facts from available informants; sift from them those facts that are typical and representative; and present these, properly grouped, with the collector's interpretation of them. But for his purpose and aim, it has seemed to the writer that the type choice should be human ; that is, instead of seeking typical facts from multiple soiu'ces, he shotdd rather seek a typical informant, a representa- tive agriculturist — presumably a woman — of the Indian group to be studied, and let the informant interpret her agricultural experiences in her own way. We might thus expect to learn how much one Indian woman knew of agriculture; what she did as an agriculturist and what were her motives for doing; and what proportion of her thought and labor were given to her fields. After consulting both Indians and whites resident on the reservation, the writer chose for typical or representative informant, his interpreter's mother, Maxi'diwiac. The writer's summer visit of 1912 to Fort Berthold Reservation was planned to obtain material for his thesis. His brother again accompanied him, and for the expenses of the trip a grant of $500 was made by Curator Wissler. This trip the writer wiU remember as one of the pleasantest ex- periences of his Ufe. The generous interest of Dr. Jenks and Dr. Wissler in his plans was equaled by the faithful cooperation of interpreter and in- formant. The writer and his brother arrived at the reservation in the be- ginning of com harvest. As already stated, Maxi'diwiac was the prmci- pal informant, and her accotmt was taken down almost literally as trans- lated by Goodbird. Models of tools, drying stage, and other objects per- 4 GILBERT LIVINGSTONE WILSON taining to agriculture were made and photographed, and sketched. Before the harvest closed notes were obtained which furnished the material for the greater part of this thesis. In the summers of 1913, 1914, and 1915, additional matter was re- covered. Previously written notes were read to Maxi'diwiac and correc- tions made. In addition to the museum's annual grant of $250, Dean A. F. Woods, Department of Agriculture, University of Miimesota, in 1914 contributed $60 for photographing, and collecting specimens of Hidatsa com; and Mr. M. L. Wilson of the Agricultural Experiment Station, Bozeman, Montana, obtained for the writer a grant of $50 for like piuposes. A few words should now be said of informant and interpreter. Maxi'- diwiac, or Buffalobird-woman, is a daughter of Small Ankle, a leader of the Hidatsas in the trying time of the tribe's removal to what is now Fort Berthold reservation. She was bom on one of the villages at Knife River two years after the "smallpox year," or about 1839. She is a conservative and sighs for the good old times, yet is aware that the younger generation of Indians must adopt civilized ways. Ignorant of EngUsh, she has a quick intelligence and a memory that is marvelous. To her patience and loyal interest is chiefly due whatever of value is in this thesis. In the swel- tering heat of an August day she has continued dictation for nine hours, lying down but never flagging in her accotmt, when too weary to sit longer in a chair. Goodbird's testimony that his mother "knows more about old ways of raising com and squashes than any one else on this reserva- tion," is not without probabiUty. Until recently, a small part of Good- bird's plowed field was each year reserved for her, that she might plant com and beans and squashes, cultivating them in old fashioned way, by hoe. Such com, of her own planting and selection, has taken first prize at an agricultural fair, held recently by the reservation authorities. Edward Goodbird, or Tsaka'kas^c, the writer's interpreter, is a son of Maxi'diwiac, bom about November, 1869. Goodbird was one of the first of the reservation children to be sent to the mission school ; and he is now native pastor of the Congregational chapel at Independence. He speaks the Hidatsa, Mandan, Dakota, and EngUsh languages. Goodbird is a natural student; and he has the rarer gift of being an artist. His sketches — and they are many — are crude; but they are drawn in true per- spective and do not lack spirit. Goodbird's life, dictated by himself, has been recently published.* Indians have the gentle custom of adopting very dear friends by rela- tionship terms. By such adoption Goodbird is the writer's brother; Maxi'diwiac is his mother. * Gilbert L. Wilson, Goodbird, the Indian: His Story. Fleming H. Revell Co. 1914. AGRICULTURE OF THE HIDATSA INDIANS 5 For his part in the account of the Agriculture of the Hidatsa Indians, the writer claims no credit beyond arranging the material and putting the interpreter's Indian-English translations into proper idiom. Bits of Indian philosophy and shrewd or humorous observations found in the narrative are not the writer's, but the informant's, and are as they fell from her lips. The writer has sincerely endeavored to add to the narra- tive essentially nothing of his own. Agriculture of the Hidatsa Indians is not, then, an account merely of Indian agriculture. It is an Indian woman's interpretation of economics; the thoughts she gave to her fields; the philosophy of her labors. May the Indian woman's story of her toil be a plea for our better appreciation of her race. CHAPTER I TRADITION We Hidatsas believe that ovir tribe once lived under the waters of Devils Lake. Some hunters discovered the root of a vine growing downward; and climbing it, they foimd themselves on the surface of the earth. Others followed them, until half the tribe had escaped; but the vine broke under the weight of a pregnant woman, leaving the rest prisoners. A part of our tribe are therefore still beneath the lake. My father. Small Ankle, going, when a young man, on a war party, visited Devils Lake. "Beneath the waves," he said, "I heard a faint drumming, as of drtrnis in a big dance." This story is true; for Sioux, who now live at Devils Lake, have also heard this drumming. Those of my people who escaped from the lake built villages near by. These were of earth lodges, such as my tribe built vmtil very recent years; two such earth lodges are still standing on this reservation. The site where an earth lodge has stood is marked by an earthen ring, rising about what was once the hard trampled floor. There are many such earthen rings on the shores of Devils Lake, showing that, as tradition says, otir villages stood there. There were three of these villages, my father said, who several times visited the sites. Near their villages, the people made gardens; and in these they planted ground beans and wild potatoes, from seed brought with them from their home under the water. These vegetables we do not cultivate now; but we do gather them in the fall, in the woods along the Missouri where they grow wild. They are good eating. These gardens by Devils Lake I think must have been rather small. I know that in later times, whenever my tribe removed up the Missouri to build a new village, our fields, the first year, were quite small; for clearing the wooded bottom land was hard work. A family usually added to their clearing each year, tmtil their garden was as large as they cared to cultivate. As yet, my people knew nothing of com or squashes. One day a war party, I think of ten men, wandered west to the Missouri River. They saw on the other side a village of earth lodges like their own. It was a village of the Mandans. The villagers saw the Hidatsas, but like them, feared to cross over, lest the strangers prove to be enemies. It was autumn, and the Missouri River was running low so that an arrow could be shot from shore to shore. The Mandans parched some ears of ripe com with the grain on the cob; they broke the ears in pieces, thrust the pieces on the points of arrows, and shot them across the river. "Eat !" they said, whether by voice or signs, I do not know. The word for "eat" is the same in the Hidatsa and Mandan languages. AGRICULTURE OF THE HIDATSA INDIANS 7 The warriors ate of the parched com, and liked it. They returned to their village and said, "We have found a people living by the Missouri River who have a strange kind of grain, which we ate and found good!" The tribe was not much interested and made no effort to seek the Mandans, fearing, besides, that they might not be friendly. However, a few years after, a war party of the Hidatsas crossed the Missouri and visited the Mandans at their village near Bird Beak Hill. The Mandan chief took an ear of yellow com, broke it in two, and gave half to the Hidatsas. This half^ar the Hidatsas took home, for seed; and soon every family was planting yellow com. I think that seed of other varieties of com, and of beans, squashes, and stmflowers, were gotten of the Mandans' afterwards; but there is no story telling of this, that I know. I do not know when my people stopped planting ground beans and wild potatoes; but grotmd beans are hard to dig, and the people, anyway, liked the new kind of beans better. Whether the grotmd beans and wild potatoes of the Missotui bottoms are descended from the seed planted by the villagers at Devils Lake, I do not know. My tribe, as our old men tell us, after they got corn, abandoned their villages at Devils Lake, and joined the Mandans near the mouth of the Heart River. The Mandans helped them build new villages here, near their own. I think this was hundreds of years ago. Firewood growing scarce, the two tribes removed up the Missotiri to the mouth of the Knife River, where they built the Five Villages, as they called them. Smallpox was brought to my people here, by traders. In a single year, more than half my tribe died, and of the Mandans, even more. Those who survived removed up the Missouri and built a village at Like-a-fishhook bend, where they Hved together, Hidatsas and Mandans, as one tribe. This village we Hidatsas called Mu'a-idu'skupe-hi'cec, or, > "In the garden vegetable family are five; com, beans, squashes, sunflowers, and tobacco. The seeds of all these plants were brought up from beneath the ground by the Mandan peoole. "Now the com, as we believe, has an enemy — the sun who tries to burn the com. But at night, when the sun has gone down, the com has magic power. It is the com that brings the night moistures — the early morning mist and fog, and the dew — as you can see yourself in the morning from the water dripping from the com leaves. Thus the com grows and keeps on until it is ripe. "The sun may scorch the com and try hard to dry it up, but the com takes care of itself, bringing the moistures that make the com, and also the beans, sunflowers, squashes, and tobacco grow. "The com possesses all this magic power. "When you white people met our Mandan people we gave to the whites the name Maci', or Waci', meaning nice people, or pretty people. We called them by this name because they had white faces and wore fine clothes. We said also 'We' will call these people our friends!' And from that time to this we have never made war on white men. "Our Mandan com must now be all over the world, for we gave the white men our seeds. And so it seems we Mandans have helped every people. But the seed of our varieties of com were originally ours. "We know that white men must also have had com seed, for their com is different from ours. But all we older folk can tell our native com from that of white men." — Wounded Face (Mandan) 8 GILBERT LIVINGSTONE WILSON Like-a-fishhook village, after the bend on which it stood; but white men called it Fort Berthold, from a trading post that was there. We lived in Like-a-fishhook village about forty years, or until 1885, when the government began to place families on allotments. The agrictdture of the Hidatsas, as I now describe it, I saw practiced in the gardens of Like-a-fishhook village, in my girlhood, before my tribe owned plows. An earth lodge Note ladder at right of lodge entrance. Dr>'ing stage before entrance lacks the usual railings. (Photograph l;>' courtesy of Re%'. George Curtis.) Like-a-fishhook village in process of being dismantled (about 1885) Drying stage in foreground is floored Arikara fashion with a mat of willows. The Arikaras at this time had joined the Hidatsa-Mandans. (Photograph by courtesy of Rev. George Curtis.) CHAPTER II BEGINNING A GARDEN Turtle My great-grandmother, as white men count their Idn, was named At^'kic, or Soft-white Com. She adopted a daughter, Mata'tic, or Turtle. Some years after, a daughter was bom to At^'kic, whom she named Otter. Turtle and Otter both married. Turtle had a daughter named Ica'wikec, or Com Sucker;! and Otter had three daughters, Want-to-be-a-woman, Red Blossom, and Strikes-many-women, all yo\inger than Com Sucker. The smallpox year at Five Villages left Otter's fan^ily with no male members to support them. Turtle and her daughter were then hving in Otter's lodge; and Otter's daughters, as Indian custom bade, called Com Sucker their elder sister. It was a custom of the Hidatsas, that if the eldest sister of a household married, her younger sisters were also given to her husband, as they came of marriageable age. Left without male kin by the smallpox, my grand- mother's family was hard put to it to get meat; and Turtle gladly gave her daughter to my father, Small Ankle, whom she knew to be a good hunter. Otter's daughters, reckoned as Com Sucker's sisters, were given to Small Ankle as they grew up; the eldest, Want-to-be-a-woman, was my mother. When I was four years old, my tribe and the Mandans came to Like-a- fishhook bend. They came in the spring and camped in tepees, or skin tents. By Butterfly's winter count, I know they began building earth lodges the next winter. I was too young to remember much of this. Two years after we came to Like-a-fishhook bend, smallpox again visited my tribe; and my mother, Want-to-be-a-woman, and Com Sucker, died of it. Red Blossom and Strikes-many-woroen survived, whom I now called my mothers. Otter and old Turtle lived with us; I was taught to call them my grandmothers. Clearing Fields Soon after they came to Like-a-fishhook bend, the famiUes of my tribe began to clear fields, for gardens, like those they had at Five Villages. Rich black soil was to be found in the timbered bottom lands of the Mis- sotiri. Most of the work of clearing was done by the women. In old times we Hidatsas never made our gardens on the untimbered, prairie land, because the soil there is too hard and dry. In the bottom lands by the Missouri, the soil is soft and easy to work. > Com sucker, i. c, the extra shoot or stem that often springs up from the base of the maize plant. 10 GILBERT LIVINGSTONE WILSON Lone- WomaMis field •■•CO;) I.';* &oes-to-ne»t-Timber« field My mothers and my two grandmothers worked at clearing our family's gar- den. It lay east of the village at a place where many other families were clearing fields. I was too small to note very much at first. But I remember that my father set boimdary rsarks — whether wooden stakes or little mounds of earth or stones, I do not now re- member — at the comers of the field we claimed. My mothers and my two grand- mothers began at one end of this field and worked forward. All had heavy iron hoes, except Turtle, who used an old fashioned wooden digging stick. With their hoes, my mothers cut the long grass that covered much of the field, and bore it off the line, to be burned. With the same implements, they next dug and softened the soil in places for the com hills, which were laid off in rows. These hiUs they planted. Then all summer they worked with their hoes, clearing and breaking the grotmd between the hills. Trees and bushes I know must have been cut off with iron axes; but I remember little of this, because I was only four years old when the clear- ing was begun. I have heard that in very old times, when clearing a new field, my people first dug the com hills with digging sticks; and afterwards, like my mothers, worked between the hUls, with bone hoes. My father told me this. Whether stone axes were used in old times to cut the trees and under- growths, I do not know. I think fields were never then laid out on ground that had large trees on it. Figure 1 Map of newly broken field drawn under Buffalobird- woman's direction. The heavy dots represent corn hills; the dashes, the clearing and breaking of ground between, done after hills were planted. In the lower left hand corner is the ground that was in dispute. Dispute and Its Settlement About two years after the first ground was broken in our field, a dispute I remember, arose between my mothers and two of their neighbors. Lone Woman and Goes-to-next-timber. These two women were clearing fields adjoining that of my mothers; as will be seen by the accompanying map (figure 1), the three fields met at a comer. I have said that my father, to set up claim to his field, had AGRICULTURE OF THE HIDATSA INDIANS 11 placed marks, one of them in the comer at which met the fields of Lone Woman and Goes-to-next-timber; but while my mothers were busy clear- ing and digging up the other end of their field, their two neighbors invaded this marked-off comer; Lone Woman had even dug up a small part before she was discovered. However, when they were shown the mark my father had placed, the two women yielded and accepted payment for any rights they might have. It was our Indian rule to keep our fields very sacred. We did not hke to quarrel about our garden lands. One's title to a field once set up, no one ever thought of disputing it; for if one were selfish and quarrelsome, and tried to seize land belonging to another, we thought some evil would come upon him, as that some one of his family would die. There is a story of a black bear who got into a pit that was not his own, and had his mind taken away from him for doing so ! Turtle Breaking Soil Lone Woman and Goes-to-next-timber having withdrawn, my grand- mother, Tiurtle, volunteered to break the soil of the comer that had been in dispute. She was an industrious woman. Often, when my mothers were busy in the earth lodge, she woiild go out to work in the garden, taking me with her for company. I was six years old then, I think, qtiite too Uttle to help her any, but I liked to watch my grandmother work. With her digging stick, she dug up a little rovmd place in the center of the comer (figure 1) ; and circling around this from day to day, she gradually enlarged the dug-up space. The point of her digging stick she forced into the soft earth to a depth equal to the length of my hand, and pried up the soil. The clods she struck smartly with her digging stick, sometimes with one end, sometimes with the other. Roots of coarse grass, weeds, small brush and the hke, she took in her hand and shook, or struck them against the ground, to knock off the loose earth cHnging to them; she then cast them into a little pile to dry. In this way she accumulated little piles, scattered rather irregularly over the dug-up ground, averaging, perhaps, four feet, one from the other. In a few days these Httle piles had dried; and Turtle gathered them up into a heap, about four feet high, and burned them, sometimes within the cleared ground, sometimes a Httle way outside. In the comer that had, been in dispute, and in other parts of the field, my grandmother worked all summer. I do not remember how big our garden was at the end of her svunmer's work, nor how many piles of roots she bumed; but I remember distinctly how she put the roots of weeds and grass and brush into little piles to dry, which she then gathered into heaps and burned. She did not attempt to bum over the whole ground, only the heaps. 12 GILBERT LIVINGSTONE WILSON Afterwards, we increased our garden from year to year until it was as large as we needed. I remember seeing my grandmother digging along the edges of the garden with her digging stick, to enlarge the field and make the edges even and straight. I remember also, that as Turtle dug up a httle space, she would wait until the next season to plant it. Thus, additional ground dug up in the summer or fall would be planted by her the next spring. There were two or three elm trees in the garden; these my grandmother left standing. It must not be supposed that upon Turtle fell all the work of clearing Fig. 2 Figure 2. Drawn from specimen in author's collection. Length of specimen, 37^ inches. Figure 3. Drawn from model made by BuSalobird* woman, duplicating that used by her grandmother. Specimen is of full size. Length of wooden handle, 35 inches; length of bone blade, 8K inches. The blade is made of the shoulder bone of an ox. land to enlarge otu- garden; but she liked to have me with her when she worked, and I remember best what I saw her do. As I was a little girl then, I have forgotten much that she did; but this that I have told, I remember distinctly. Turtle's Primitive Tools In breaking ground for our garden, Tvu^le always used an ash digging stick (figru-e 2) ; and when hoeing time came, she hoed the com with a bone hoe (figure 3). Digging sticks are still used in my tribe for digging wild turnips; but even in my grandmother's Hfetime, digging sticks and bone hoes, as garden tools, had all but given place to iron hoes and axes. My grandmother was one of the last women of my tribe to cUng to these old fashioned implements. Two other women, I remember, owned bone hoes when I was a little girl; but Turtle, I think, was the very last one in the tribe who actually worked in her garden with one. AGRICULTURE OF THE HID ATS A INDIANS 13 This hoe my grandmother kept in the lodge, under her bed; and when any of the children of the household tried to get it out to look at it, she would cry, "Let that hoe alone; you will break it!" Beginning a Field in Later Times As I grew up, I learned to work in the garden, as every Hidatsa woman was expected tb learn; but iron axes and hoes, bought of the traders, were now used by everybody, and the work of clearing and breaking a new field was less difficult than it had been in otir grandfathers' times. A family had also greater freedom in choosing where they should have their garden, since with iron axes they cotdd more easily cut down any small trees and bushes that might be on the land. However, to avoid having to cut down big trees, a rather open place was usually chosen. A family, then, having chosen a place for a field, cleared off the ground as much as they could, cutting down small trees and bushes in such way that the trees fell all in one direction. Some of the timber that was fit might be taken home for firewood; the rest was let lie to dry until spring, when it was fired. The object of felling the trees in one direction was to make them cover the ground as much as possible, since firing them softened the soil and left it loose and mellow for planting. We sought always to bum over all the ground, if we could. Before firing, the family careftilly raked off the dry grass and leaves from the edge of the field, and cut down any brush wood. This was done that the fire might not spread to the surrounding timber, nor out on the prairie. Prairie fires and forest fires are even yet not unknown on our reservation. Planting season having come, the women of the household planted the field in com. The hiUs were in rows, and about four feet or a little less apart. They were rather irregularly placed the first year. It was easy to make a hiU in the ashes where a brush heap had been fired, or in soil that was free of roots and stimips; but there were many sttunps in the field, left over from the previous summer's clearing. If the planter found a stump stood where a hill shoiild be, she placed the hiU on this side the stump or beyond it, no matter how close this brought the hill to the next in the row. Thus, the com lulls did not stand at even distances in the row the first year; but the rows were always kept even and straight. While the com was coming up, the women worked at clearing out the roots and smaller stumps between the hills; but a stump of any consider- able size was left to rot, especially if it stood midway between two com hills, where it did not interfere with their cultivation. My mothers and I used to labor in a similar way to enlarge our fields. With our iron hoes we made hills along the edge of the field and planted 14 GILBERT LIVINGSTONE WILSON com; then, as we had opportunity, we worked with our hoes between the com hills to loosen up the soil. Figure 4 Drawn from specimen made , by Yellow Hair. Length, of specim.en, fol- lowing curvature of tines, 36 J^ inches. Figure 5 Drawn from specimen made by Buffalobifd-woman. Length of wooden handle, 42 inches; spread of tines of antler, 15 H inches. Although our tribe now had iron axes and hoes from the traders, they still used their native made rakes. These were of wood (figure 4), or of the antler of a black-tailed deer (figure 5). It was with such rakes that the edges of a newly opened field were cleaned of leaves for the firing of the brush, in the spring. In the field with a horn rake Hoeing squashes with a bone hoe AGRICULTURE OF THE HIDATSA INDIANS 15 Trees in the Garden Trees were not left standing in the garden, except perhaps one to shade the watchers' stage. If a tree stood in the field, it shaded the com; and that on the north side of the tree never grew up strong, and the stalks would be yellow. Cottonwood trees were apt to grow up in the field, unless the young shoots were plucked up as they appeared. Our West Field The field which Turtle helped to clear, lay, I have said, east of the vil- lage. I was about nineteen years old, I think, when my mothers deter- mined to clear ground for a second field, west of the village. There were five of us who undertook the work, my father, my two moth- ers, Red Blossom and Strikes-many-women, my sister. Cold Medicine, and myself. "We began in the fall, after harvesting the com from our east garden, so that we had leisure for the work; we had been too busy to begin earlier in the season. We chose a place down in the bottoms, overgrown with willows; and with our axes we cut the willows close to the ground, letting them lie as they fell. I do not know how many days we worked; but we stopped when we had cleared a field of about seventy-five by one hundred yards, perhaps. In our east, or yellow com field, we counted nine rows of com to one na'xu; and I remember that when we came to plant our new field, it had nine na'xu. Burning Over the Field The next spring my father, his two wives, my sister and I went out and burned the felled willows and bmsh which the spring sun had dried. We did not bum them every day; only when the weather was fine. We would go out after breakfast, bum until tired of the work, and come home. We sought to bum over the whole field, for we knew that this left a good, loose sou. We did not pile the willows in heaps, but loosened them from the ground or scattered them loosely but evenly over the soil. In some places the grotmd was quite bare of willows; but we collected dry grass and weeds and dead willows, and strewed them over these bare places, so that the fire would run over the whole area of the field. It took us about four days to bum over the field. It was well known in my tribe that burning over new ground left the soil soft and easy to work, and for this reason we thought it a wise thing to do. CHAPTER III SUNFLOWERS Remark by Maxi'diwiac This that I am going to tell you of the planting and harvesting of otir crops is out of my own experience, seen with my own eyes. In olden times, I know, my tribe used digging sticks and bone hoes for garden tools; and I have described how I saw my grandmother use them. There may be other tools or garden customs once in use in my tribe, and now forgotten; of them I cannot speak. There were families in Like-a-fishhook village less industrious than ours, and some families may have tilled their fields in ways a little different; of them, also, I can not speak. This that I now tell is as I saw my mothers do, or did myself, when I was young. My mothers were industrious women, and our family had always good crops; and I win tell now how the women of my father's family cared for their fields, as I saw them, and helped them. Planting Sunflowers The first seed that we planted in the spring was sunflower seed. Ice breaks on the Missouri about the first week in April; and we planted sun- flower seed as soon after as the soil could be worked. Our native name for the limar month that corresponds most nearly to April, is Mapi'-o'ce-mi'di, or Sunflower-planting-moon. Planting was done by hoe, or the woman scooped up the soil with her hands. Three seeds were planted in a hill, at the depth of the second joint of a woman's finger. The three seeds were planted together, pressed into the loose soil by a single motion, with thumb and first two fingers. The hill was heaped up and patted firm with the palm in the same way as we did for com. Usually we planted stmflowers only aroimd the edges of a field. The hills were placed eight or nine paces apart; for we never sowed sunflowers thickly. We thought a field surrounded thus by a sparce-sown row of stmflowers, had a handsome appearance. Sometimes all three seeds sprouted and came up together; sometimes only two sprouted; sometimes one. Varieties Of cultivated sunflowers we had several varieties, black, white, red, striped, named from the color of the seed. The varieties differed only in color; all had the same taste and smell, and were treated alike in cooking. 16 AGRICULTURE OF THE HIDATSA INDIANS 17 White sunflower seed when potmded into meal, tvimed dark, but I think this was caused by the parching. Each family raised the variety they preferred. The varieties were well fixed; black seed produced black; white seed, white. Harvesting the Seed Although our simflower seed was the first crop to be planted in the spring, it was the last to be harvested in the fall. For harvesting, we reckoned two kinds of flowers, or heads. A stalk springing from seed of one of our cultivated varieties had one, sometimes two, or even three larger heads, heavy and full, bending the top of the stalk with their weight of seed. Some of these big heads had each a seed area as much as eleven inches across; and yielded each an even double handful of seed. We called the seed from these big heads mapi'-i'ti'a from mapi', sunflower, or sunflover seed, and i'ti'a, big. Besides these larger heads, there were other and smaller heads on the stalk; and wild simflowers bearing similar small heads grew in many places along the Missotiri, and were sure to be found springing up in abandoned gardens. These smaller heads of the cultivated, and the heads of the wild, plants, were never more than five inches across; and these and their seed we called mapi'-na'ka, sunflower's child or baby sunflower. Our sunflowers were ready for harvesting when the little petals that covered the seeds fell off, exposing the ripe seeds beneath. Also, the back of the head tvimed yellow; earlier in the season it would be green. To harvest the larger heads, I put a basket on my back, and knife in hand, passed from plant to plant, cutting off each large head close to the stem; the severed heads I tossed into my basket. These heads I did not let dry on the stalk, as birds would devour the seeds. My basket" filled, I returned to the lodge, climbed the ladder to the roof, and spread the sunflower heads upon the flat part of the roof arovmd the smoke hole, to dry. The heads were laid face downward, with the backs to the sun. When I was a girl, only three or four earth lodges in the village had peaked roofs; and these lodges were rather small. All the larger and better lodges, those of what we deemed wealthier families, were built with the top of the roof flat, like a floor. A flat roof was useful to dry things on; and when the weather was fair, the men often sat there and gossiped. The simflower heads were dried face downward, that the sun falling on the back of the head might dry and shrink the flber, thus loosening the seeds. The heads were laid flat on the bare roof, without skins or other protection beneath. If a storm threatened, the unthreshed heads were gathered up and borne into the lodge; but they were left on the roof overnight, if the weather was fair. 18 GILBERT LIVINGSTONE WILSON When the heads had dried about four days, the seeds were threshed out; and I would fetch in from the garden another supply of heads to dry and thresh. Threshing To thresh the heads, a skin was spread and the heads laid on it face downward, and beaten with a stick. Threshing might be on the ground, or on the flat roof, as might be convenient. An average threshing filled a good sized basket, with enough seed left over to make a small package. Harvesting the Mapi'-na'ka The smaller heads of the cultivated plants were sometimes gathered, dried, and threshed, as were the larger heads; but if the season was getting late and frost had fallen, and the seeds were getting loose in their pods, I more often threshed these smaller heads and those of the wild plants di- rectly from the stalk. For this I bore a carrying basket, swinging it around over my breast instead of my back; and going about the garden or into the places where the wHd plants grew, I held the basket under these smaller, or baby sun- flower heads, and beating them smartly with a stick, threshed the seeds into the basket. It took me about half a day to thresh a basket half full. The seeds I took home to dry, before sacking them. The seeds from the baby sunflowers of both wild and cultivated plants were sacked together. The seeds of the large heads were sacked separately ; and in the spring, when we came to plant, our seed was always taken from the sack containing the harvest of the larger heads. In my father's family, we usually stored away two, sometimes three sacks of dried sunflower seed for winter use. Sacks were made of skins, perhaps fourteen inches high and eight inches in diameter, on an average. Sunflower harvest came after we had threshed our com; and corn threshing was in the first part of October. Effect of Frost Because they were gathered later, the seeds of baby sunflowers were looked upon as a kind of second crop; and as I have said, they were kept apart from the earlier harvest, because seed for planting was selected from the larger and earlier gathered heads. Gathered thus late, this second crop was nearly always touched by the frost, even before the seeds were threshed from the stalks. This frosting of the seeds had an effect upon them that we rather esteemed. We made a kind of oily meal from stuiflower seed, by pounding AGRICULTURE OF THE HIDATSA INDIANS 19 them in a com mortar; but meal made from seed that had been frosted, seemed more oily than that from seed gathered before frost fell. The freezing of the seeds seemed to bring the oil out of the crushed kernels. This was well known to us. The large heads, left on the roof over night, were sometimes caught by the frost; and meal made from their seed was more oily than that from tmfrosted seed. Sometimes we took the threshed seed out of doors and let it get frosted, so as to bring out this oiliness. Frosting the seeds did not kill them. The oiliness brought out by the frosting was more apparent in the seeds of baby sunflowers than in seeds of the larger heads. Seeds of the latter seemed never to have as much oil in them as seeds of the baby sunflowers. Parching the Seed To make sunflower meal the seeds were first roasted, or parched. This was done in a clay pot, for iron pots were scarce in my tribe when I was yoimg. The day pot in use in my father's family was about a foot high and eight or nine inches in diameter, as you see from measurements I make with my hands. This pot I set on the lodge fire, working it down into the coals with a rocking motion, and raked coals around it; the mouth I tipped slightly toward me. I threw into the pot two or three double-handfuls of the seeds and as they parched, I stirred them with a little stick, to keep them from burning. Now and then I took out a seed and bit it; if the kernel was soft and g nTnm y, I knew the parching was not done; but when it bit dry and crisp, I knew the seeds were cooked and I dipped them out with a horn spoon into a wooden bowl. Again I threw into the pot two or three double-handfuls of seed to parch; and so, until I had enough. As the pot grew quite hot I was carefijl not to touch it with my hands. The parching done, I lifted the pot out, fiorst throwing over it a piece of old tent cover to protect my two hands. Parching the seeds caused them to crack open somewhat. The parched seeds were potmded in the com mortar to make meal. Pounding sunflower seeds took longer, and was harder work, than pounding com. Four-vegetables-mixed Sunflower meal was used in making a dish that we called do'patsa- makihi'kS, or four-vegetables-jnixed; from do'patsa, four things; and makihi'kS, mixed or put together. Four-vegetables-mixed we thought our very best dish. To make this dish, enough for a family of five, I did as follows: 20 GILBERT LIVINGSTONE WILSON I put a clay pot with water on the fire. Into the pot I threw one double-handftil of beans. This was a fixed quantity; I put in just one double-handful whether the family to be served was large or small; for a larger quantity of beans in this dish was apt to naake gas on one's stomach. When we dried squash in the fall we strung the slices upon strings of twisted grass, each seven Indian fathoms long; an Indian fathom is the distance between a woman's two hands outstretched on either side. From one of these seven-fathom" strings I cut a piece as long as from my elbow to the tip of my thumb; the two ends of the severed piece I tied together, making a ring; and this I dropped into the pot with the beans. When the squash slices were well cooked I lifted them out of the pot by the grass string into a wooden bowl. With a horn spoon I chopped and mashed the cooked squash slices into a mass, which I now returned to the pot with the beans. The grass string I threw away. Figiire 6 Drawn from specimens in author's collection. To the mess I now added four or five double-handfuls of mixed meal, of pounded parched stmflower seed and poimded parched com. The whole was boiled for a few minutes more, and was ready for serving. I have already told how we parched sunflower seed; and that I used two or three double-handfuls of seed to a parching. I used two parchings of sunflower seed for one mess of four-vegetables-mixed. I also used two parchings of com; but I put more corn into the pot at a parching than I did of sunflower seed. Pounding the parched com and sunflower seed reduced their bulk so that the four parchings, two of sunflower seed and two of com, made but four or five double-handfuls of the mixed meal. << Four-vegetables-mixed was eaten freshly cooked; and the mixed com- and-sunflower meal was made fresh for it each time. A little alkali salt might be added for seasoning, but even this was not usual. No other sea- soning was used. Meat was not boiled with the mess, as the sunflower seed gave sufficient oil to furnish fat. AGRICULTURE OF THE HI DATS A INDIANS 21 FoTiT-vegetables-mixed was a winter food; and the squash used in its making was dried, sliced squash, never green, fresh squash. The clay pot used for boiling this and other dishes was about the size of an iron dinner pot, or even larger. For a large family, the pot might be as much as thirteen or fo\irteen inches high. I have described that in use in my father's family. When a mess of four-vegetables-mixed was cooked, I did not remove the pot from the coals, but dipped out the vegetables with a mountain- sheep horn spoon, into wooden bowls (figure 6.) Sunflower-seed Balls Sunflower meal of the parched seeds was also used to make stmflower seed balls; these were important articles of diet in olden times, and had a particular use. » For sunflower-seed balls I parched the seeds in a pot in the usual way, put them in a com mortar and pounded them. When they were reduced to a fine meal I reached into the mortar and took out a handful of the meal, squeezing it in the fingers and palm of my right hand. This squeezing it made it into a kind of lump or ball. This ball I enclosed in the two palms and gently shook it. The shaking brought out the oil of the seeds, cementing the particles of the meal and making the lump firm. I have said that frosted seeds gave out more oil than tmfrosted; and that baby sunflower seeds gave out more oil than seeds from the big heads. In olden times every warrior carried a bag of soft skin at his left side, supported by a thong over his right shoulder; in this bag he kept needles, sinews, awl, soft tanned skin for making patches for moccasins, gun caps, and the like. The warrior's powder horn hung on the outside of this bag. In the bottom of this soft-skin bag the warrior commonly carried one of these sunflower-seed balls, wrapped in a piece of buffalo-heart skin. When worn with fatigue or overcome with sleep and weariness, the warrior took out his sunflower-seed ball, and nibbled at it to refresh himself. It was amazing what effect nibbling at the sunflower-seed ball had. If the warrior was weary, he began to feel fresh again; if sleepy, he grew wakeful. Sometimes the warrior kept his stmflower-seed ball in his flint case that hung always at his belt over his right hip. It was quite a general custom in my tribe for a warrior or hunter to carry one of these sunflower-seed balls. We called the svmflower-seed ball mapi', the same name as for sunflower. Sunflower meal, parched and pounded as described, was often mixed with com balls, to which it gave an agreeable smell, as well as a pleasant taste. CHAPTER IV CORN Planting Com 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-htmting stories. We knew when com 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 com!" Com was planted each year in the same hills. Arotmd each of the old and dead lulls 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 bumed. 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 com, 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. I planted about six to eight grains in a him (figure 7). Then with my hands I raked the earth over the planted grains until the seed lay ,j' ^'^^■°*'^<*-'^°"an says she planted six to eight kernels to a hill. Just what pattern she used she could not tell until she went out with a handful of seed and planted a few hiUs to revive her memory. The three patterns shown in figure 7 will show how she laid the grains in the bottom of the several hills. ^Gilbert L. Wilson Figure 7 22 AGRICULTURE OF THE HID ATS A INDIANS 23 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 com hills I planted well apart, because later, in hilhng up, I wovild need room to draw earth from all directions over the roots to protect them from the sun, that they might not dry out. Com 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 com 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 pltunp 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 com 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 simset and planted; but this was not usual. Soaking the Seed The very last com 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 com thtis soaked would have sprouts a third of an inch long within foTir 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 24 GILBERT LIVINGSTONE WILSON 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 com 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-roo£-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 ovir com was in, we began planting beans and squashes. Beans we commonly planted between com rows, sometimes over the whole field, more often over a part of it. Our bean and squash planting I wiU 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 Tvirtle 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 comer 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 Com Sucker died, however. AGRICULTURE OF THE HIDATSA INDIANS 25 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 ovur garden reached its maximum size, there were seven boys in the family; three of these died yotmg, 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 com, run- ning lengthwise with the field, made one na'xu, or Indian acre, as we usually sf sf -sf c .-. c c. . . c . . c c • • c ■ c sq b b . '■ b . '; . b '• ■ b b . . b . C C C;.-.'- C- -C C ■ C.'. -.C SCf .b, ./. b .-.. b • -b. b. • -b . .>. ■:■■ b .b '.b :■: '•■b' ■. b\ :V .'b:;-:; ■ b. . • C C "C •' C C C C C Sq c . • . c • . c b . .b:.} C " C ■■ : -'c ■ b b.-\ c ■ c ..c ■V-.b ■■ h- ■': c' •■■■■c ■ ■ • c «! «l «f sq sq Sq sq sq sq «J C - C C .C ...C- , ■ C-.- ■.■ C- . •.;^C- ■; ■. C .■ . -C-. . -.C- •.^ .•■•b.v'\;:b;-';^;-b: >; ^a,^':■.'b■■:.::■b:" b; :b. ■••,b' ■■.:,. b;. c- "-■■'■ c :••':> :.' '..c- . ;;.c •' /.c} : ■•.c." : ::.'b V. -b .■.-■.• b ';/..■; b ;■ ■ Vb •■ ' bV b c---- x • -c •■■ ■ c . ■ \ c ■ c c- Figure 8 c.-:' c.". ■; c • c:;-;";;c '.': b :■■'■■] h-' ■ -b ■ ; :b: ;;■■ translate it. There were ten of these na'xus, or Indian acres, in the garden. Some families of our village counted eight rows of com to one na'xu, others coimted 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 irregu- larity, the rows curved with it. In our garden a row of squashes separated each na'xu from its neighbor. Four rows of com 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 famUies, even by sunflowers. Like those of the na'xus, the rows of the nu'camis often curved to follow irregularity in the shape of the garden plot. (See figure 8.) some 26 GILBERT LIVINGSTONE WILSON 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 com and weeds grew rapidly; other seasons were colder, and delayed the growth of the com. Com plants about three inches high we called "young-bird's-feather- tail-com," because the plants then had blunt ends, like the tail feath^s of a very yoimg bird. Com and weeds alike grew rapidly now, and we women of the house- hold were out with our hoes daily, to keep ahead of the weeds. We worked as in planting season, in the early morning hotxrs. I cultivated each hiU 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 com alone, but went right through the garden, com, squashes, beans, and all. Weeds were let he on the ground, as they were now young and harmless. We hoed but once, not very many weeds coming up to bother us after- wards. 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 com 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 com silk appeared, but was accompanied by hilling, so that we looked upon it rather as a hilling time. Hilhng 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 com. 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 com, 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 com fields had many enemies. Magpies, and especially crows, pulled up much of the young com, so that we had to replant many hills. Crows were fond of pvilling up the green shoots when they were a half inch AGRICULTURE OF THE HID ATS A INDIANS 27 or an inch high. Spotted gophers would dig up the seed from the roots of young plants. When the com had eared, and the grains were still soft^ blackbirds and crows were destructive. Any hills of young com that the birds destroyed, I replanted if the sea- son was not too late. If only a part of the plants in a hill had been de- stroyed, I did not disturb the living plants, but replanted only the destroyed ones. In the place of each missing plant, I dug a Uttle hole with my hand, and dropped in a seed. We made scarecrows' to frighten the crows. Two sticks were driven into the ground for legs; to these were bound two other sticks, like out- stretched arms; on the top was fastened a ball of cast-away skins, or the like, for a head. An old bufEalo robe was drawn over the figure and a belt tied aroxmd its middle, to make it look hke 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 yotmg 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 com 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 ovir growing com liked to hear us sing, just as children like to hear their mother sing to them.' Also, we did not want the birds to come and steal our com. Horses, too, might break in and crop the plants, or boys might steal the green ears and go off and roast them. * "Twice in the corn season were scarecrows used; first, when the com was just coming up; and again when the grain was forming on the ear and getting ripe." — Edward Goodbird • In August, 1910, Buffalobird-woman related the story of "The Grandson," in the course of which she said in explanation of reference to a watchers' stage: "I will now stop a moment to explain something in the other form of this tale. "According to this way of telling it, there was a garden and in the middle of the garden was a tree. There was a platform under the tree made of trunks and slabs; and there those two girls sat to watch the garden and sing watch-garden songs. They did this to make the garden grow, just as people sing to a baby to make it be quiet and feel good. In old times we sang to a garden for a like reason, to make the garden feel good and grow. This custom was one used in every garden. Sometimes one or two women sang. "The singing was begun in the spring and continued until the corn was ripe. We Indians loved our gardens and kept them clean; we did not let weeds grow in them. Always in every garden during the growing season, there would be some one working or singing. "Now in old times, many of our gardens had resting stages, or watchers' stages, such as I have just described. We always made our gardens down in the woods by the river, because there is better ground there. When we cut off the timber we would often leave one tree standing in the garden. Under this tree were erected four forked posts, on which was laid a platform. This made the stage; in the tree overhead we often spread robes and blankets for shade. "This resting stage was small. It was just big enough for two persons to sit on comfortably. Com was never dried on it; it was used for a singing and resting place only. It was reached by a ladder. Its height was about four and a half feet high. "This resting stage or watchers' stage was built on the north side of the tree so that the shade of the tree would fall upon it. Robes were laid on the floor of the stage to make a couch or bed. Sometimes- people even slept on this platform — sometimes a man and his wife slept there. "This resting stage we used to rest on after working in the garden; and to sing here the songs that we sang at this season of the year, and which I have called watch-garden songs. A place to cook in was not 28 GILBERT LIVINGSTONE WILSON Our Hidatsa name for such a stage was adukati' i'kakS-ma'tsati, or field watchers' stage; from adukati', field; i'kakS, watch; and ma'tsati, stage. These stages, while common, were not in every garden. I had one in my garden where I tised 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 ptmcheons, or split small logs, at about the height of the full grown com. 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 otur custom to locate g\3x 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 com field this present summer, is perhaps about the height of the trees that used to stand in our fields at Like-a-fish- hook village. Explanation of Sketch of Watchers' Stage My son Goodbird has made a sketch, under my direction, of a watchers' stage (figure 9). far away on the edge of the garden. It was a kind of booth, or bower. With a stake we made holes in the ground in a circle, and into the holes thrust willows. The tops of these willows we bent toward the center and joined together to make a bower. Over the top we threw a robe. We built a fire beneath to cook by. "Our gardens I am describing were those at Like-a-fishhook village; and they were on the Missouri on either side of the village. They were strung along the river bank for a mile or more on either side of the village." AGRICULTURE OF THE HID ATS A INDIANS 29 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 ade of the stage, the floor beams lay always in one of these two ways. Figure 9 Redrawn from sketch by Edward Goodbird. In the sketch a skin^ 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 htmg 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. ' In redrawing Goodbird's sketch this calf-skin has been omitted, that the construction of the stage floor might be shown. 30 GILBERT LIVINGSTONE WILSON 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 ■stin, so that the watcher had shade in any part of the day. The calf skin used for a sun shade hang 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 up- holding 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 comers 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 smaU cottonwood with thick, leafy iDranches 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 Hke 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 com 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 AGRICULTURE OF THE HIDATSA INDIANS 31 sprouted grain; such damage we were content to repair by replanting. Girls began to go on the watchers' stage to watch the com 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 m 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 com. Older girls and young married women, and even old women, often worked at porcu- pine 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 ottr com 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 @>me at simset. The watching season continued until the com 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 vil- lage. 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 com cooked in these booths. I often did so when I was a yotmg 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, Tm-tle, also, in her booth very early in the morning, in the com season. 32 GILBERT LIVINGSTONE WILSON 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 enter- tained 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 weU 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 com and beans. The com was shelled off the cob and boiled with green beans that were shelled also; sometimes the beans were boiled in the pod. Figure 10 Redrawn from sketch by Goodbird of specimen made by Buffalobird-woman. To serve the com 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 spUt at one end and the spHt 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 squaslies 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 tmeaten com she had boiled that day. AGRICULTURE OF THE HID ATS A INDIANS 33 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 yoimg men who came were offered neither food nor drink, tmless 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 arotmd. Sometitnes two youths came together, sometimes but one. If there were relatives at the watchers' stage the boys wotild 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 oiir rule that we should work and shoidd not say anything, to him. So we sat, not look- ing 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 sweet- heart, 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 yoimg girl was not permitted to go to the watchers' stage tmless 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 stmg 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; Yoiur 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. 34 GILBERT LIVINGSTONE WILSON 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 com 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 yotmg 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 simg from the watchers' stage that did not have love-boy words. I will give you one of these, but to make it in- telligible, 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 wUl 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 marri 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 tetising 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 iU 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. AGRICULTURE OF THE HIDATSA INDIANS 35 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 medidne man; and in his earth lodge he kept a bull snake, whom he called "father." When Snake-head-omament 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-omament 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-omament 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- omament 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 smelUng; yet I do not despise you\" The snake, hearing this, would creep into his hole as if ashamed. Snake-head-omament made up a war party and led it against enemies on the Yellowstone River. The party not only failed to kiU any of the enemy, but lost three of their own men. This was a kind of disgrace to Snake-head-omament; 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 claly 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-omament, 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 yovmg bird, he should be in a nest; But he comes aroimd here looking gray, And wanders aimlessly everywhere outside the village! 36 GILBERT LIVINGSTONE WILSON 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. «-:■ ^"^ $fi Snake-head-omament 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 voman had sung her song for a cause. Years before, when Snake-head-omament 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 pali- sades around the village to defend it, and Snake-head-omament, as a mem- ber 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-omament, seeing this, approached her and fired off his gun close by her legs. She looked around, but seeing that it was Snake-head-omament 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 com 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 com, boiHng the fresh ears in a pot as white people do; but every Hidatsa family also put up dried green com for winter. This took the place with us of the caimed green com we now buy at the trader's store. I knew when the com ears were ripe enough for boiling from these signs : The blossoms on the top of the stalk were tumed brown, the silk on the end AGRICULTURE OF THE HIDATSA INDIANS 37 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 agri- culturists 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 com, 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 httle brown ants cUmb up the stalk and eat the ear and spoil it. I do not -think you are very good garden- ers 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 com season lasted about ten days, when the grain, though not yet ripe, became too hard for boiUng green. To provide green com to be eaten late in the season, we used to make a second planting of com 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 com. It came ready to eat when the other com 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 com, was to boil it in a kettle on the cob. Fresh, green com, shelled from the cob, was often put in a com 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 com we buy of the traders. Shelled green com, 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 fa,ther's family never prepared a ftiU meal of roasted ears that I remember; if any one wanted roasted, fresh, green com, he prepared it himself. When I wanted to roast green com I made a fire of cottonwood and pre- pared a bed of coals. I laid the fresh ear on the coals with the husk re- moved. As the com roasted, I rolled the ear gently to and fro over the coals. When properly cooked I removed the ear and laid on another. 38 GILBERT LIVINGSTONE WILSON 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 com 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 com 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 com, boiled and eaten fresh, we used all varieties except the gvimmy ; for when green they tasted alike. But for roasting ears we thought the two yellow varieties, hard and soft, were the best. Mdtu'a-la'kapa A common dish made from green com was matu'a-la'kapa, from matu'a, green com; 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 com, with the grain still soft, was shelled off the cob with the tip of the thumb or with the thtraib 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 com bread from green com. Green ears were plucked and the com shelled off with the thumb nail, so as not to break open the kemels. Boiled green com could be shelled with a mussel shell because boiling toughened the kemels; but unboiled green com was shelled with the thtunb nail. Two or three women often worked at shelling the com as it was rather tedious work. When enough of the com had been shelled, it was put in a com 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 trans- versely to the layer of husks beneath. The shelled com, 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 AGRICULTURE OF THE HIDATSA INDIANS 39 inches square, and an inch or two thick. However, this varied; a girl would make a much smaUer 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 spUt into strips half an inch to three quarters of an inch in width. These strips were tied together to make bands to bmd 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 com 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-bakcd. Soft white and soft yellow com were good varieties from which to make this buried- and-baked com, as we called it. Drying Green Corn for Winter Every Hidatsa family put up a store of dried green com 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 teU 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 f virther away, I gathered the ears into my basket and bore them to the pile. I left oflE plucking when the pile contained five basketfuls if I was work- ing alone. If two of us were working we plucked about ten basketfuls. Green com 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 com 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 com to our lodge in the village. As I brought the baskets into the lodge. 40 GILBERT LIVINGSTONE WILSON 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 pxirpose. 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 four- teen rows of kernels; smaller ears had not more than eight rows. Two kettles, meanwhile, had been prepared. One marked D in figure 1 1 , 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 com was husked to fill one of these kettles, I gathered up the ears and dropped them in the boil- ing water. I watched the com care- fully, 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. When aU the com 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 fioor. 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 com was brought into the lodge again. A skin tent cover had been spread on the floor and the half boUed ears were laid on it, in a pile. I now sat on the fioor, 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 com in my left hand, holding it with the greater end toward me. I had a small, pointed stick; and this I ran, point for- ward, down between two rows of kemels, thus loosening the grains. The right hand row of the two rows of loosened kemels I now shelled off with my right thumb. I then shelled off all the other rows of kemels, one row at a time, working toward the left, and rolling the cob over toward the right as I did so. Figure 11 AGRICULTURE OF THE HIDATSA INDIANS 41 There was another way of shelUng half boiled com. 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 stiU shell half boiled com in this way, using large spoons instead of sheUs. There were very few metal spoons in use in my tribe when I was a gu-1; mussel shells were used instead for most purposes. If while I was shelling the com, 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 com to dry, carrying it up on the-stage in my basket. At night I covered the drying com with old tent skins to protect it from dampness. The com dried in about four days. When the com 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 com that lay heaped on the tent cover; and holding the bowl aloft I let the grain potir slowly from it, that any chaff might be winnowed out. The com was now ready to be put in sacks for winter. Com thus prepared we called maada'ckihe, from ada'ckihe, treated-by- fire-but-not-cooked, a word also used to designate food that has been pre- pared by smoking. AH varieties of com could be prepared in this way.'' The Arikaras on this reservation have a different way of preparing and drying green com. 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 com; and they often roast a great pile of com at one time, in this way. The roasted ears are husked and shelled, and the grain dried, for storing. Com 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 com 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 com ; it is dirty ! ' "My wife is drying half-boiled com on the ear this year. This way we find makes the dried com sweeter, but takes longer to dry it. We cook it in winter by dropping the ear, cob and all, into the pot. This method of drying com was known also in old times." — Edward Goodbird 42 GILBERT LIVINGSTONE WILSON Mape'di (Corn Smut) Mape'di Mape'di is a black mass that grows in the husk of an ear of com; it is what you say white men call com smut ftingus. Sometimes an ear of com appears very plump, or somewhat swelled; and when the husk is opened, there is no com inside, only mape'di, or smut ; or sometimes part of the ear will be found with a little grain at one end, and mape'di at the other. These masses of mape'di, or com smut, that we foiuid growing on the ear, we gathered and dried for food. There is another mape'di that grows on the stalk of the com. It is not good to eat, and was not gathered up at the harvest time. The mape'di that grows on the stalk is commonly foimd at a place where the stalk, by some accident, has been half broken. We looked upon the mape'di that grew on the com ear as a kind of com, 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 com. We did not find many mape'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 com, and stored in the same sack with them. Mape'di was cooked by boiHng with the half -boiled dried com. We did not eat mape'di fresh from the garden, nor did we cook it separately. Mape'di, boiled with com, tasted good, not sweet, and not sour. I still follow the custom of my tribe and gather mape'di each year at the com harvest. The Ripe Corn Harvest Husking As the com in the fields began to show signs of ripening, the people of Like-a-fishhook village went htmting 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 com 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 com; this was because there were not many persons in the family to do the work. AGRICULTURE OF THE HID ATS A INDIANS 43 In a big family, like my father's, harvesting was more speedily done. We had a large garden, but we never spent more than one day gathering up the com, which we piled in a heap in the middle of the field. The next day after the com was plucked, we gave a husking feast. We took out into the field a great deal of dried meat that my mothers had al- ready cooked in the lodge; or we took the dried meat into the field and boiled it in a kettle near the com pile. We also boiled com on a fire near by. The meat and com 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 com 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.* 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.' The husking season was looked upon as a time of jollity; and youths and maidens dressed and decked themselves for the occasion. • Buffalobird-woman means that the huskers arrived in the fields in the morning to begin the day's labors. More than one com pile might be husked in a single day. — Gilbert L. Wilson ' Water Chief having strolled into the cabin while Buffalobird-woman was dictating, here inter- rupted with the following; "The owner of a field would come and notify the crier of some society, as the Fox or Dog society, or some other. The crier would go on the roof of the society's lodge and call, 'All you of the Fox society come hither; they want you to husk. When you all get here, we will go to that one's garden and husk the com!" "We young men of the society all gathered together and marched to the field to which we were bidden. In old times we took our guns with us, for the Sioux might come up to attack us. As we approached the field we began to sing, that the girls might hear us. We knew that our sweethearts would take notice of our singing. The girls themselves did not sing. "At the com pile in each garden would be the woman owner and maybe two or three girls. On our way to some field, if we passed through other fields with corn piles at which were girls, each young man looked to see if his sweetheart was there; and if he saw her he would yell, expecting that she would recog- nize his voice. "Sometimes two societies husked at one com pile. Any of the societies might be asked. If the pile was too big for one society, another society was asked, if the owner could afford the food for the feast. "Different societies would be husking in different gardens all at the same time. "Sometimes a group of young men belonging to different societies were asked to come and husk. This was chiefly at small gardens; the societies were usually asked to come and husk the big com piles of the larger gardens. "If a society went early, they got through just after midday. By early I mean nine o'clock in the morning. "When we had finished husking one pile, we went to another. We worked late, by moonlight, even. "Some man of the family and his wife would be out all night and watch by the com if they had not gotten all the husked ears borne in to the village. Also while the pile awaited husking watchers stayed by to protect against horses." 44 GILBERT LIVINGSTONE WILSON Of covirse 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 gkl. Some of the yoimg men rode ponies, and when her com pile had been husked, a youth would sometimes lend his pony to his sweetheart for her to carry home her com. She loaded the pony with loose ears in bags, bound on either side of the saddle, or with strings of braided com laid upon the pony's back. The husking season, like the green com season, lasted about ten days. The yotmg men helped faithfully each day, and when they had husked all the com in one field, they moved to another. Thus all the com piles were speedily husked. The husking was always done in the field. We never carried the com ' 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.* Rejecting Green Ears As the buskers worked they were carefvd 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 leamed 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. » "Com in old times was gathered in September. A basket was carried on the back and the com was tossed into it over the shoulder, or the basket was set on the ground and filled. This work was done by the women. The com having been plucked, the owner of the field notified people what food she wanted to serve— meat or boiled com-and-beans— and young men came to husk the corn. A pile might be three or four feet high and twenty feet long. The men huskers sat on one side of the pile and the women on the other. The big ears were strung in braids. A braid was long enough to reach from the thigh around under the foot and up again to the other side of the thigh. A husker would try the newly made braid with his foot as he held the ends in his hands!. Unless this was done a weak place in the string might escape notice and the braid break, and all the others would then laugh. "SmaU ears were tossed into one place. Four or five women would carry off these ears in baskets; they bore the filled baskets right up the ladder to the top of the drying stage. The braided strings were often borne home on the backs of ponies, ten strings on a pony. They were hung like dead snakes on the railings above the floor of the stage to dry. "Boys and young men went to the husking bees because of the fun to be had; they wanted to see the girls! ' — EowAKD GooDBiRi) {related in 1909). AGRICULTURE OF THE HID ATS A INDIANS 45 Braiding Corn Most of the com 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 posi- tion. 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 be- side 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 buskers 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 wotdd 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 nvunber 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 aU varieties of com but two, ata'ki tso'ki, or hard white, and tsi'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, some- times parch hard yellow to be poxmded up into meal for com balls. The strings of braided com were bome to the village on the backs of ponies. Some families laid ten strings on a pony ; but in my father's family 46 GILBERT LIVINGSTONE WILSON 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.' These drying rods were laid across only where the forks supported the raUs (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 dry- ing rods were botmd 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 com, ascended the log lad- der of the stage and emptied the com on the stage floor. Here the com 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 com as we moved about. Also, if a pony came in with a load of braided com, 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 com 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 com, the smaller ears; and besides these there were about one hundred strings of braided com 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 com yield, when I was a young woman. I think the figures are approximately accurate. For about eight days the com 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 spUt from cottonwood trunks were leaned against these drying rods, on the side next the com. The com heap was now spread evenly over the floor of the drying stage for the depth of about • "Sometimes for tun we lads used to take long poles with nooses on the end and snare off one ear of a braid of com as it hung drying; for the braids were soft when fresh. An ear broken off, we would run off and make a fire and parch the com. This was when we were little fellows, ten or eleven years old. The owner would run after us, and if he caught one of us, whipped him. However, this was our custom; and the owner and the boy's father both looked upon it as a kind of lark, and not anything very serious." — Edward Goodbird AGRICULTURE OF THE HIDATSA INDIANS 47 a foot; the split planks prevented the dry smooth ears from sUding off the stage. The dry ears had a tendency to roll or slide down the sides of the com pile, as fresh ears did not. This spreading out the com heap evenly had also the effect of stirring up the tmderlying ears and exposing them to the air. If rain fell while the com was thus drying on the stage, it gave us no concern. The com soon dried again, and no harm was done it. The com, 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 drjring 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 be- fore 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 com with my feet as I walked, so that my feet would be on the stage floor and not tread on the drying com. I would push ten of the braided strings together on the rail or the drying rod on which they h\mg, 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 com we chose the longest and finest ears. In my father's family we used to braid about one htmdred 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'ikadicakS, 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 com, I have said, were not braided, be- cause not used for parching. For seed of these varieties, some good ears were taken from the drying pile on the com stage and stored in the cache 48 GILBERT LIVINGSTONE WILSON 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 com, 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 com which joins the cob is black or dark colored, we say it has a black heart. This imperfection is caused by pluck- ing the ear when too green. A kernel with a black heart will not grow. An ear of com has always small grains toward the point of the cob, and large grains toward the butt of the ear. When I came to plant com, 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 Com 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 weU. The fourth year the seed would be dead and useless. Knowing that seed com 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 otir 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 qtiality. 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 com, but of our squash seeds, beans, sunflower seeds, and even of our tobacco seeds; for if I re- member rightly, the tobacco fields were sometimes injured by frost just as were our com fields. Not all families in our viUage 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 com. Corn stage of Butteifiy's wife This stage lacks railing?;, and is floored Ankara fashion whh a ^\■illlJ\v 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. Owl Woman pounding corn into meal in a corn mortar AGRICULTURE OF THE HIDATSA INDIANS 49 Even to-day, families on this reservation come to me to buy seed com 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. Com was threshed in a booth, under the drying stage. 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 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 be was a boy. Goodbird's sketches are closely followed, excepting that the. floor of slabs is restored. The figure tallies in every respect with BuSalobird-woman's description, and the model made by her for the American Museum of Natural History. two poles, e and/, 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 comer ties. The first pole was raised in position and botmd firmly to the post; and if a second pole was to be laid over the first — as was done at two of the comers — 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. so GILBERT LIVINGSTONE WILSON A tent cover was now fetched out of the lodge. Tents were of dif- ferent 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. 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. 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, in- Figure 14 AGRICULTURE OF THE HID ATS A INDIANS 51 eluding 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, 1 think, will explain the arrange- ment of the booth. The end comers, X and y, were bound to opposite posts, M and N, respectively, the lapping edges, at 0, fonning a door through which the threshers entered the booth; P and P' were bound to posts at p and p'; the final comer, M, was left imtied until the threshers had entered and were ready to begin their task. (Compare with figvire 12, in which, however, the posts are differ- ently 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 com 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 re- moved, at R. Through the aperture thus made, com was pushed down to left and right of R; this was continued until there was a pile of com just under the aperture, and miming the width of the booth, about eighteen or twenty inches high. The threshers now entered the booth and tied the comer at M, closing the door. In my father's family there were usually three thresh- ers, women; and they sat in a row on the floor of the booth, facing the pile of com. Each woman had a stick for a flail, with which she beat the com. Flails were of ash or cottonwood. An ash flail would be about three and a half feet long and from thr "I have raised white beans mostly of late years because it is easier to sell them to white men. ThB summer, however (1913), I planted several acres also to other kinds of our Hidatsa beans, red, black, spotte^ ^^^^ ^^^ ^^^ ^^ ^^^ ^.^^_j^^ j^^^_ ^^^^ ^^^ ^^^ tj,^„ tl,^ 3p^tg