278 Singing Valleys 



The Watermelon Moon 

 The Moon of Fishes 

 The Mulberry Moon 

 The Moon of New Corn 

 The Moon of Turkeys 

 The Buffalo Moon 

 The Bear's Moon 

 The Cold Meal Moon 

 The Moon of Chestnuts 

 The Walnut Moon 



During the Moon of Old Corn, the last of the last year's 

 harvest was eaten. The Moon of New Corn marked the new 

 harvest, and was therefore, the chief feast of the year. 



How good the green roasting ears were the English colonists 

 soon discovered. John Smith enters in his diary under July 

 1607: 



It pleased God to move the Indians to bring us corn ere it was 

 halfe ripe to refresh us. 



The newcomers learned how to test the ears by pressing 

 the kernels with the thumb. If no milk squirted, then the corn 

 was already too far advanced for boiling or roasting. 



Naturally enough, corn figured in many of the Indian re- 

 ligious rites. Smith's own account of his capture and captivity 

 in the Powhatan's village tells how the medicine man per- 

 formed a twelve-hour ritual before Smith's fate was decided. 

 First the priest laid a ring of cornmeal around the campfire. 

 Outside this he made circles of grains of corn, laying these in 

 a careful pattern of red and black kernels, and in fives and 

 threes and twos. During the ceremony the priest and the 

 other Indians fasted solemnly. 



The Pueblo Indians of the Southwest have developed their 

 maize magic in numerous dances, songs and legends. The 

 dances, which come at appropriate seasons, are intended to 

 encourage the growth of the corn and to frighten away the 



