38 NE\V YORK STATE MUSEUM 



was the only ear in the country, the remainder being in the posses- 

 sion of a ferocious company of women who killed by their very 

 glances. Beasts and serpents guarded the path to their houses and 

 as there was nothing else to eat the nephew and uncle must starve. 

 The nephew laughed and set out to conquer all the difficulties. The 

 story of his conquest of all these things is detailed and exciting. 

 However, he chased the women up a tree and made them promise 

 to deliver up the corn, which they did and the hero went home, step- 

 ping disdainfully over the carcasses of monsters and serpents. Since 

 then corn has been plentiful. 



Beauchamp refers to this tale which he found among the Onon- 

 daga but thinks it of European origin. Hewett in his Cosmology'^ 

 gives this tale substantially as outlined above. The reference in the 

 tale to the nuts on the stick has given some Iroquois the idea that 

 chestnuts were meant and the story is given as the origin of chest- 

 nuts. The Seneca names for chestnuts and corn kernels are not 

 dissimilar, the former being o'nis'ta' and the latter o'nie'sta'. 



Dr Beauchamp relates another tale which he had from Joseph 

 Lyon, an Onondaga. A fine young man lived on a small hill, so the 

 story runs, and being lonely he desired to marry some faithful, agree- 

 able maiden. With his long flowing robes and tasseled plumes he 

 lifted up his voice and sang, " Say it, say it, some one I will marry." 

 He kept up his song day after day and at last there came a fair 

 maiden, arrayed in a flowing green mantle over which were fastened 

 beautiful yellow bells, " I have come to marry you," she smiled, but 

 the tall young warrior responded, " No, you are not the one, you 

 wander too much from home and run over the ground so fast that 

 I can not keep you by my side." The poor rejected pumpkin maiden 

 went sorrowfully away and floating after her came the echo of the 

 song, " Some one I will marry." 



One morning a tall slender maiden appeared drawn toward the 

 singer by the magic of the song (which even we of these degenerate 

 days must confess, though even inaudible, is a song that attracts). 

 The maiden was covered with clusters of flowers and gracefully 

 dangling leaves. The tall young man needed but to look and there 

 was an immediate 'consciousness of afiinity. The two embraced each 

 other and to this day in the Indian's cornfield the two plants are 

 inseparable. The cornstalk bean twines around her lover still. 



1 Bureau of Ethnology Rep't. 1903. 



