Evening Republican, Volume 14, Number 143, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 16 June 1910 — Pretty Legend About Corn. [ARTICLE]

Pretty Legend About Corn.

There is a beautiful Seneca story of the origin of corn in Canfield’s “Legends of the Iroquois," as follows: “Long and earnestly a young brave wooed a beautiful maiden and at lastgained her consent to live in his wigwam. Fearing that she might be stolen by one of her many admirers he slept by night in the forest that he might be near to protect her. One night he was awakened by a light footstep and, 1 starting up, saw his loved one stealing out of her lodge as a sleep walker. He pursued her, but as if fleeing in her dreams from a danger that threatened her life, she ran from him like a fleet-footed hare. On and on he pursued and finally

drew so near that he could hear her quick breath and the rapid beating of her heart. With all his remaining strength the lover sprang forward and clasped the maiden’s form to his breast. What was not his grief and astonishment when he found that his arms elapsed not the maiden he loved, but a strange plant the like of which he had never seen before. The maiden had awakened just as her lover overtook her, and, frightened at her surroundings, she was transformed. She had raised her arms just as her lover caught her and her uplifted hands were changed to ears of corn and where her fingers caught her hair the maize bears beautiful silken threads.”