Note 15 — Chapter IV · CORN
Reading edition
“Sometimes for fun we lads used to take long poles with nooses on the end and snare off one ear of a braid of corn 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 corn. 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