In Secret of Mana, did kicking stones to make them smile have a consequence?

I always wondered something about Secret of Mana (Super Nintendo).

Remember those stones everywhere? They looked like :(

And when you hit them with your sword, they looked like :)

I always wondered if they were some kind of switch, but never could figure it out. Were they? Was there a trick there?

Are these the stones you're talking about?

According to this page on The Seikens, the smiling totem stones were just an easter egg:

If you hit them with the sword (and yes, that's only with the sword), you'll hear the sound of a bush being cut down, and notice that the totem pole is now sticking its tongue out at you. Hit it again, and it will disappear. You can do this as many times as you like, and even try to action all of the totem poles in the forest to try and reveal some hidden secret, but you're just wasting your precious time.