Making of the Earth - Blackfoot
During the flood, Old Man was sitting on the highest mountain with all the beasts. The flood was caused by the Above People because the baby (a fungus) of the woman who married a star was heedlessly torn in pieces by an Indian child.
Old Man sent the Otter down to get some Earth. For a long time he waited, then the Otter came up dead. Old Man examined its feet, but found nothing on them. Next he sent Beaver down, but after a long time he also came up drowned. Again nothing was found on his feet. He sent Muskrat to dive next. Muskrat also was drowned.
At length he sent the Duck. It was drowned, but in its paw held some earth. Old Man saw it, put it in his hand, feigned putting it on the water three times, and at last dropped it. Then the Above People sent rain, and everything grew on the earth.
Source: Clark Wissler and D. C. Duvall, Mythology of the Blackfoot Indians
(New York: Anthropological Papers of the American Museum of Natural History,
1908), v. 2, part 1, p. 19.
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