The great spirit on his visit came across a worthless fellow one day who was making sharp the edge of a knife, probably a very different affair from the steel knife of to-day. The great spirit said:
“What are you doing there?” This in the Twana dialect, of course.
The worthless fellow replied, “Nothing,” also in Indian.
The Do-ka-batl replied: “I know what you are doing; you are going to kill me. Give me that knife.”
The Indian was frightened but gave up the knife and turned to run, but as he did so the great spirit stuck it in his heel and the Indian began to jump about and he has been jumping about ever since in the shape of a deer, for he was quickly transformed into one as soon as the knife entered his heel. The little hoof that sticks out of the deer’s foot just above the two main hoof toes and at the back is the handle of the knife that Do-ka-batl stuck there.
While among the Twanas Do-ka-batl came across another fellow flopping his hands over his head much like a donkey does his ears when keeping the gnats and flies out of his eyes. The Indian, however, was trying to keep off the rain. Do-ka-batl thought that a fellow who was afraid of getting wet was no good, so he changed him into a humming bird while he was still at the foolish pastime, and the Indians say that is why the humming bird always keeps its wings going. The Indian when changed did not stop his foolish flopping of his hands, but kept right on.
One day, while Do-ka-batl tarried among them they were at their ta-mahn-a-wis, and one of their medicine men, probably all of them, had his shock of black greasy hair done up in a top-knot on the top of his head. This angered Do-ka-batl and he thought such an Indian would be more useful in the form of a pretty bird, so he changed him into a blue jay, with his top-knot still tied up on the top of his head. That is why the blue jay wears his hair pompadour. The grating sound of the blue jay’s voice probably is a reproduction of the medicine man’s song at the time, though this does not form a part of the tradition.
There is a very pretty tradition among the Indians at the Skokomish reservation about the origin of the big marsh lands at the mouth of that river. A vast reed-grown area blocks up the river to-day and it is a great place for all kinds of water fowl and the like. Cat-tails grow there enough for all the rush mats of the entire Indian population, so that while Do-ka-batl under the guise of his wrath made a great transformation that brought lasting good to the red faced people. When Do-ka-batl left the Twana village at the mouth of the Skokomish to continue his journey on down the beautiful shores of the canal his big, foot slipped from under him at the edge of the water and he fell.
This made him angry and he cursed the ground, and, lo; the water went away and a great mass of ground rose up, half sea half land, and so it is to this day. The pretty cat-tails and tula grass came up over the ground and the ducks and geese came and made their nests and gathered the tender shoots and leaves of the sea-weed for food. Had it been any other great spirit than Do-ka-batl he might have placed a curse on the people of the Indian village rather than on the ground, but he did not and they have lived and prospered ever since. Though their number is small to-day they have the best gardens and fields and orchards and houses of all the Indian people on the Sound. Do-ka-batl continued his journey down the canal after getting upon his feet again and to this day the Indians still point to the marks in the rocks along the beach made by his big feet. There are two big prints a few miles from the beach close to what is now Hoodsport, which have vague resemblance to a mammoth foot-print, and these the Indians say were made by Do-ka-batl.
Their traditional story of the deluge is much like that told by some of the eastern tribes, excepting as to canoes which, of course, the Indians here used to ascend to the top of their biggest mountains instead of going up horse-back.