Taking the remnants of the material left after making the earth he fashioned two men but just as they were all finished except their noses, Tau Tana from below the earth appeared and wanted to help him.
Melu did not wish any assistance, and a great argument ensued. Tau Tana finally won his point and made the noses which he placed on the people upside down. When all was finished, Melu and Tau Tana whipped the forms until they moved. Then Melu went to his home above the clouds, and Tau Tana returned to his place below the earth.
All went well until one day a great rain came, and the people on the earth nearly drowned from the water which ran off their heads into their noses. Melu, from his place on the clouds, saw their danger, and he came quickly to earth and saved their lives by turning their noses the other side up.
The people were very grateful to him, and promised to do anything he should ask of them. Before he left for the sky, they told him that they were very unhappy living on the great earth all alone, so he told them to save all the hair from their heads and the dry skin from their bodies and the next time he came he would make them some companions. And in this way there came to be a great many people on the earth.
In the Beginning
Bilaan (Mindanao)
In the beginning there were four beings,[19] and they lived on an island no larger than a hat. On this island there were no trees or grass or any other living thing besides these four people and one bird.[20] One day they sent this bird out across the waters to see what he could find, and when he returned he brought some earth, a piece of rattan, and some fruit.
Melu, the greatest of the four, took the soil and shaped it and beat it with a paddle in the same manner in which a woman shapes pots of clay, and when he finished he had made the earth. Then he planted the seeds from the fruit, and they grew until there was much rattan and many trees bearing fruit.
The four beings watched the growth for a long time and were well pleased with the work, but finally Melu said:
“Of what use is this earth and all the rattan and fruit if there are no people?”