Mat-ho-ko-sabbi
The place or land of holes in the nose, so called because here once all created life met to engage in games of running, jumping, swimming, and walking. All the birds had holes bored in their beaks.
The duck came last. "Your nose is too flat," said Pa-o-chash, called the Judge, because he is the judge of all actions of men or animals, here or hereafter. "I can't help that," said the duck, "I was born so; I must have a hole in my nose like the rest; I wouldn't look pretty without it." The Judge consented and the hole was bored.
Then men came up. The Judge said: "I don't bore holes in flat noses. No flat-nosed creature, except the duck, can have a hole in his nose. A flat-nosed man wouldn't look pretty."
After that, the animals ran round in a circle. The duck and dove both ran and flew and so came in ahead; the horned toad ran until out of breath, and then stopped.
When Mustamho (Pa-o-chach) first created men and animals they were very much alike in appearance, and Mustamho did not really know what any particular kind was good for. That is the reason why he assembled them at Mat-ho-ko-sabbi and made them run to see which could best live on its legs; swim and dive, to see which could best live in water; fly, to learn which were qualified to abide in the air.
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References
Source
- Bourke, John G. (1889). "Cosmogony and Theogony of the Mojave Indians." JAF 2:169-189, pp. 173-174.