Bahloo the moon made baby girls. Sometimes Wahn the crow helped him. Although Wahn could make baby girls by himself, Bahloo didn't like to let him because the girls Wahn made
grew up noisy and quarrelsome like crows.
(Bumayamul the wood lizard made boys and sometimes
Bahloo helped him.)
They always made new babies. But one day, Wahn suggested, 'Let's bring dead people back to life instead of making
new babies.' Bahloo did not like the idea at all. 'No,' he said. 'Leave dead people dead. Their spirits may have moved into other people, or into plants or animals, or into rivers or rocks. We can make new babies without interfering with the dead.'
They argued and argued. Then Wahn told Bahloo about a tree with lots of grubs in it. 'Come and eat with me,' Wahn said. When they got to the tree, Wahn asked Bahloo to climb the tree and use a hooked stick to dig the grubs out of the bark and throw them down.
Bahloo was concentrating on his job and didn't notice that Wahn was blowing on the tree. As each grub fell, Wahn blew and Bahloo and the tree gradually rose higher and higher into the air. When the tree was almost touching the top of the sky, Bahloo looked down and noticed what had happened.
Wahn called up, 'Stay up there in the sky and I will make
baby girls by myself.'
Each night, Bahloo the moon and the tree could be seen
high in the sky. Bahloo travelled across the sky trying to find
a way back to earth. He even changed his shape to try
to get down. Every morning, Bahloo was chased away
by his enemy Yhi the sun. (Bahloo was resourceful and found another way to get down, in the form of an emu, so that
he could keep making new babies.)
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