Water Baby place and they was Water Baby food. Womens
used to sit on a platform of logs and weave baskets there [special
baskets for the Water Babies, apparently, such as the one used as
offering in the story above]. One time I took another fella like
you [anthropologist] up there but when we got there we couldn't
find nothing but sand with a little water bubbling up in the
middle. He wouldn't believe me. I showed him where them womens had
sat but I think he thought I was lying. I guess them Water Babies
did something."

3. "There is this women called Frances. She was up at Blue Lake
with her husband following him along the edge of the lake. It was
kind of dark. She saw them little footprints right on top of her
husband's in the sand."

4. "I'll tell you what happened to me right in this house about
two years ago. I was in bed in that room there and I felt these
little hands creeping under the covers. I brushed 'em away but
they just come back. They tried to feel me down here [indicating
his genitalia]. I yelled for my mother and she come in and said
something and something went zip (waving arm violently to indicate
direction) right out of that window. We looked out that way [to
the south], that's toward Walker Lake. Everything was kind of hazy
blue."

In light of Washo views about receiving shamanistic power, it would appear
that my informant was suggesting that this visitation was a Water Baby
making its patronage known.

5. "My old uncle had been doctoring up by Genoa. He had a tough
one and fallen in the fire and burned all his pants off and was
walking wearing his coat like a skirt. He got by Wally's Hot
Springs when he felt like he wanted a bath. Them Water Babies must
have been working on him. He went over by the creek and started to
lean over and then he passed out and fell into the water and there
was a Water Baby. That Water Baby said, 'come on,' and he took him
down to Water Baby country. The chief of the Water Babies lived in
a big house made out of that black shining rock [obsidian]. But
they didn't go there. The Water Baby said 'we got some girls that
want to give you something,' and he took my uncle to a place and
there was five girls there. They all sat around my uncle and sang
him a song and told him that it was his song from now on. Then the
Water Baby to