In the old days there was a great fish called the Dakwa', which lived
in Tennessee river where Toco creek comes in at Dakwâ'i, the "Dakwa'
place," above the mouth of Tellico, and which was so large that it
could easily swallow a man. Once a canoe filled with warriors was
crossing over from the town to the other side of the river, when the
Dakwa' suddenly rose up under the boat and threw them all into the
air. As they came down it swallowed one with a single snap of its jaws
and dived with him to the bottom of the river. As soon as the hunter
came to his senses he found that he had not been hurt, but it was so
hot and close inside the Dakwa' that he was nearly smothered. As he
groped around in the dark his hand struck a lot of mussel shells which
the fish had swallowed, and taking one of these for a knife he began
to cut his way out, until soon the fish grew uneasy at the scraping
inside his stomach and came up to the top of the water for air. He
kept on cutting until the fish was in such pain that it swam this way
and that across the stream and thrashed the water into foam with its
tail. Finally the hole was so large that he could look out and saw that
the Dakwa' was now resting in shallow water near the shore. Reaching
up he climbed out from the side of the fish, moving very carefully so
that the Dakwa' would not know it, and then waded to shore and got
back to the settlement, but the juices in the stomach of the great
fish had scalded all the hair from his head and he was bald ever after.