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A wild woman named Quamichan—who made a basket out of a snake was a giantess, and her whole appearance was disgusting.

She lived on human flesh and sneaked about villages stealing the children, whom she put into her snake basket. She lived on Salt Spring Island, near Kuper. She had wings and used to fly about Saanich and elsewhere, stealing young people. Her sister was a very small woman and hated Quamichan bitterly.

Quamichan decided to have a big feast and invite her friends, so for a few days she was kept busy stealing children, whom she hid in a cave. When she had enough, she dug a huge pit about one hundred big sticks across the top and between she placed small dry wood as kindlings and then big stones on the top of all. Then she set fire to the wood.

She called the children out and made them sit down and watch the fire. There were hundreds of poor children, crying and begging to be let go home. She made fire by rubbing two sticks together in this fashion: A flat stick with a small hole in the middle and a small round stick with a sharp point to fit in the flat piece of wood; then the round stick was rubbed violently between the two palms and as soon as smoke and sparks were seen coming out, fine dry cedar bark was held to the sparks and as they fell on the bark it was gently blown and the fire fanned into flame.

Now, after the fire had started, Quamichan danced round the pit, singing and shouting. “Now I am going to have a big feast with my friends and eat these young animals,” as she called the children. “I hope the stones will get red-hot quickly, so that they will be well-cooked.”

She told her sister to take pitch pine and make the children open their eyes and smear their eyeballs with the pitch so that they could not see what was going to happen. Now, the sister's heart was tender. She took the pitch and went to each child and bade it close its eyes and put the pitch on the lids and said to each, “When I call out ‘Open your eyes!’ you must get sticks and be ready, for I am going to punish Quamichan. Now, be ready.” When she had finished, Quamichan told her to take out the sticks and throw them to one side, as the stones were red-hot. “Yes, sister,” she said, “but first dance again and sing– for you sing so well– and shut your eyes tight and look up as you dance.”

Quamichan was greatly pleased with this flattery and danced away like mad. The little sister now got a long pole and when Quamichan came close by her, she thrust the pole between her legs and tripped her and Quamichan fell into the hot pit on her back. She screamed to her sister to help.

”Oh, yes, I am helping you out, but you are awfully her out. heavy. Call on the boys and girls to help.”

With that the sister shouted, “Children, open your eyes,” and they took sticks and threw them into the pit where they caught fire. Quamichan was burning like oil and the sparks from her turned into ducks, geese, and all sorts of birds.

This was the end of Quamichan. The little sister sent the poor children back to their homes, rejoicing. The Cowichan Indians called themselves Quamichans after this big woman and they learned to make fire from her.