Polite Dissent

Things I’ve learned reading Sheena:

1. Her “mate” Bob is the clumsiest, most useless character ever.

2. You can kill anything with a good jungle knife: leopards, gorillas, elephants, bats, natives, and criminals.

3. Sheena alone is responsible for the Great Cats endangered status: she seems to kill at least 3-4 leopards, panthers, or lions an issue.

Here poor Bob is climbing up the ladder to their treehouse when he is attacked and blinded by a snake. While it looks like the snake is licking his eyeballs, I think it’s supposed to be a spitting cobra spraying venom at him and hitting his eyes.

There are several known varieties of spitting cobras, and four of them live in Africa so it’s reasonable that they might encounter one. These snakes spit venom as a defensive maneuver, and that fits the situation as Bob seems to have startled the snake. In reality, spitting cobras don’t actually “spit” in the same way that we do; instead powerful muscles contract the venom glands forcing the venom out through holes in the fangs and releasing a fine spray of the venom. A spitting cobra can hit a victim up to six feet away. The sprayed venom doesn’t kill, but it can scar the skin if left untreated. If the venom comes it contact with the eyes and isn’t washed out immediately it will scar the corneas, leading to permanent blindness.

Of course, Sheena doesn’t wash the venom out of Bob’s eyes — which seems like only common sense — but decides to treat the blindness in her own manner:
1. Decapitate the snake.
2. Drag Bob to a remote temple where a powerful healer lives.
3. Kill panther released by healer.
4. Track down the criminal who kidnapped the healer’s son.
5. Kill another panther.
6. Kill several crocodiles.
7. Duel the criminal blindfolded on a spinning log over a pit filled with man-eating apes.
8. Knock criminal into the pit to be eaten by his own apes.
9. Return to healer with rescued son.
10. Bob’s eyes are healed!
Now wasn’t that easier than washing his eyes!