The Key West citizen., 1952-08-08
/ Al.
BOYLE
SAYS
BY RELMAN NORM
(for Hal Boyie)

NEW YORK R-E1ow would YOU
eel if you.were in a crowded bus
with some loose cobras?
That happened to some people
in India the other day. The Bonn.
bay office of the Associated Press
reported that a snake-charmel
came aboard, carrying the cobra.
in baskets. The bus jolted over a
pot-hole in the road. The baskets
sprung open.
When one of the cobras reached
the drivers compartment, the driv-
er panicked and lost control. So he
said, afterward. There was seri-
GUS accident.
In a way, this is the other half
of a Kiplingesque~ story. =.
One night in India, a British Of
ficer and his wife gave a small
dinner party. 1t was during the
war, and so there was some talk
of the fighting and the bombing
of British cities, and what-not. And
then one Of the ladies tripped the
trigger on lovely argument.
"This war has proved one thing" !"
she said, women are just as brave
as men in an emergency, and per-
haps braver."
The men were indulgent. They
conceded that women in the serv-
ices had often displayed extraordi-
nary courage. But they pointed out
also that women will jump on
chair and scream in the presence
of a mouse.
The argument was swirling, and
nobody noticed when the hostess
quietly signalled one of the Indian
servants.
He bent over her shoulder. She
whispered something. He hurried
out of the room.
A moment later, he reappeared,
holding a bowl of milk. He set the
bowl on the floor in a far corner
of the room.
Suddenly, a cobra slithered out
from beneath the table, heading
for the milk. There were screams,
quick exits, and the confusion was
immense when the other guests
saw it. The servant quickly de-
Stroyed the snake.
Later, they asked the hostess
how she knew the cobra was in
the room. Did she see it? When?
Where? =
81 didn't see it," she replied,
"but I felt it. it was coiled
around my ankle"
This tended to chill the argu-
ment about men and women and
what they do in the presence of
danger.
But about the cobras. There
are almost as many tales of their
strange ways as there are snakes.
The king cobra is aggressive,
and presumably, will always at
tack; the other types only defend
themselves. Yet, some of the In
dams claim that not even the big
king will harm a small child. They
believe a snake reacts, through
some sixth sense, to the loathing
and dread that arises, on sight,
in most adults.
And they think this is an ac-
quired feeling, something you have
to learn. Since a baby does not
know enough to be afraid, he may
be perfectly safe-even with a
cobra.
Preston Grover, who headed the
AP office in India for a number
of years, was a witness to one of
these incidents.
He was visiting an Indian fam
lily. Their child, in high chair
on the lawn, was eating a bowl
of bread and milk. Cobras like
milk, and apparently they can
smell it from considerable dis
tances.
Grover, Mortified, saw the snake,
just as it was crawling up the
side Of the chair. II crossed the
baby's lap, and came onto the
apron Of the high chair. Then it
began drinking the milk.
With clumsy gesture, the baby
banged it over the head with the
spoon.
"The cobra never did strike"
he said, but the baby upset the
bowl, and the snake simply drop
ped onto the grass and went on
looking for milk down there"
It was only when they ap-
preached to kill it, he said, that
the hood went up and it coiled
to strike.
So, in case you are ever on a
crowded bus with a loose cobra.
either open a bottle of the best
homogenized, or pretend not to