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Title: Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 2 (of 6)
Author: Havelock Ellis
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Language: English
***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK STUDIES IN THE PSYCHOLOGY OF SEX,
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STUDIES IN THE PSYCHOLOGY OF SEX, VOLUME II
Sexual Inversion
by
HAVELOCK ELLIS
1927
PREFACE TO THE THIRD EDITION.
It has been remarked by Professor Wilhelm Ostwald that the problem of
homosexuality is a problem left over to us by the Middle Ages, which for
five hundred years dealt with inverts as it dealt with heretics and
witches. To regard the matter thus is to emphasize its social and
humanitarian interest rather than its biological and psychological
significance. It is no doubt this human interest of the question of
inversion, rather than its scientific importance, great as the latter is,
which is mainly responsible for the remarkable activity with which the
study of homosexuality has been carried on during recent years.
The result has been that, during the fourteen years that have passed since
the last edition of this _Study_ was issued, so vast an amount of work has
been carried on in this field that the preparation of a new edition of the
book has been a long and serious task. Nearly every page has been
rewritten or enlarged and the Index of Authors consulted has more than
doubled in length. The original portions of the book have been still more
changed; sixteen new Histories have been added, selected from others in my
possession as being varied, typical, and full.
These extensive additions to the volume have rendered necessary various
omissions. Many of the shorter and less instructive Histories contained in
earlier editions have been omitted, as well as three Appendices which no
longer seem of sufficient interest to retain. In order to avoid undue
increase in the size of this volume, already much larger than in the
previous editions, a new Study of Eonism, or sexo-esthetic inversion, will
be inserted in vol. v, where it will perhaps be at least as much in place
as here.
HAVELOCK ELLIS.
PREFACE TO FIRST EDITION.
It was not my intention to publish a study of an abnormal manifestation of
the sexual instinct before discussing its normal manifestations. It has
happened, however, that this part of my work is ready first, and, since I
thus gain a longer period to develop the central part of my subject, I do
not regret the change of plan.
I had not at first proposed to devote a whole volume to sexual inversion.
It may even be that I was inclined to slur it over as an unpleasant
subject, and one that it was not wise to enlarge on. But I found in time
that several persons for whom I felt respect and admiration were the
congenital subjects of this abnormality. At the same time I realized that
in England, more than in any other country, the law and public opinion
combine to place a heavy penal burden and a severe social stigma on the
manifestations of an instinct which to those persons who possess it
frequently appears natural and normal. It was clear, therefore, that the
matter was in special need of elucidation and discussion.
There can be no doubt that a peculiar amount of ignorance exists regarding
the subject of sexual inversion. I know medical men of many years' general
experience who have never, to their knowledge, come across a single case.
We may remember, indeed, that some fifteen years ago the total number of
cases recorded in scientific literature scarcely equaled those of British
race which I have obtained, and that before my first cases were published
not a single British case, unconnected with the asylum or the prison, had
ever been recorded. Probably not a very large number of people are even
aware that the turning in of the sexual instinct toward persons of the
same sex can ever be regarded as inborn, so far as any sexual instinct is
inborn. And very few, indeed, would not be surprised if it were possible
to publish a list of the names of sexually inverted men and women who at
the present time are honorably known in church, state, society, art, or
letters. It could not be positively affirmed of all such persons that they
were born inverted, but in most the inverted tendency seems to be
instinctive, and appears at a somewhat early age. In any case, however, it
must be realized that in this volume we are not dealing with subjects
belonging to the lunatic asylum, or the prison. We are concerned with
individuals who live in freedom, some of them suffering intensely from
their abnormal organization, but otherwise ordinary members of society. In
a few cases we are concerned with individuals whose moral or artistic
ideals have widely influenced their fellows, who know nothing of the
peculiar organization which has largely molded those ideals.
I am indebted to several friends for notes, observations, and
correspondence on this subject, more especially to one, referred to as
"Z.," and to another as "Q.," who have obtained a considerable number of
reliable histories for me, and have also supplied many valuable notes; to
"Josiah Flynt" (whose articles on tramps in _Atlantic Monthly_ and
_Harper's Magazine_ have attracted wide attention) for an appendix on
homosexuality among tramps; to Drs. Kiernan, Lydston, and Talbot for
assistance at various points noted in the text; and to Dr. K., an American
woman physician, who kindly assisted me in obtaining cases, and has also
supplied an appendix. Other obligations are mentioned in the text.
All those portions of the book which are of medical or medico-legal
interest, including most of the cases, have appeared during the last three
years in the _Alienist and Neurologist_, the _Journal of Mental Science_,
the _Centralblatt für Nervenheilkunde_, the _Medico-legal Journal_, and
the _Archivo delle Psicopatie Sessuale_. The cases, as they appear in the
present volume, have been slightly condensed, but nothing of genuine
psychological interest has been omitted. Owing to some delay in the
publication of the English edition of the work, a German translation by my
friend, Dr. Hans Kurella, editor of the _Centralblatt für
Nervenheilkunde_, has already appeared (1896) in the _Bibliothek für
Sozialwissenschaft_. The German edition contains some matter which has
finally been rejected from the English edition as of minor importance; on
the other hand, much has been added to the English edition, and the whole
carefully revised.
I have only to add that if it may seem that I have unduly ignored the
cases and arguments brought forward by other writers, it is by no means
because I wish to depreciate the valuable work done by my predecessors in
this field. It is solely because I have not desired to popularize the
results previously reached, but simply to bring forward my own results. If
I had not been able to present new facts in what is perhaps a new light, I
should not feel justified in approaching the subject of sexual inversion
at all.
HAVELOCK ELLIS.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I.
INTRODUCTION.
Homosexuality Among Animals--Among the Lower Human Races--The
Albanians--The Greeks--The Eskimos--The Tribes of the Northwest United
States--Homosexuality Among Soldiers in Europe--Indifference Frequently
Manifested by European Lower Classes--Sexual Inversion at
Rome--Homosexuality in Prisons--Among Men of Exceptional Intellect and
Moral Leaders--Muret--Michelangelo--Winkelmann--Homosexuality in English
History--Walt Whitman--Verlaine--Burton's Climatic Theory of
Homosexuality--The Racial Factor--The Prevalence of Homosexuality Today.
CHAPTER II.
THE STUDY OF SEXUAL INVERSION.
Westphal--Hössli--Casper--Ulrichs--Krafft-Ebing--Moll--Féré--Kiernan--
Lydston--Raffalovich--Edward Carpenter--Hirschfeld.
CHAPTER III.
SEXUAL INVERSION IN MEN.
Relatively Undifferentiated State of the Sexual Impulse in Early Life--The
Freudian View--Homosexuality in Schools--The Question of Acquired
Homosexuality--Latent Inversion--Retarded Inversion--Bisexuality--The
Question of the Invert's Truthfulness--Histories.
CHAPTER IV.
SEXUAL INVERSION IN WOMEN.
Prevalence of Sexual Inversion Among Women--Among Women of
Ability--Among the Lower Races--Temporary Homosexuality in Schools,
etc.--Histories--Physical and Psychic Characteristics of Inverted
Women--The Modern Development of Homosexuality Among Women.
CHAPTER V.
THE NATURE OF SEXUAL INVERSION.
Analysis of Histories--Race--Heredity--General Health--First Appearance of
Homosexual Impulse--Sexual Precocity and Hyperesthesia--Suggestion and
Other Exciting Causes of Inversion--Masturbation--Attitude Toward
Women--Erotic Dreams--Methods of Sexual Relationship--Pseudo-sexual
Attraction--Physical Sexual Abnormalities--Artistic and Other
Aptitudes--Moral Attitude of the Invert.
CHAPTER VI.
THE THEORY OF SEXUAL INVERSION.
What is Sexual Inversion?--Causes of Diverging Views--The Theory of
Suggestion Unworkable--Importance of the Congenital Element in
Inversion--The Freudian Theory--Embryonic Hermaphroditism as a Key to
Inversion--Inversion as a Variation or "Sport"--Comparison with
Color-blindness, Color-hearing, and Similar Abnormalities--What is an
Abnormality?--Not Necessarily a Disease--Relation of Inversion to
Degeneration--Exciting Causes of Inversion--Not Operative in the Absence
of Predisposition.
CHAPTER VII.
CONCLUSIONS.
The Prevention of Homosexuality--The Influence of the
School--Coeducation--The Treatment of Sexual
Inversion--Castration--Hypnotism--Associational
Therapy--Psycho-analysis--Mental and Physical Hygiene--Marriage--The
Children of Inverts--The Attitude of Society--The Horror Aroused by
Homosexuality--Justinian--The _Code Napoléon_--The State of the Law in
Europe Today--Germany--England--What Should be our Attitude Toward
Homosexuality?
APPENDIX A.
Homosexuality Among Tramps.
APPENDIX B.
The School-friendships of Girls.
INDEX OF AUTHORS.
INDEX OF SUBJECTS.
SEXUAL INVERSION.
CHAPTER I.
INTRODUCTION.
Homosexuality Among Animals--Among the Lower Human Races--The
Albanians--The Greeks--The Eskimos--The Tribes of the Northwest United
States--Homosexuality Among Soldiers in Europe--Indifference Frequently
Manifested by European Lower Classes--Sexual Inversion at
Rome--Homosexuality in Prisons--Among Men of Exceptional Intellect and
Moral Leaders--Muret--Michelangelo--Winkelmann--Homosexuality in English
History--Walt Whitman--Verlaine--Burton's Climatic Theory of
Homosexuality--The Racial Factor--The Prevalence of Homosexuality Today.
Sexual inversion, as here understood, means sexual instinct turned by
inborn constitutional abnormality toward persons of the same sex. It is
thus a narrower term than homosexuality, which includes all sexual
attractions between persons of the same sex, even when seemingly due to
the accidental absence of the natural objects of sexual attraction, a
phenomenon of wide occurrence among all human races and among most of the
higher animals. It is only during recent years that sexual inversion has
been recognized; previously it was not distinguished from homosexuality in
general, and homosexuality was regarded as a national custom, as an
individual vice, or as an unimportant episode in grave forms of
insanity.[1] We have further to distinguish sexual inversion and all other
forms of homosexuality from another kind of inversion which usually
remains, so far as the sexual impulse itself is concerned, heterosexual,
that is to say, normal. Inversion of this kind leads a person to feel like
a person of the opposite sex, and to adopt, so far as possible, the
tastes, habits, and dress of the opposite sex, while the direction of the
sexual impulse remains normal. This condition I term sexo-esthetic
inversion, or Eonism.
The nomenclature of the highly important form of sexual
perversion with which we are here concerned is extremely varied,
and most investigators have been much puzzled in coming to a
conclusion as to the best, most exact, and at the same time most
colorless names to apply to it.
The first in the field in modern times was Ulrichs who, as early
as 1862, used the appellation "Uranian" (Uranier), based on the
well-known myth in Plato's _Banquet_. Later he Germanized this
term into "Urning" for the male, and "Urningin" for the female,
and referred to the condition itself as "Urningtum." He also
invented a number of other related terms on the same basis; some
of these terms have had a considerable vogue, but they are too
fanciful and high-strung to secure general acceptance. If used in
other languages than German they certainly should not be used in
their Germanized shape, and it is scarcely legitimate to use the
term "Urning" in English. "Uranian" is more correct.
In Germany the first term accepted by recognized scientific
authorities was "contrary sexual feeling" (Konträre
Sexualempfindung). It was devised by Westphal in 1869, and used
by Krafft-Ebing and Moll. Though thus accepted by the earliest
authorities in this field, and to be regarded as a fairly
harmless and vaguely descriptive term, it is somewhat awkward,
and is now little used in Germany; it was never currently used
outside Germany. It has been largely superseded by the term
"homosexuality." This also was devised (by a little-known
Hungarian doctor, Benkert, who used the pseudonym Kertbeny) in
the same year (1869), but at first attracted no attention. It
has, philologically, the awkward disadvantage of being a bastard
term compounded of Greek and Latin elements, but its
significance--sexual attraction to the same sex--is fairly clear
and definite, while it is free from any question-begging
association of either favorable or unfavorable character. (Edward
Carpenter has proposed to remedy its bastardly linguistic
character by transforming it into "homogenic;" this, however,
might mean not only "toward the same sex," but "of the same
kind," and in German already possesses actually that meaning.)
The term "homosexual" has the further advantage that on account
of its classical origin it is easily translatable into many
languages. It is now the most widespread general term for the
phenomena we are dealing with, and it has been used by
Hirschfeld, now the chief authority in this field, as the title
of his encyclopedic work, _Die Homosexualität_.
"Sexual Inversion" (in French "inversion sexuelle," and in
Italian "inversione sessuale") is the term which has from the
first been chiefly used in France and Italy, ever since Charcot
and Magnan, in 1882, published their cases of this anomaly in the
_Archives de Neurologie_. It had already been employed in Italy
by Tamassia in the _Revista Sperimentale di Freniatria_, in 1878.
I have not discovered when and where the term "sexual inversion"
was first used. Possibly it first appeared in English, for long
before the paper of Charcot and Magnan I have noticed, in an
anonymous review of Westphal's first paper in the _Journal of
Mental Science_ (then edited by Dr. Maudsley) for October, 1871,
that "Conträre Sexualempfindung" is translated as "inverted
sexual proclivity." So far as I am aware, "sexual inversion" was
first used in English, as the best term, by J.A. Symonds in 1883,
in his privately printed essay, _A Problem in Greek Ethics_.
Later, in 1897, the same term was adopted, I believe for the
first time publicly in English, in the present work.
It is unnecessary to refer to the numerous other names which have
been proposed. (A discussion of the nomenclature will be found in
the first chapter of Hirschfeld's work, _Die Homosexualität_, and
of some special terms in an article by Schouten,
_Sexual-Probleme_, December, 1912.) It may suffice to mention the
ancient theological and legal term "sodomy" (sodomia) because it
is still the most popular term for this perversion, though, it
must be remembered, it has become attached to the physical act of
intercourse _per anum_, even when carried out heterosexually, and
has little reference to psychic sexual proclivity. This term has
its origin in the story (narrated in Genesis, ch. xix) of Lot's
visitors whom the men of Sodom desired to have intercourse with,
and of the subsequent destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. This
story furnishes a sufficiently good ground for the use of the
term, though the Jews do not regard sodomy as the sin of Sodom,
but rather inhospitality and hardness of heart to the poor (J.
Preuss, _Biblisch-Talmudische Medizin_, pp. 579-81), and
Christian theologians also, both Catholic and Protestant (see,
e.g., _Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, vol. iv, p. 199,
and Hirschfeld, _Homosexualität_, p. 742), have argued that it
was not homosexuality, but their other offenses, which provoked
the destruction of the Cities of the Plain. In Germany "sodomy"
has long been used to denote bestiality, or sexual intercourse
with animals, but this use of the term is quite unjustified. In
English there is another term, "buggery," identical in meaning
with sodomy, and equally familiar. "Bugger" (in French,
_bougre_) is a corruption of "Bulgar," the ancient Bulgarian
heretics having been popularly supposed to practise this
perversion. The people of every country have always been eager to
associate sexual perversions with some other country than their
own.
The terms usually adopted in the present volume are "sexual
inversion" and "homosexuality." The first is used more especially
to indicate that the sexual impulse is organically and innately
turned toward individuals of the same sex. The second is used
more comprehensively of the general phenomena of sexual
attraction between persons of the same sex, even if only of a
slight and temporary character. It may be admitted that there is
no precise warrant for any distinction of this kind between the
two terms. The distinction in the phenomena is, however, still
generally recognized; thus Iwan Bloch applies the term
"homosexuality" to the congenital form, and
"pseudo-homosexuality" to its spurious or simulated forms. Those
persons who are attracted to both sexes are now usually termed
"bisexual," a more convenient term than "psycho-sexual
hermaphrodite," which was formerly used. There remains the normal
person, who is "heterosexual."
Before approaching the study of sexual inversion in cases which we may
investigate with some degree of scientific accuracy, there is interest in
glancing briefly at the phenomena as they appear before us, as yet
scarcely or at all differentiated, among animals, among various human
races, and at various periods.
Among animals in a domesticated or confined state it is easy to find
evidence of homosexual attraction, due merely to the absence of the other
sex.[2] This was known to the ancients; the Egyptians regarded two male
partridges as the symbol of homosexuality, and Aristotle noted that two
female pigeons would cover each other if no male was at hand. Buffon
observed many examples, especially among birds. He found that, if male or
female birds of various species--such as partridges, fowls, and
doves--were shut up together, they would soon begin to have sexual
relations among themselves, the males sooner and more frequently than the
females. More recently Sainte-Claire Deville observed that dogs, rams, and
bulls, when isolated, first became restless and dangerous, and then
acquired a permanent state of sexual excitement, not obeying the laws of
heat, and leading them to attempts to couple together; the presence of the
opposite sex at once restored them to normal conditions.[3] Bombarda of
Lisbon states that in Portugal it is well known that in every herd of
bulls there is nearly always one bull who is ready to lend himself to the
perverted whims of his companions.[4] It may easily be observed how a cow
in heat exerts an exciting influence on other cows, impelling them to
attempt to play the bull's part. Lacassagne has also noted among young
fowls and puppies, etc., that, before ever having had relations with the
opposite sex, and while in complete liberty, they make hesitating attempts
at intercourse with their own sex.[5] This, indeed, together with similar
perversions, may often be observed, especially in puppies, who afterward
become perfectly normal. Among white rats, which are very sexual animals,
Steinach found that, when deprived of females, the males practise
homosexuality, though only with males with whom they have long associated;
the weaker rats play the passive part. But when a female is introduced
they immediately turn to her; although they are occasionally altogether
indifferent to sex, they never actually prefer their own sex.[6]
With regard to the playing of the female part by the weaker rats it is
interesting to observe that Féré found among insects that the passive part
in homosexual relations is favored by fatigue; among cockchafers it was
the male just separated from the female who would take the passive part
(on the rare occasions when homosexual relations occurred) with a fresh
male.[7]
Homosexuality appears to be specially common among birds. It was among
birds that it attracted the attention of the ancients, and numerous
interesting observations have been made in more recent times. Thus Selous,
a careful bird-watcher, finds that the ruff, the male of the _Machetes
pugnax_, suffers from sexual repression owing to the coyness of the female
(the reeve), and consequently the males often resort to homosexual
intercourse. It is still more remarkable that the reeves also, even in the
presence of the males, will court each other and have intercourse.[8] We
may associate this with the high erotic development of birds, the
difficulty with which tumescence seems to occur in them, and their long
courtships.
Among the higher animals, again, female monkeys, even when grown up (as
Moll was informed), behave in a sexual way to each other, though it is
difficult to say how far this is merely in play. Dr. Seitz, Director of
the Frankfurt Zoölogical Garden, gave Moll a record of his own careful
observations of homosexual phenomena among the males and females of
various animals confined in the Garden (_Antelope cervicapra, Bos Indicus,
Capra hircus, Ovis steatopyga_).[9] In all such cases we are not concerned
with sexual inversion, but merely with the accidental turning of the
sexual instinct into an abnormal channel, the instinct being called out
by an approximate substitute, or even by diffused emotional excitement, in
the absence of the normal object.
It is probable, however, that cases of true sexual inversion--in which
gratification is preferably sought in the same sex--may be found among
animals, although observations have rarely been made or recorded. It has
been found by Muccioli, an Italian authority on pigeons, that among
Belgian carrier-pigeons inverted practices may occur, even in the presence
of many of the other sex.[10] This seems to be true inversion, though we
are not told whether these birds were also attracted toward the opposite
sex. The birds of this family appear to be specially liable to sexual
perversion. Thus M.J. Bailly-Maitre, a breeder of great knowledge and a
keen observer, wrote to Girard that "they are strange creatures in their
manners and customs and are apt to elude the most persistent observer. No
animal is more depraved. Mating between males, and still more frequently
between females, often occurs at an early age: up to the second year. I
have had several pairs of pigeons formed by subjects of the same sex who
for many months behaved as if the mating were natural. In some cases this
had taken place among young birds of the same nest, who acted like real
mates, though both subjects were males. In order to mate them productively
we have had to separate them and shut each of them up for some days with a
female."[11] In the Berlin Zoölogical Gardens also, it has been noticed
that two birds of the same sex will occasionally become attached to each
other and remain so in spite of repeated advances from individuals of
opposite sex. This occurred, for instance, in the case of two males of the
Egyptian goose who were thus to all appearance paired, and always kept
together, vigorously driving away any female that approached. Similarly a
male Australian sheldrake was paired to a male of another species.[12]
Among birds generally, inverted sexuality seems to accompany the
development of the secondary sexual characters of the opposite sex which
is sometimes found. Thus, a poultry-breeder describes a hen (colored
Dorking) crowing like a cock, only somewhat more harshly, as a cockerel
crows, and with an enormous comb, larger than is ever seen in the male.
This bird used to try to tread her fellow-hens. At the same time she laid
early and regularly, and produced "grand chickens."[13] Among ducks, also,
it has occasionally been observed that the female assumes at the same time
both male livery and male sexual tendencies. It is probable that such
observations will be multiplied in the future, and that sexual inversion
in the true sense will be found commoner among animals than at present it
appears to be.
Traces of homosexual practices, sometimes on a large scale, have been
found among all the great divisions of the human race. It would be
possible to collect a considerable body of evidence under this head.[14]
Unfortunately, however, the travellers and others on whose records we are
dependent have been so shy of touching these subjects, and so ignorant of
the main points for investigation, that it is very difficult to discover
sexual inversion in the proper sense in any lower race. Travellers have
spoken vaguely of crimes against nature without defining the precise
relationship involved nor inquiring how far any congenital impulse could
be distinguished.
Looking at the phenomena generally, so far as they have been recorded
among various lower races, we seem bound to recognize that there is a
widespread natural instinct impelling men toward homosexual relationships,
and that this has been sometimes, though very exceptionally, seized upon
and developed for advantageous social purposes. On the whole, however,
unnatural intercourse (sodomy) has been regarded as an antisocial offense,
and punishable sometimes by the most serious penalties that could be
invented. This was, for instance, the case in ancient Mexico, in Peru,
among the Persians, in China, and among the Hebrews and Mohammedans.
Even in very early history it is possible to find traces of homosexuality,
with or without an implied disapproval. Its existence in Assyria and
Babylonia is indicated by the Codex Hamurabi and by inscriptions which do
not on the whole refer to it favorably.[15] As regards Egypt we learn from
a Fayum papyrus, found by Flinders Petrie, translated by Griffiths, and
discussed by Oefele,[16] that more than four thousand years ago homosexual
practices were so ancient that they were attributed to the gods Horus and
Set. The Egyptians showed great admiration of masculine beauty, and it
would seem that they never regarded homosexuality as punishable or even
reprehensible. It is notable, also, that Egyptian women were sometimes of
very virile type, and Hirschfeld considers that intermediate sexual types
were specially widespread among the Egyptians.[17]
One might be tempted to expect that homosexual practices would be
encouraged whenever it was necessary to keep down the population.
Aristotle says that it was allowed by law in Crete for this end. And
Professor Haddon tells me that at Torres Straits a native advocated sodomy
on this ground.[18] There seems, however, on the whole, to be little
evidence pointing to this utilization of the practice. The homosexual
tendency appears to have flourished chiefly among warriors and warlike
peoples. During war and the separation from women that war involves, the
homosexual instinct tends to develop; it flourished, for instance, among
the Carthaginians and among the Normans, as well as among the warlike
Dorians, Scythians, Tartars, and Celts,[19] and, when there has been an
absence of any strong moral feeling against it, the instinct has been
cultivated and, idealized as a military virtue, partly because it
counteracts the longing for the softening feminine influences of the home
and partly because it seems to have an inspiring influence in promoting
heroism and heightening _esprit de corps_. In the lament of David over
Jonathan we have a picture of intimate friendship--"passing the love of
women"--between comrades in arms among a barbarous, warlike race. There is
nothing to show that such a relationship was sexual, but among warriors in
New Caledonia friendships that were undoubtedly homosexual were recognized
and regulated; the fraternity of arms, according to Foley,[20] complicated
with pederasty, was more sacred than uterine fraternity. We have,
moreover, a recent example of the same relationships recognized in a
modern European race--the Albanians.
Hahn, in the course of his _Albanische Studien_ (1854, p. 166),
says that the young men between 16 and 24 lore boys from about 12
to 17. A Gege marries at the age of 24 or 25, and then he
usually, but not always, gives up boy-love. The following passage
is reported by Hahn as the actual language used to him by an
Albanian Gege: "The lover's feeling for the boy is pure as
sunshine. It places the beloved on the same pedestal as a saint.
It is the highest and most exalted passion of which the human
breast is capable. The sight of a beautiful youth awakens
astonishment in the lover, and opens the door of his heart to the
delight which the contemplation of this loveliness affords. Love
takes possession of him so completely that all his thought and
feeling goes out in it. If he finds himself in the presence of
the beloved, he rests absorbed in gazing on him. Absent, he
thinks of nought but him. If the beloved unexpectedly appears, he
falls into confusion, changes color, turns alternately pale and
red. His heart beats faster and impedes his breathing. He has
ears and eyes only for the beloved. He shuns touching him with
the hand, kisses him only on the forehead, sings his praise in
verse, a woman's never." One of these love-poems of an Albanian
Gege runs as follows: "The sun, when it rises in the morning, is
like you, boy, when you are near me. When your dark eye turns
upon me, it drives my reason from my head."
It should be added that Prof. Weigand, who knew the Albanians
well, assured Bethe (_Rheinisches Museum für Philologie_, 1907,
p. 475) that the relations described by Hahn are really sexual,
although tempered by idealism. A German scholar who travelled in
Albania some years ago, also, assured Näcke (_Jahrbuch für
sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, vol. ix, 1908, p. 327) that he could
fully confirm Hahn's statements, and that, though it was
difficult to speak positively, he doubted whether these
relationships were purely ideal. While most prevalent among the
Moslems, they are also found among the Christians, and receive
the blessing of the priest in church. Jealousy is frequently
aroused, the same writer remarks, and even murder may be
committed on account of a boy.
It may be mentioned here that among the Tschuktsches,
Kamschatdals, and allied peoples (according to a Russian
anthropological journal quoted in _Sexual-Probleme_, January,
1913, p. 41) there are homosexual marriages among the men, and
occasionally among the women, ritually consecrated and openly
recognized.
The Albanians, it is possible, belonged to the same stock which produced
the Dorian Greeks, and the most important and the most thoroughly known
case of socially recognized homosexuality is that of Greece during its
period of highest military as well as ethical and intellectual vigor. In
this case, as in those already mentioned, the homosexual tendency was
frequently regarded as having beneficial results, which caused it to be
condoned, if not, indeed, fostered as a virtue. Plutarch repeated the old
Greek statement that the Beotians, the Lacedemonians, and the Cretans were
the most warlike stocks because they were the strongest in love; an army
composed of loving homosexual couples, it was held, would be invincible.
It appears that the Dorians introduced _paiderastia_, as the Greek form of
homosexuality is termed, into Greece; they were the latest invaders, a
vigorous mountain race from the northwest (the region including what is
now Albania) who spread over the whole land, the islands, and Asia Minor,
becoming the ruling race. Homosexuality was, of course, known before they
came, but they made it honorable. Homer never mentions it, and it was not
known as legitimate to the Æolians or the Ionians. Bethe, who has written
a valuable study of Dorian _paiderastia_, states that the Dorians admitted
a kind of homosexual marriage, and even had a kind of boy-marriage by
capture, the scattered vestiges of this practice indicating, Bethe
believes, that it was a general custom among the Dorians before the
invasion of Greece. Such unions even received a kind of religions
consecration. It was, moreover, shameful for a noble youth in Crete to
have no lover; it spoke ill for his character. By _paiderastia_ a man
propagated his virtues, as it were, in the youth he loved, implanting them
by the act of intercourse.
In its later Greek phases _paiderastia_ was associated less with war than
with athletics; it was refined and intellectualized by poetry and
philosophy. It cannot be doubted that both Æschylus and Sophocles
cultivated boy-love, while its idealized presentation in the dialogues of
Plato has caused it to be almost identified with his name; thus in the
early _Charmides_ we have an attractive account of the youth who gives his
name to the dialogue and the emotions he excites are described. But even
in the early dialogues Plato only conditionally approved of the sexual
side of _paiderastia_ and he condemned it altogether in the final
_Laws_.[21]
The early stages of Greek _paiderastia_ are very interestingly
studied by Bethe, "Die Dorische Knabenliebe," _Rheinisches Museum
für Philologie_, 1907. J.A. Symonds's essay on the later aspects
of _paiderastia_, especially as reflected in Greek literature, _A
Problem in Greek Ethics_, is contained in the early German
edition of the present study, but (though privately printed in
1883 by the author in an edition of twelve copies and since
pirated in another private edition) it has not yet been published
in English. _Paiderastia_ in Greek poetry has also been studied
by Paul Brandt, _Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, vols.
viii and ix (1906 and 1907), and by Otto Knapp
(_Anthropophyteia_, vol. iii, pp. 254-260) who seeks to
demonstrate the sensual side of _paiderastia_. On the other hand,
Licht, working on somewhat the same lines as Bethe (_Zeitschrift
für Sexualwissenschaft_, August, 1908), deals with the ethical
element in _paiderastia_, points out its beneficial moral
influence, and argues that it was largely on this ground that it
was counted sacred. Licht has also published a learned study of
_paiderastia_ in Attic comedy (_Anthropophyteia_, vol. vii,
1910), and remarks that "without _paiderastia_ Greek comedy is
unthinkable." _Paiderastia_ in the Greek anthology has been fully
explored by P. Stephanus (_Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_,
vol. ix, 1908, p. 213). Kiefer, who has studied Socrates in
relation to homosexuality (O. Kiefer, "Socrates und die
Homosexualität," _Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, vol. ix,
1908), concludes that he was bisexual but that his sexual
impulses had been sublimated. It may be added that many results
of recent investigation concerning _paiderastia_ are summarized
by Hirschfeld, _Die Homosexualität_, pp. 747-788, and by Edward
Carpenter, _Intermediate Types Among Primitive Folk_, 1914, part
ii; see also Bloch, _Die Prostitution_, vol. i, p. 232 et seq.,
and _Der Ursprung der Syphilis_, vol. ii, p. 564.
It would appear that almost the only indications outside Greece of
_paiderastic_ homosexuality showing a high degree of tenderness and
esthetic feeling are to be found in Persian and Arabian literature, after
the time of the Abbasids, although this practice was forbidden by the
Koran.[22]
In Constantinople, as Näcke was informed by German inverts living in that
city, homosexuality is widespread, most cultivated Turks being capable of
relations with boys as well as with women, though very few are exclusively
homosexual, so that their attitude would seem to be largely due to custom
and tradition. Adult males rarely have homosexual relations together; one
of the couple is usually a boy of 12 to 18 years, and this condition of
things among the refined classes is said to resemble ancient Greek
_paiderastia_. But ordinary homosexual prostitution is prevalent; it is
especially recognized in the baths which abound in Constantinople and are
often open all night. The attendants at these baths are youths who
scarcely need an invitation to induce them to gratify the client in this
respect, the gratification usually consisting in masturbation, mutual or
one-sided, as desired. The practice, though little spoken of, is carried
on almost openly, and blackmailing is said to be unknown.[23] In the New
Turkey, however, it is stated by Adler Bey that homosexual prostitution
has almost disappeared.[24]
There is abundant evidence to show that homosexual practices exist and
have long existed in most parts of the world outside Europe, when
subserving no obvious social or moral end. How far they are associated
with congenital inversion is usually very doubtful. In China, for
instance, it seems that there are special houses devoted to male
prostitution, though less numerous than the houses devoted to females, for
homosexuality cannot be considered common in China (its prevalence among
Chinese abroad being due to the absence of women) and it is chiefly found
in the north.[25] When a rich man gives a feast he sends for women to
cheer the repast by music and song, and for boys to serve at table and to
entertain the guests by their lively conversation. The boys have been
carefully brought up for this occupation, receiving an excellent
education, and their mental qualities are even more highly valued than
their physical attractiveness. The women are less carefully brought up and
less esteemed. After the meal the lads usually return home with a
considerable fee. What further occurs the Chinese say little about. It
seems that real and deep affection is often born of these relations, at
first platonic, but in the end becoming physical, not a matter for great
concern in the eyes of the Chinese. In the Chinese novels, often of a very
literary character, devoted to masculine love, it seems that all the
preliminaries and transports of normal love are to be found, while
physical union may terminate the scene. In China, however, the law may be
brought into action for attempts against nature even with mutual consent;
the penalty is one hundred strokes with the bamboo and a month's
imprisonment; if there is violence, the penalty is decapitation; I am not
able to say how far the law is a dead letter. According to Matignon, so
far as homosexuality exists in China, it is carried on with much more
decorum and restraint than it is in Europe, and he thinks it may be put
down to the credit of the Chinese that, unlike Europeans, they never
practice unnatural connection with women. His account of the customs of
the Chinese confirms Morache's earlier account, and he remarks that,
though not much spoken of, homosexuality is not looked down upon. He gives
some interesting details concerning the boy prostitutes. These are sold by
their parents (sometimes stolen from them), about the age of 4, and
educated, while they are also subjected to a special physical training,
which includes massage of the gluteal regions to favor development,
dilatation of the anus, and epilation (which is not, however, practised by
Chinese women). At the same time, they are taught music, singing, drawing,
and the art of poetry. The waiters at the restaurants always know where
these young gentlemen are to be found when they are required to grace a
rich man's feast. They are generally accompanied by a guardian, and
usually nothing very serious takes place, for they know their value, and
money will not always buy their expensive favors. They are very
effeminate, luxuriously dressed and perfumed, and they seldom go on foot.
There are, however, lower orders of such prostitutes.[26]
Homosexuality is easily traceable in India. Dubois referred to houses
devoted to male prostitution, with men dressed as women, and imitating the
ways of women.[27] Burton in the "Terminal Essay" to his translation of
the _Arabian Nights_, states that when in 1845 Sir Charles Napier
conquered and annexed Sind three brothels of eunuchs and boys were found
in the small town of Karachi, and Burton was instructed to visit and
report on them. Hindus, in general, however, it appears, hold
homosexuality in abhorrence. In Afghanistan homosexuality is more
generally accepted, and Burton stated that "each caravan is accompanied by
a number of boys and lads almost in woman's attire, with kohled eyes and
rouged cheeks, long tresses and hennaed fingers and toes, riding
luxuriously in camel paniers."
If we turn to the New World, we find that among the American Indians, from
the Eskimo of Alaska downward to Brazil and still farther south,
homosexual customs have been very frequently observed. Sometimes they are
regarded by the tribe with honor, sometimes with indifference, sometimes
with contempt; but they appear to be always tolerated. Although there are
local differences, these customs, on the whole, seem to have much in
common. The best early description which I have been able to find is by
Langsdorff[28] and concerns the Aleuts of Oonalashka in Alaska: "Boys, if
they happen to be very handsome," he says, "are often brought up entirely
in the manner of girls, and instructed in the arts women use to please
men; their beards are carefully plucked out as soon as they begin to
appear, and their chins tattooed like those of women; they wear ornaments
of glass beads upon their legs and arms, bind and cut their hair in the
same manner as the women, and supply their place with the men as
concubines. This shocking, unnatural, and immoral practice has obtained
here even from the remotest times; nor have any measures hitherto been
taken to repress and restrain it; such men are known under the name of
_schopans_."
Among the Konyagas Langsdorff found the custom much more common than among
the Aleuts; he remarks that, although the mothers brought up some of their
children in this way, they seemed very fond of their offspring. Lisiansky,
at about the same period, tells us that: "Of all the customs of these
islanders, the most disgusting is that of men, called _schoopans_, living
with men, and supplying the place of women. These are brought up from
their infancy with females, and taught all the feminine arts. They even
assume the manner and dress of the women so nearly that a stranger would
naturally take them for what they are not. This odious practice was
formerly so prevalent that the residence of one of these monsters in a
house was considered as fortunate; it is, however, daily losing
ground."[29] He mentions a case in which a priest had nearly married two
males, when an interpreter chanced to come in and was able to inform him
what he was doing.
The practice has, however, apparently continued to be fairly common among
the Alaska Eskimos down to recent times. Thus Dr. Engelmann mentioned to
me that he was informed by those who had lived in Alaska, especially near
Point Barrow, that as many as 5 such individuals (regarded by uninstructed
strangers as "hermaphrodites") might be found in a single comparatively
small community. It is stated by Davydoff, as quoted by Holmberg,[30] that
the boy is selected to be a _schopan_ because he is girl-like. This is a
point of some interest as it indicates that the schopan is not effeminated
solely by suggestion and association, but is probably feminine by inborn
constitution.
In Louisiana, Florida, Yucatan, etc., somewhat similar customs exist or
have existed. In Brazil men are to be found dressed as women and solely
occupying themselves with feminine occupations; they are not very highly
regarded.[31] They are called _cudinas_: i.e., circumcized. Among the
Pueblo Indians of New Mexico these individuals are called _mujerados_
(supposed to be a corruption of _mujeriego_) and are the chief passive
agents in the homosexual ceremonies of these people. They are said to be
intentionally effeminated in early life by much masturbation and by
constant horse-riding.[32]
Among all the tribes of the northwest United States sexual inverts may be
found. The invert is called a _boté_ ("not man, not woman") by the
Montana, and a _burdash_ ("half-man, half-woman") by the Washington
Indians. The _boté_ has been carefully studied by Dr. A.B. Holder.[33]
Holder finds that the _boté_ wears woman's dress, and that his speech and
manners are feminine. The dress and manners are assumed in childhood, but
no sexual practices take place until puberty. These consist in the
practice of _fellatio_ by the _boté_, who probably himself experiences the
orgasm at the same time. The _boté_ is not a pederast, although pederasty
occurs among these Indians. Holder examined _boté_ who was splendidly
made, prepossessing, and in perfect health. With much reluctance he agreed
to a careful examination. The sexual organs were quite normal, though
perhaps not quite so large as his _physique_ would suggest, but he had
never had intercourse with a woman. On removing his clothes he pressed his
thighs together, as a timid woman would, so as to conceal completely the
sexual organs; Holder says that the thighs "really, or to my fancy," had
the feminine rotundity. He has heard a _boté_ "_beg_ a male Indian to
submit to his caress," and he tells that "one little fellow, while in the
agency boarding-school, was found frequently surreptitiously wearing
female attire. He was punished, but finally escaped from school and became
a _boté_, which vocation he has since followed."
At Tahiti at the beginning of the nineteenth century, Turnbull[34] found
that "there are a set of men in this country whose open profession is of
such abomination that the laudable delicacy of our language will not admit
it to be mentioned. These are called by the natives _Mahoos_; they assume
the dress, attitude, and manners of women, and affect all the fantastic
oddities and coquetries of the vainest of females. They mostly associate
with the women, who court their acquaintance. With the manners of the
women they adopt their peculiar employments, making cloth, bonnets, and
mats; and so completely are they unsexed that had they not been pointed
out to me I should not have known them but as women. I add, with some
satisfaction, that the encouragement of this abomination is almost solely
confined to the chiefs."
Among the Sakalaves of Madagascar there are certain boys called _sekatra_,
as described by Lasnet, who are apparently chosen from childhood on
account of weak or delicate appearance and brought up as girls. They live
like women and have intercourse with men, with or without sodomy, paying
the men who please them.[35]
Among the negro population of Zanzibar forms of homosexuality which are
believed to be congenital (as well as acquired forms) are said to be
fairly common. Their frequency is thought to be due to Arab influence. The
male congenital inverts show from their earliest years no aptitude for
men's occupations, but are attracted toward female occupations. As they
grow older they wear women's clothes, dress their hair in women's fashion,
and behave altogether like women. They associate only with women and with
male prostitutes, and they obtain sexual satisfaction by passive pederasty
or in ways simulating coitus. In appearance they resemble ordinary male
prostitutes, who are common in Zanzibar, but it is noteworthy that the
natives make a clear distinction between them and men prostitutes. The
latter are looked down on with contempt, while the former, as being what
they are "by the will of God," are tolerated.[36]
Homosexuality; occurs in various parts of Africa. Cases of _effeminatio_
and passive sodomy have been reported from Unyamwezi and Uganda. Among the
Bangala of the Upper Congo sodomy between men is very common, especially
when they are away from home, in strange towns, or in fishing camps. If,
however, a man had intercourse with a woman _per anum_ he was at one time
liable to be put to death.[37]
Among the Papuans in some parts of New Guinea, as already mentioned,
homosexuality is said to be well recognized, and is resorted to for
convenience as well, perhaps, as for Malthusian reasons.[38] But in the
Rigo district of British New Guinea, where habitual sodomy is not
practised, Dr. Seligmann, of the Cambridge Anthropological Expedition to
Torres Straits, made some highly important observations on several men and
women who clearly appeared to be cases of congenital sexual inversion with
some degree of esthetic inversion and even some anatomical
modification.[39] These people, it may be noted, belong to a primitive
race, uncontaminated by contact with white races, and practically still in
the Stone Age.
Finally, among another allied primitive people, the Australians, it would
appear that homosexuality has long been well established in tribal
customs. Among the natives of Kimberley, Western Australia (who are by no
means of low type, quick and intelligent, with special aptitudes for
learning languages and music), if a wife is not obtainable for a young man
he is presented with a boy-wife between the ages of 5 and 10 (the age when
a boy receives his masculine initiation). The exact nature of the
relations between the boy-wife and his protector are doubtful; they
certainly have connection, but the natives repudiate with horror and
disgust the idea of sodomy.[40]
Further light is thrown on homosexuality in Australia by the supposition
of Spencer and Gillen that the _mika_ operation (urethral subincision), an
artificial hypospadias, is for the purpose of homosexual intercourse.
Klaatsch has discussed the homosexual origin of the _mika_ operation on
the basis of information he received from missionaries at Niol-Niol, on
the northwest coast. The subincised man acts as a female to the as yet
unoperated boys, who perform coitus in the incised opening. Both informed
Klaatsch in 1906 that at Boulia in Queensland the operated men are said to
"possess a vulva."[41]
These various accounts are of considerable interest, though for the most
part their precise significance remains doubtful. Some of them,
however,--such as Holder's description of the _boté_, Baumann's account of
homosexual phenomena in Zanzibar, and especially Seligmann's observations
in British New Guinea,--indicate not only the presence of esthetic
inversion but of true congenital sexual inversion. The extent of the
evidence will doubtless be greatly enlarged as the number of competent
observers increases, and crucial points are no longer so frequently
overlooked.
On the whole, the evidence shows that among lower races homosexual
practices are regarded with considerable indifference, and the real
invert, if he exists among them, as doubtless he does exist, generally
passes unperceived or joins some sacred caste which sanctifies his
exclusively homosexual inclinations.
Even in Europe today a considerable lack of repugnance to homosexual
practices may be found among the lower classes. In this matter, as
folklore shows in so many other matters, the uncultured man of
civilization is linked to the savage. In England, I am told, the soldier
often has little or no objection to prostitute himself to the "swell" who
pays him, although for pleasure he prefers to go to women; and Hyde Park
is spoken of as a center of male prostitution.
"Among the working masses of England and Scotland," Q. writes,
"'comradeship' is well marked, though not (as in Italy) very
conscious of itself. Friends often kiss each other, though this
habit seems to vary a good deal in different sections and
coteries. Men commonly sleep together, whether comrades or not,
and so easily get familiar. Occasionally, but not so very often,
this relation delays for a time, or even indefinitely, actual
marriage, and in some instances is highly passionate and
romantic. There is a good deal of grossness, no doubt, here and
there in this direction among the masses; but there are no male
prostitutes (that I am aware of) whose regular clients are manual
workers. This kind of prostitution in London is common enough,
but I have only a slight personal knowledge of it. Many youths
are 'kept' handsomely in apartments by wealthy men, and they are,
of course, not always inaccessible to others. Many keep
themselves in lodgings by this means, and others eke out scanty
wages by the same device: just like women, in fact. Choirboys
reinforce the ranks to a considerable extent, and private
soldiers to a large extent. Some of the barracks (notably
Knightsbridge) are great centres. On summer evenings Hyde Park
and the neighborhood of Albert Gate is full of guardsmen and
others plying a lively trade, and with little disguise, in
uniform or out. In these cases it sometimes only amounts to a
chat on a retired seat or a drink at a bar; sometimes recourse is
had to a room in some known lodging-house, or to one or two
hotels which lend themselves to this kind of business. In any
case it means a covetable addition to Tommy Atkins's
pocket-money." And Mr. Raffalovich, speaking of London, remarks:
"The number of soldiers who prostitute themselves is greater than
we are willing to believe. It is no exaggeration to say that in
certain regiments the presumption is in favor of the venality of
the majority of the men." It is worth noting that there is a
perfect understanding in this matter between soldiers and the
police, who may always be relied upon by the former for
assistance and advice. I am indebted to my correspondent "Z" for
the following notes: "Soldiers are no less sought after in France
than in England or in Germany, and special houses exist for
military prostitution both in Paris and the garrison-towns. Many
facts known about the French army go to prove that these habits
have been contracted in Algeria, and have spread to a formidable
extent through whole regiments. The facts related by Ulrichs
about the French foreign legion, on the testimony of a credible
witness who had been a pathic in his regiment, deserve attention
(_Ara Spei_, p. 20; _Memnon_, p. 27). This man, who was a German,
told Ulrichs that the Spanish, French, and Italian soldiers were
the lovers, the Swiss and German their beloved (see also General
Brossier's Report, quoted by Burton, _Arabian Nights_, vol. x, p.
251). In Lucien Descaves's military novel, _Sous Offs_ (Paris,
Tresse et Stock, 1890), some details are given regarding
establishments for male prostitution. See pages 322, 412, and 417
for description of the drinking-shop called 'Aux Amis de
l'Armée,' where a few maids were kept for show, and also of its
frequenters, including, in particular, the Adjutant Laprévotte.
Ulrichs reports that in the Austrian army lectures on homosexual
vices are regularly given to cadets and conscripts (_Memnon_, p.
26). A soldier who had left the army told a friend of mine that
he and many of his comrades had taken to homosexual indulgences
when abroad on foreign service in a lonely station. He kept the
practice up in England 'because the women of his class were so
unattractive.' The captain of an English man-of-war said that he
was always glad to send his men on shore after a long cruise at
sea, never feeling sure how far they might not all go if left
without women for a certain space of time." I may add that A.
Hamon (_La France Sociale et Politique_, 1891, pp. 653-55; also
in his _Psychologie du Militaire Professional_, chapter x) gives
details as to the prevalence of homosexuality in the French army,
especially in Algeria; he regards it as extremely common,
although the majority are free. A fragment of a letter by General
Lamoricière (speaking of Marshal Changarnier) is quoted: _En
Afrique nous en étions tous, mais lui en est resté ici_.
This primitive indifference is doubtless also a factor in the prevalence
of homosexuality among criminals, although, here, it must be remembered,
two other factors (congenital abnormality and the isolation of
imprisonment) have to be considered. In Russia, Tarnowsky observes that
all pederasts are agreed that the common people are tolerably indifferent
to their sexual advances, which they call "gentlemen's games." A
correspondent remarks on "the fact, patent to all observers, that simple
folk not infrequently display no greater disgust for the abnormalities of
sexual appetite than they do for its normal manifestations."[42] He knows
of many cases in which men of lower class were flattered and pleased by
the attentions of men of higher class, although not themselves inverted.
And from this point of view the following case, which he mentions, is very
instructive:--
A pervert whom I can trust told me that he had made advances to
upward of one hundred men in the course of the last fourteen
years, and that he had only once met with a refusal (in which
case the man later on offered himself spontaneously) and only
once with an attempt to extort money. Permanent relations of
friendship sprang up in most instances. He admitted that he
looked after these persons and helped them with his social
influence and a certain amount of pecuniary support--setting one
up in business, giving another something to marry on, and finding
places for others.
Among the peasantry in Switzerland, I am informed, homosexual
relationships are not uncommon before marriage, and such relationships are
lightly spoken of as "Dummheiten". No doubt, similar traits might be found
in the peasantry of other parts of Europe.
What may be regarded as true sexual inversion can be traced in Europe from
the beginning of the Christian era (though we can scarcely demonstrate the
congenital element) especially among two classes--men of exceptional
ability and criminals; and also, it may be added, among those neurotic and
degenerate individuals who may be said to lie between these two classes,
and on or over the borders of both. Homosexuality, mingled with various
other sexual abnormalities and excesses, seems to have flourished in Rome
during the empire, and is well exemplified in the persons of many of the
emperors.[43] Julius Cæsar, Augustus, Tiberius, Caligula, Claudius, Nero,
Galba, Titus, Domitian, Nerva, Trajan, Hadrian, Commodus, and
Heliogabalus--many of them men of great ability and, from a Roman
standpoint, great moral worth--are all charged, on more or less solid
evidence, with homosexual practices. In Julius Cæsar--"the husband of all
women and the wife of all men" as he was satirically termed--excess of
sexual activity seems to have accompanied, as is sometimes seen, an excess
of intellectual activity. He was first accused of homosexual practices
after a long stay in Bithynia with King Nikomedes, and the charge was
very often renewed. Cæsar was proud of his physical beauty, and, like
some modern inverts, he was accustomed carefully to shave and epilate his
body to preserve the smoothness of the skin. Hadrian's love for his
beautiful slave Antinoüs is well known; the love seems to have been deep
and mutual, and Antinoüs has become immortalized, partly by the romance of
his obscure death and partly by the new and strangely beautiful type which
he has given to sculpture.[44] Heliogabalus, "the most homosexual of all
the company," as he has been termed, seems to have been a true sexual
invert, of feminine type; he dressed as a woman and was devoted to the men
he loved.[45]
Homosexual practices everywhere flourish and abound in prisons. There is
abundant evidence on this point. I will only bring forward the evidence of
Dr. Wey, formerly physician to the Elmira Reformatory, New York.
"Sexuality" (he wrote in a private letter) "is one of the most troublesome
elements with which we have to contend. I have no data as to the number of
prisoners here who are sexually perverse. In my pessimistic moments I
should feel like saying that all were; but probably 80 per cent, would be
a fair estimate." And, referring to the sexual influence which some men
have over others, he remarks that "there are many men with features
suggestive of femininity that attract others to them in a way that reminds
me of a bitch in heat followed by a pack of dogs."[46] In Sing Sing prison
of New York, 20 per cent, of the prisoners are said to be actively
homosexual and a large number of the rest passively homosexual. These
prison relationships are not always of a brutal character, McMurtrie
states, the attraction sometimes being more spiritual than physical.[47]
Prison life develops and fosters the homosexual tendency of criminals; but
there can be little doubt that that tendency, or else a tendency to sexual
indifference or bisexuality, is a radical character of a very large number
of criminals. We may also find it to a considerable extent among tramps,
an allied class of undoubted degenerates, who, save for brief seasons, are
less familiar with prison life. I am able to bring forward interesting
evidence on this point by an acute observer who lived much among tramps in
various countries, and largely devoted himself to the study of them.[48]
The fact that homosexuality is especially common among men of exceptional
intellect was long since noted by Dante:--
"In somma sappi, che tutti fur cherci
E litterati grandi, et di gran fama
D'un medismo peccato al mondo lerci."[49]
It has often been noted since and remains a remarkable fact.
There cannot be the slightest doubt that intellectual and
artistic abilities of the highest order have frequently been
associated with a congenitally inverted sexual temperament. There
has been a tendency among inverts themselves to discover their
own temperament in many distinguished persons on evidence of the
most slender character. But it remains a demonstrable fact that
numerous highly distinguished persons, of the past and the
present, in various countries, have been inverts. I may here
refer to my own observations on this point in the preface.
Mantegazza (_Gli Amori degli Uomini_) remarks that in his own
restricted circle he is acquainted with "a French publicist, a
German poet, an Italian statesman, and a Spanish jurist, all men
of exquisite taste and highly cultivated mind," who are sexually
inverted. Krafft-Ebing, in the preface to his _Psychopathia
Sexualis_, referring to the "numberless" communications he has
received from these "step-children of nature," remarks that "the
majority of the writers are men of high intellectual and social
position, and often possess very keen emotions." Raffalovich
(_Uranisme_, p. 197) names among distinguished inverts, Alexander
the Great, Epaminondas, Virgil, the great Condé, Prince Eugène,
etc. (The question of Virgil's inversion is discussed in the
_Revista di Filologia_, 1890, fas. 7-9, but I have not been able
to see this review.) Moll, in his _Berühmte Homosexuelle_ (1910,
in the series of _Grenzfragen des Nerven- und Seelenlebens_)
discusses the homosexuality of a number of eminent persons, for
the most part with his usual caution and sagacity; speaking of
the alleged homosexuality of Wagner he remarks, with entire
truth, that "the method of arguing the existence of homosexuality
from the presence of feminine traits must be decisively
rejected." Hirschfeld has more recently included in his great
work _Die Homosexualität_ (1913, pp. 650-674) two lists, ancient
and modern, of alleged inverts among the distinguished persons of
history, briefly stating the nature of the evidence in each case.
They amount to nearly 300. Not all of them, however, can be
properly described as distinguished. Thus we end in the list 43
English names; of these at least half a dozen were noblemen who
were concerned in homosexual prosecutions, but were of no
intellectual distinction. Others, again, are of undoubted
eminence, but there is no good reason to regard them as
homosexual; this is the case, for instance, as regards Swift, who
may have been mentally abnormal, but appears to have been
heterosexual rather than homosexual; Fletcher, of whom we know
nothing definite in this respect, is also included, as well as
Tennyson, whose youthful sentimental friendship for Arthur Hallam
is exactly comparable to that of Montaigne for Etienne de la
Boëtie, yet Montaigne is not included in the list. It may be
added, however, that while some of the English names in the list
are thus extremely doubtful, it would have been possible to add
some others who were without doubt inverts.
It has not, I think, been noted--largely because the evidence was
insufficiently clear--that among moral leaders, and persons with strong
ethical instincts, there is a tendency toward the more elevated forms of
homosexual feeling. This may be traced, not only in some of the great
moral teachers of old, but also in men and women of our own day. It is
fairly evident why this should be so. Just as the repressed love of a
woman or a man has, in normally constituted persons, frequently furnished
the motive power for an enlarged philanthropic activity, so the person
who sees his own sex also bathed in sexual glamour, brings to his work of
human service an ardor wholly unknown to the normally constituted
individual; morality to him has become one with love.[50] I am not
prepared here to insist on this point, but no one, I think, who studies
sympathetically the histories and experiences of great moral leaders can
fail in many cases to note the presence of this feeling, more or less
finely sublimated from any gross physical manifestation.
If it is probable that in moral movements persons of homosexual
temperament have sometimes become prominent, it is undoubtedly true,
beyond possibility of doubt, that they have been prominent in religion.
Many years ago (in 1885) the ethnologist, Elie Reclus, in his charming
book, _Les Primitifs_,[51] setting forth the phenomena of homosexuality
among the Eskimo Innuit tribe, clearly insisted that from time immemorial
there has been a connection between the invert and the priest, and showed
how well this connection is illustrated by the Eskimo _schupans_. Much
more recently, in his elaborate study of the priest, Horneffer discusses
the feminine traits of priests and shows that, among the most various
peoples, persons of sexually abnormal and especially homosexual
temperament have assumed the functions of priesthood. To the popular eye
the unnatural is the supernatural, and the abnormal has appeared to be
specially close to the secret Power of the World. Abnormal persons are
themselves of the same opinion and regard themselves as divine. As
Horneffer points out, they often really possess special aptitude.[52]
Karsch in his _Gleichgeschlechtliche Leben der Naturvölker_ (1911) has
brought out the high religious as well as social significance of castes of
cross-dressed and often homosexual persons among primitive peoples. At the
same time Edward Carpenter in his remarkable book, _Intermediate Types
among Primitive Folk_ (1914), has shown with much insight how it comes
about that there is an organic connection between the homosexual
temperament and unusual psychic or divinatory powers. Homosexual men were
non-warlike and homosexual women non-domestic, so that their energies
sought different outlets from those of ordinary men and women; they became
the initiators of new activities. Thus it is that from among them would in
some degree issue not only inventors and craftsmen and teachers, but
sorcerers and diviners, medicine-men and wizards, prophets and priests.
Such persons would be especially impelled to thought, because they would
realize that they were different from other people; treated with reverence
by some and with contempt by others, they would be compelled to face the
problems of their own nature and, indirectly, the problems of the world
generally. Moreover, Carpenter points out, persons in whom the masculine
and feminine temperaments were combined would in many cases be persons of
intuition and complex mind beyond their fellows, and so able to exercise
divination and prophecy in a very real and natural sense.[53]
This aptitude of the invert for primitive religion, for sorcery and
divination, would have its reaction on popular feeling, more especially
when magic and the primitive forms of religion began to fall into
disrepute. The invert would be regarded as the sorcerer of a false and
evil religion and be submerged in the same ignominy. This point has been
emphasized by Westermarck in the instructive chapter on homosexuality in
his great work on Moral Ideas.[54] He points out the significance of the
fact, at the first glance apparently inexplicable, that homosexuality in
the general opinion of medieval Christianity was constantly associated,
even confounded, with heresy, as we see significantly illustrated by the
fact that in France and England the popular designation for homosexuality
is derived from the Bulgarian heretics. It was, Westermarck believes,
chiefly as a heresy and out of religious zeal that homosexuality was so
violently reprobated and so ferociously punished.
In modern Europe we find the strongest evidence of the presence of what
may fairly be called true sexual inversion when we investigate the men of
the Renaissance. The intellectual independence of those days and the
influence of antiquity seem to have liberated and fully developed the
impulses of those abnormal individuals who would otherwise have found no
clear expression, and passed unnoticed.[55]
Muret, the Humanist, may perhaps be regarded as a typical example of the
nature and fate of the superior invert of the Renaissance. Born in 1526 at
Muret (Limousin), of poor but noble family, he was of independent,
somewhat capricious character, unable to endure professors, and
consequently he was mainly his own teacher, though he often sought advice
from Jules-César Scaliger. Muret was universally admired in his day for
his learning and his eloquence, and is still regarded not only as a great
Latinist and a fine writer, but as a notable man, of high intelligence,
and remarkable, moreover, for courtesy in polemics in an age when that
quality was not too common. His portrait shows a somewhat coarse and
rustic but intelligent face. He conquered honor and respect before he died
in 1585, at the age of 59. In early life Muret wrote wanton erotic poems
to women which seem based on personal experience. But in 1553 we find him
imprisoned in the Châtelet for sodomy and in danger of his life, so that
he thought of starving himself to death. Friends, however, obtained his
release and he settled in Toulouse. But the very next year he was burnt in
effigy in Toulouse, as a Huguenot and sodomist, this being the result of a
judicial sentence which had caused him to flee from the city and from
France. Four years later he had to flee from Padua owing to a similar
accusation. He had many friends but none of them protested against the
charge, though they aided him to escape from the penalty. It is very
doubtful whether he was a Huguenot, and whenever in his works he refers to
pederasty it is with strong disapproval. But his writings reveal
passionate friendship for men, and he seems to have expended little energy
in combating a charge which, if false, was a shameful injustice to him. It
was after fleeing into Italy and falling ill of a fever from fatigue and
exposure that Muret is said to have made the famous retort (to the
physician by his bedside who had said: "Faciamus experimentum in anima
vili"): "Vilem animam appellas pro qua Christus non dedignatus est
mori."[56]
A greater Humanist than Muret, Erasmus himself, seems as a young man, when
in the Augustinian monastery of Stein, to have had a homosexual attraction
to another Brother (afterward Prior) to whom he addressed many
passionately affectionate letters; his affection seems, however, to have
been unrequited.[57]
As the Renaissance developed, homosexuality seems to become more prominent
among distinguished persons. Poliziano was accused of pederasty. Aretino
was a pederast, as Pope Julius II seems also to have been. Ariosto wrote
in his satires, no doubt too extremely:--
"Senza quel vizio son pochi umanisti."[58]
Tasso had a homosexual strain in his nature, but he was of weak and
feminine constitution, sensitively emotional and physically frail.[59]
It is, however, among artists, at that time and later, that homosexuality
may most notably be traced. Leonardo da Vinci, whose ideals as revealed in
his work are so strangely bisexual, lay under homosexual suspicion in his
youth. In 1476, when he was 24 years of age, charges were made against him
before the Florentine officials for the control of public morality, and
were repeated, though they do not appear to have been substantiated. There
is, however, some ground for supposing that Leonardo was imprisoned in his
youth.[60] Throughout life he loved to surround himself with beautiful
youths and his pupils were more remarkable for their attractive appearance
than for their skill; to one at least of them he was strongly attached,
while there is no record of any attachment to a woman. Freud, who has
studied Leonardo with his usual subtlety, considers that his temperament
was marked by "ideal homosexuality."[61]
Michelangelo, one of the very chief artists of the Renaissance period, we
cannot now doubt, was sexually inverted. The evidence furnished by his own
letters and poems, as well as the researches of numerous recent
workers,--Parlagreco, Scheffler, J.A. Symonds, etc.,--may be said to have
placed this beyond question.[62] He belonged to a family of 5 brothers, 4
of whom never married, and so far as is known left no offspring; the fifth
only left 1 male heir. His biographer describes Michelangelo as "a man of
peculiar, not altogether healthy, nervous temperament." He was indifferent
to women; only in one case, indeed, during his long life is there evidence
even of friendship with a woman, while he was very sensitive to the beauty
of men, and his friendships were very tender and enthusiastic. At the
same time there is no reason to suppose that he formed any physically
passionate relationships with men, and even his enemies seldom or never
made this accusation against him. We may probably accept the estimate of
his character given by Symonds:--
Michelangelo Buonarotti was one of those exceptional, but not
uncommon men who are born with sensibilities abnormally deflected
from the ordinary channel. He showed no partiality for women, and
a notable enthusiasm for the beauty of young men.... He was a man
of physically frigid temperament, extremely sensitive to beauty
of the male type, who habitually philosophized his emotions, and
contemplated the living objects of his admiration as amiable, not
only for their personal qualities, but also for their esthetical
attractiveness.[63]
A temperament of this kind seems to have had no significance for the men
of those days; they were blind to all homosexual emotion which had no
result in sodomy. Plato found such attraction a subject for sentimental
metaphysics, but it was not until nearly our own time that it again became
a subject of interest and study. Yet it undoubtedly had profound influence
on Michelangelo's art, impelling him to find every kind of human beauty in
the male form, and only a grave dignity or tenderness, divorced from every
quality that is sexually desirable, in the female form. This deeply rooted
abnormality is at once the key to the melancholy of Michelangelo and to
the mystery of his art.
Michelangelo's contemporary, the painter Bazzi (1477-1549), seems also to
have been radically inverted, and to this fact he owed his nickname
Sodoma. As, however, he was married and had children, it may be that he
was, as we should now say, of bisexual temperament. He was a great artist
who has been dealt with unjustly, partly, perhaps, because of the
prejudice of Vasari,--whose admiration for Michelangelo amounted to
worship, but who is contemptuous toward Sodoma and grudging of
praise,--partly because his work is little known out of Italy and not
very easy of access there. Reckless, unbalanced, and eccentric in his
life, Sodoma revealed in his painting a peculiar feminine softness and
warmth--which indeed we seem to see also in his portrait of himself at
Monte Oliveto Maggiore--and a very marked and tender feeling for
masculine, but scarcely virile, beauty.[64]
Cellini was probably homosexual. He was imprisoned on a charge of
unnatural vice and is himself suspiciously silent in his autobiography
concerning this imprisonment.[65]
In the seventeenth century another notable sculptor who has been termed
the Flemish Cellini, Jérôme Duquesnoy (whose still more distinguished
brother François executed the Manneken Pis in Brussels), was an invert;
having finally been accused of sexual relations with a youth in a chapel
of the Ghent Cathedral, where he was executing a monument for the bishop,
he was strangled and burned, notwithstanding that much influence,
including that of the bishop, was brought to bear in his behalf.[66]
In more recent times Winkelmann, who was the initiator of a new Greek
Renaissance and of the modern appreciation of ancient art, lies under what
seems to be a well-grounded suspicion of sexual inversion. His letters to
male friends are full of the most passionate expressions of love. His
violent death also appears to have been due to a love-adventure with a
man. The murderer was a cook, a wholly uncultivated man, a criminal who
had already been condemned to death, and shortly before murdering
Winkelmann for the sake of plunder he was found to be on very intimate
terms with him.[67] It is noteworthy that sexual inversion should so often
be found associated with the study of antiquity. It must not, however, be
too hastily concluded that this is due to suggestion and that to abolish
the study of Greek literature and art would be largely to abolish sexual
inversion. What has really occurred in those recent cases that may be
studied, and therefore without doubt in the older cases, is that the
subject of congenital sexual inversion is attracted to the study of Greek
antiquity because he finds there the explanation and the apotheosis of his
own obscure impulses. Undoubtedly that study tends to develop these
impulses.
While it is peculiarly easy to name men of distinguished ability who,
either certainly or in all probability, have been affected by homosexual
tendencies, they are not isolated manifestations. They spring out of an
element of diffused homosexuality which is at least as marked in
civilization as it is in savagery. It is easy to find illustrations in
every country. Here it may suffice to refer to France, Germany, and
England.
In France in the thirteenth century the Church was so impressed by the
prevalence of homosexuality that it reasserted the death penalty for
sodomy at the Councils of Paris (1212) and Rouen (1214), while we are told
that even by rejecting a woman's advances (as illustrated in Marie de
France's _Lai de Lanval_) a man fell under suspicion as a sodomist, which
was also held to involve heresy.[68] At the end of this century (about
1294) Alain de Lille was impelled to write a book, _De Planctu Naturæ_, in
order to call attention to the prevalence of homosexual feeling; he also
associated the neglect of women with sodomy. "Man is made woman," he
writes; "he blackens the honor of his sex, the craft of magic Venus makes
him of double gender"; nobly beautiful youths have "turned their hammers
of love to the office of anvils," and "many kisses lie untouched on maiden
lips." The result is that "the natural anvils," that is to say the
neglected maidens, "bewail the absence of their hammers and are seen sadly
to demand them." Alain de Lille makes himself the voice of this
demand.[69]
A few years later, at the beginning of the fourteenth century, sodomy was
still regarded as very prevalent. At that time it was especially
associated with the Templars who, it has been supposed, brought it from
the East. Such a supposition, however, is not required to account for the
existence of homosexuality in France. Nor is it necessary, at a somewhat
later period, to invoke, as is frequently done, the Italian origin of
Catherine de Medici, in order to explain the prevalence of homosexual
practices at her court.
Notwithstanding its prevalence, sodomy was still severely punished from
time to time. Thus in 1586, Dadon, who had formerly been Rector of the
University of Paris, was hanged and then burned for injuring a child
through sodomy.[70] In the seventeenth century, homosexuality continued,
however, to flourish, and it is said that nearly all the numerous
omissions made in the published editions of Tallement des Reaux's
_Historiettes_ refer to sodomy.[71]
How prominent homosexuality was, in the early eighteenth century in
France, we learn from the frequent references to it in the letters of
Madame, the mother of the Regent, whose husband was himself effeminate and
probably inverted.[72] For the later years of the century the evidence
abounds on every hand. At this time the Bastille was performing a useful
function, until recently overlooked by historians, as an _asile de sureté_
for abnormal persons whom it was considered unsafe to leave at large.
Inverts whose conduct became too offensive to be tolerated were frequently
placed in the Bastille which, indeed "abounded in homosexual subjects," to
a greater extent than any other class of sexual perverts. Some of the
affairs which led to the Bastille have a modern air. One such case on a
large scale occurred in 1702, and reveals an organized system of
homosexual prostitution; one of the persons involved in this affair was a
handsome, well-made youth named Lebel, formerly a lackey, but passing
himself off as a man of quality. Seduced at the age of 10 by a famous
sodomist named Duplessis, he had since been at the disposition of a number
of homosexual persons, including officers, priests, and marquises. Some of
the persons involved in these affairs were burned alive; some cut their
own throats; others again were set at liberty or transferred to the
Bicêtre.[73] During the latter part of the eighteenth century, also, we
find another modern homosexual practice recognized in France; the
rendezvous or center where homosexual persons could quietly meet each
other.[74]
Inversion has always been easy to trace in Germany. Ammianus Marcellinus
bears witness to its prevalence among some German tribes in later Roman
days.[75] In mediæval times, as Schultz points out, references to sodomy
in Germany were far from uncommon. Various princes of the German Imperial
house, and of other princely families in the Middle Ages, were noted for
their intimate friendships. At a later date, attention has frequently been
called to the extreme emotional warmth which has often marked German
friendship, even when there has been no suspicion of any true homosexual
relationship.[76] The eighteenth century, in the full enjoyment of that
abandonment to sentiment initiated by Rousseau, proved peculiarly
favorable to the expansion of the tendency to sentimental friendship. On
this basis a really inverted tendency, when it existed, could easily come
to the surface and find expression. We find this well illustrated in the
poet Heinrich von Kleist who seems to have been of bisexual temperament,
and his feelings for the girl he wished to marry were, indeed, much cooler
than those for his friend. To this friend, Ernst von Pfuël (afterward
Prussian war minister), Kleist wrote in 1805 at the age of 28: "You bring
the days of the Greeks back to me; I could sleep with you, dear youth, my
whole soul so embraces you. When you used to bathe in the Lake of Thun I
would gaze with the real feelings of a girl at your beautiful body. It
would serve an artist to study from." There follows an enthusiastic
account of his friend's beauty and of the Greek "idea of the love of
youths," and Kleist concludes: "Go with me to Anspach, and let us enjoy
the sweets of friendship.... I shall never marry; you must be wife and
children to me."[77]
In all social classes and in all fields of activity, Germany during the
nineteenth century produced a long series of famous or notorious
homosexual persons. At the one end we find people of the highest
intellectual distinction, such as Alexander von Humboldt, whom Näcke, a
cautious investigator, stated that he had good ground for regarding as an
invert.[78] At the other end we find prosperous commercial and
manufacturing people who leave Germany to find solace in the free and
congenial homosexual atmosphere of Capri; of these F.A. Krupp, the head of
the famous Essen factory, may be regarded as the type.[79]
In England (and the same is true today of the United States), although
homosexuality has been less openly manifest and less thoroughly explored,
it is doubtful whether it has been less prevalent than in Germany. At an
early period, indeed, the evidence may even seem to show that it was more
prevalent. In the Penitentials of the ninth and tenth centuries "natural
fornication and sodomy" were frequently put together and the same penance
assigned to both; it was recognized that priests and bishops, as well as
laymen, might fall into this sin, though to the bishop nearly three times
as much penance was assigned as to the layman. Among the Normans,
everywhere, homosexuality was markedly prevalent; the spread of sodomy in
France about the eleventh century is attributed to the Normans, and their
coming seems to have rendered it at times almost fashionable, at all
events at court. In England William Rufus was undoubtedly inverted, as
later on were Edward II, James I, and, perhaps, though not in so
conspicuous a degree, William III.[80]
Ordericus Vitalis, who was himself half Norman and half English, says that
the Normans had become very effeminate in his time, and that after the
death of William the Conqueror sodomy was common both in England and
Normandy. Guillaume de Nangis, in his chronicle for about 1120, speaking
of the two sons of Henry and the company of young nobles who went down
with them, in the _White Ship_, states that nearly all were considered to
be sodomists, and Henry of Huntingdon, in his _History_, looked upon the
loss of the _White Ship_ as a judgment of heaven upon sodomy. Anselm, in
writing to Archdeacon William to inform him concerning the recent Council
at London (1102), gives advice as to how to deal with people who have
committed the sin of sodomy, and instructs him not to be too harsh with
those who have not realized its gravity, for hitherto "this sin has been
so public that hardly anyone has blushed for it, and many, therefore, have
plunged into it without realizing its gravity."[81] So temperate a remark
by a man of such unquestionably high character is more significant of the
prevalence of homosexuality than much denunciation.
In religious circles far from courts and cities, as we might expect,
homosexuality was regarded with great horror, though even here we may
discover evidence of its wide prevalence. Thus in the remarkable
_Revelation_ of the Monk of Evesham, written in English in 1196, we find
that in the very worst part of Purgatory are confined an innumerable
company of sodomists (including a wealthy, witty, and learned divine, a
doctor of laws, personally known to the Monk), and whether these people
would ever be delivered from Purgatory was a matter of doubt; of the
salvation of no other sinners does the Monk of Evesham seem so dubious.
Sodomy had always been an ecclesiastical offense. The Statute of 1533 (25
Henry VIII, c. 6) made it a felony; and Pollock and Maitland consider that
this "affords an almost sufficient proof that the temporal courts had not
punished it, and that no one had been put to death for it, for a very long
time past."[82] The temporal law has never, however, proved very
successful in repressing homosexuality. At this period the Renaissance
movement was reaching England, and here as elsewhere it brought with it,
if not an increase, at all events a rehabilitation and often an
idealization of homosexuality.[83]
An eminent humanist and notable pioneer in dramatic literature, Nicholas
Udall, to whom is attributed _Ralph Roister Doister_, the first English
comedy, stands out as unquestionably addicted to homosexual tastes,
although he has left no literary evidence of this tendency. He was an
early adherent of the Protestant movement, and when head-master of Eton he
was noted for his love of inflicting corporal punishment on the boys.
Tusser says he once received from Udall 53 stripes for "fault but small or
none at all." Here there was evidently a sexual sadistic impulse, for in
1541 (the year of _Ralph Roister Doister_) Udall was charged with
unnatural crime and confessed his guilt before the Privy Council. He was
dismissed from the head-mastership and imprisoned, but only for a short
time, "and his reputation," his modern biographer states, "was not
permanently injured." He retained the vicarage of Braintree, and was much
favored by Edward VI, who nominated him to a prebend of Windsor. Queen
Mary was also favorable and he became head-master of Westminster
School.[84]
An Elizabethan lyrical poet of high quality, whose work has had the honor
of being confused with Shakespeare's, Richard Barnfield, appears to have
possessed the temperament, at least, of the invert. His poems to male
friends are of so impassioned a character that they aroused the protests
of a very tolerant age. Very little is known of Barnfield's life. Born in
1574 he published his first poem, _The Affectionate Shepherd_, at the age
of 20, while still at the University. It was issued anonymously, revealed
much fresh poetic feeling and literary skill, and is addressed to a youth
of whom the poet declares:--
"If it be sin to love a lovely lad,
Oh then sin I."
In his subsequent volume, _Cynthia_ (1595), Barnfield disclaims any
intention in the earlier poem beyond that of imitating Virgil's second
eclogue. But the sonnets in this second volume are even more definitely
homosexual than the earlier poem, though he goes on to tell how at last he
found a lass whose beauty surpassed that
"of the swain
Whom I never could obtain."
After the age of 31 Barnfield wrote no more, but, being in easy
circumstances, retired to his beautiful manor house and country estate in
Shropshire, lived there for twenty years and died leaving a wife and
son.[85] It seems probable that he was of bisexual temperament, and that,
as not infrequently happens in such cases, the homosexual element
developed early under the influence of a classical education and
university associations, while the normal heterosexual element developed
later and, as may happen in bisexual persons, was associated with the more
commonplace and prosaic side of life. Barnfield was only a genuine poet on
the homosexual side of his nature.
Greater men of that age than Barnfield may be suspected of homosexual
tendencies. Marlowe, whose most powerful drama, _Edward II_, is devoted to
a picture of the relations between that king and his minions, is himself
suspected of homosexuality. An ignorant informer brought certain charges
of freethought and criminality against him, and further accused him of
asserting that they are fools who love not boys. These charges have
doubtless been colored by the vulgar channel through which they passed,
but it seems absolutely impossible to regard them as the inventions of a
mere gallows-bird such as this informer was.[86] Moreover, Marlowe's
poetic work, while it shows him by no means insensitive to the beauty of
women, also reveals a special and peculiar sensitiveness to masculine
beauty. Marlowe clearly had a reckless delight in all things unlawful, and
it seems probable that he possessed the bisexual temperament. Shakespeare
has also been discussed from this point of view. All that can be said,
however, is that he addressed a long series of sonnets to a youthful male
friend. These sonnets are written in lover's language of a very tender and
noble order. They do not appear to imply any relationship that the writer
regarded as shameful or that would be so regarded by the world. Moreover,
they seem to represent but a single episode in the life of a very
sensitive, many-sided nature.[87] There is no other evidence in
Shakespeare's work of homosexual instinct such as we may trace throughout
Marlowe's, while there is abundant evidence of a constant preoccupation
with women.
While Shakespeare thus narrowly escapes inclusion in the list of
distinguished inverts, there is much better ground for the inclusion of
his great contemporary, Francis Bacon. Aubrey in his laboriously compiled
_Short Lives_, in which he shows a friendly and admiring attitude toward
Bacon, definitely states that he was a pederast. Aubrey was only a careful
gleaner of frequently authentic gossip, but a similar statement is made by
Sir Simonds D'Ewes in his _Autobiography_. D'Ewes, whose family belonged
to the same part of Suffolk as Bacon's sprang from, was not friendly to
Bacon, but that fact will not suffice to account for his statement. He was
an upright and honorable man of scholarly habits, and, moreover, a trained
lawyer, who had many opportunities of obtaining first-hand information,
for he had lived in the Chancery office from childhood. He is very precise
as to Bacon's homosexual practices with his own servants, both before and
after his fall, and even gives the name of a "very effeminate-faced youth"
who was his "catamite and bedfellow"; he states, further, that there had
been some question of bringing Bacon to trial for sodomy. These
allegations may be supported by a letter of Bacon's own mother (printed in
Spedding's _Life of Bacon_), reproving him on account of what she had
heard concerning his behavior with the young Welshmen in his service whom
he made his bedfellows. It is notable that Bacon seems to have been
specially attracted to Welshmen (one might even find evidence of this in
the life of the Welshman, Henry VII), a people of vivacious temperament
unlike his own; this is illustrated by his long and intimate friendship
with the mercurial Sir Toby Mathew, his "alter ego," a man of dissipated
habits in early life, though we are not told that he was homosexual. Bacon
had many friendships with men, but there is no evidence that he was ever
in love or cherished any affectionate intimacy with a woman. Women play no
part at all in his life. His marriage, which was childless, took place at
the mature age of 46; it was effected in a business-like manner, and
though he always treated his wife with formal consideration it is probable
that he neglected her, and certain that he failed to secure her devotion;
it is clear that toward the end of Bacon's life she formed a relationship
with her gentleman usher, whom subsequently she married. Bacon's writings,
it may be added, equally with his letters, show no evidence of love or
attraction to women; in his _Essays_ he is brief and judicial on the
subject of Marriage, copious and eloquent on the subject of Friendship,
while the essay on Beauty deals exclusively with masculine beauty.
During the first half of the eighteenth century we have clear evidence
that homosexuality flourished in London with the features which it
presents today in all large cities everywhere. There was a generally known
name, "Mollies," applied to homosexual persons, evidently having reference
to their frequently feminine characteristics; there were houses of private
resort for them ("Molly houses"), there were special public places of
rendezvous whither they went in search of adventure, exactly as there are
today. A walk in Upper Moorfields was especially frequented by the
homosexual about 1725. A detective employed by the police about that date
gave evidence as follows at the Old Bailey; "I takes a turn that way and
leans over the wall. In a little time the prisoner passes by, and looks
hard at me, and at a small distance from me stands up against the wall as
if he was going to make water. Then by degrees he siddles nearer and
nearer to where I stood, till at last he was close to me. 'Tis a very fine
night,' says he. 'Aye,' say I, 'and so it is.' Then he takes me by the
hand, and after squeezing and playing with it a little, he conveys it to
his breeches," whereupon the detective seizes the man by his sexual organs
and holds him until the constable comes up and effects an arrest.
At the same period Margaret Clap, commonly called Mother Clap, kept a
house in Field Lane, Holborn, which was a noted resort of the homosexual.
To Mother Clap's Molly-house 30 or 40 clients would resort every night; on
Sunday there might be as many as 50, for, as in Berlin and other cities
today, that was the great homosexual gala night; there were beds in every
room in this house. We are told that the "men would sit in one another's
laps, kissing in a lewd manner and using their hands indecently. Then they
would get up, dance and make curtsies, and mimic the voices of women, 'Oh,
fie, sir,'--'Pray, sir,'--'Dear sir,'--'Lord, how can you serve me
so?'--'I swear I'll cry out,'--'You're a wicked devil,'--'And you're a
bold face,'--'Eh, ye dear little toad,'--'Come, bus.' They'd hug and play
and toy and go out by couples into another room, on the same floor, to be
'married,' as they called it."
On the whole one gains the impression that homosexual practices were more
prevalent in London in the eighteenth century, bearing in mind its
population at that time, than they are today.[88] It must not, however, be
supposed that the law was indulgent and its administration lax. The very
reverse was the case. The punishment for sodomy, when completely effected,
was death, and it was frequently inflicted. Homosexual intercourse,
without evidence of penetration, was regarded as "attempt" and was usually
punished by the pillory and a heavy fine, followed by two years'
imprisonment. Moreover, it would appear that more activity was shown by
the police in prosecution than is nowadays the case; this is, for
instance, suggested by the evidence of the detective already quoted.
To keep a homosexual resort was also a severely punishable offense. Mother
Clap was charged at the Old Bailey in 1726 with "keeping a sodomitical
house"; she protested that she could not herself have taken part in these
practices, but that availed her nothing; she could bring forward no
witnesses on her behalf and was condemned to pay a fine, to stand in the
pillory, and to undergo imprisonment for two years. The cases were dealt
with in a matter-of-fact way which seems to bear further witness to the
frequency of the offense, and with no effort to expend any specially
vindictive harshness on this class of offenders. If there was the
slightest doubt as to the facts, even though the balance of evidence was
against the accused, he was usually acquitted, and the man who could bring
witnesses to his general good character might often thereby escape. In
1721 a religious young man, married, was convicted of attempting sodomy
with two young men he slept with; he was fined, placed in the pillory and
imprisoned for two months. Next year a man was acquitted on a similar
charge, and another man, of decent aspect, although the evidence indicated
that he might have been guilty of sodomy, was only convicted of attempt,
and sentenced to fine, pillory, and two years' imprisonment. In 1723,
again, a schoolmaster was acquitted, on account of his good reputation, of
the charge of attempt on a boy of 15, his pupil, though the evidence
seemed decidedly against him. In 1730 a man was sentenced to death for
sodomy effected on his young apprentice; this was a bad case and the
surgeon's evidence indicated laceration of the perineum. Homosexuality of
all kinds flourished, it will be seen, notwithstanding the fearless yet
fair application of a very severe law.[89]
In more recent times Byron has frequently been referred to as experiencing
homosexual affections, and I have been informed that some of his poems
nominally addressed to women were really inspired by men. It is certain
that he experienced very strong emotions toward his male friends. "My
school-friendships," he wrote, "were with me passions." When he afterward
met one of these friends, Lord Clare, in Italy, he was painfully agitated;
and could never hear the name without a beating of the heart. At the age
of 22 he formed one of his strong attachments for a youth to whom he left
£7000 in his will.[90] It is probable, however, that here, as well as in
the case of Shakespeare, and in that of Tennyson's love for his youthful
friend, Arthur Hallam, as well as of Montaigne for Etienne de la Boëtie,
although such strong friendships may involve an element of sexual emotion,
we have no true and definite homosexual impulse; homosexuality is merely
simulated by the ardent and hyperesthetic emotions of the poet.[91] The
same quality of the poet's emotional temperament may doubtless, also, be
invoked in the case of Goethe, who is said to have written elegies which,
on account of their homosexual character, still remain unpublished.
The most famous homosexual trial of recent times in England was that of
Oscar Wilde, a writer whose literary reputation may be said to be still
growing, not only in England but throughout the world. Wilde was the son
of parents who were both of unusual ability and somewhat eccentric. Both
these tendencies became in him more concentrated. He was born with, as it
were, a congenital antipathy to the commonplace, a natural love of
paradox, and he possessed the skill to embody the characteristic in
finished literary form. At the same time, it must not be forgotten,
beneath this natural attitude of paradox, his essential judgments on life
and literature were usually sound and reasonable. His essay on "The Soul
of Man Under Socialism" witnessed to his large and enlightened conception
of life, and his profound admiration for Flaubert to the sanity and
solidity of his literary taste. In early life he revealed no homosexual
tendencies; he married and had children. After he had begun to outgrow his
youthful esthetic extravagances, however, and to acquire success and fame,
he developed what was at first a simply inquisitive interest in inversion.
Such inquisitive interest is sometimes the sign of an emerging homosexual
impulse. It proved to be so in Wilde's case and ultimately he was found to
be cultivating the acquaintance of youths of low class and doubtful
character. Although this development occurred comparatively late in life,
we must hesitate to describe Wilde's homosexuality as acquired. If we
consider his constitution and his history, it is not difficult to suppose
that homosexual germs were present in a latent form from the first, and it
may quite well be that Wilde's inversion was of that kind which is now
described as retarded, though still congenital.
As is usual in England, no active efforts were made to implicate Wilde in
any criminal charge. It was his own action, as even he himself seems to
have vaguely realized beforehand, which brought the storm about his head.
He was arrested, tried, condemned, and at once there arose a general howl
of execration, joined in even by the judge, whose attitude compared
unfavorably with the more impartial attitude of the eighteenth century
judges in similar cases. Wilde came out of prison ambitious to retrieve
his reputation by the quality of his literary work. But he left Reading
gaol merely to enter a larger and colder prison. He soon realized that his
spirit was broken even more than his health. He drifted at last to Paris,
where he shortly after died, shunned by all but a few of his friends.[92]
In a writer of the first order, Edward Fitzgerald, to whom we owe the
immortal and highly individualized version of _Omar Khayyam_, it is easy
to trace an element of homosexuality, though it appears never to have
reached full and conscious development. Fitzgerald was an eccentric person
who, though rich and on friendly terms with some of the most distinguished
men of his time, was always out of harmony with his environment. He felt
himself called on to marry, very unhappily, a woman whom he had never been
in love with and with whom he had nothing in common. All his affections
were for his male friends. In early life he was devoted to his friend W.K.
Browne, whom he glorified in _Euphranor_. "To him Browne was at once
Jonathan, Gamaliel, Apollo,--the friend, the master, the God,--there was
scarcely a limit to his devotion and admiration."[93] On Browne's
premature death Fitzgerald's heart was empty. In 1859 at Lowestoft,
Fitzgerald, as he wrote to Mrs. Browne, "used to wander about the shore at
night longing for some fellow to accost me who might give some promise of
filling up a very vacant place in my heart." It was then that he met
"Posh" (Joseph Fletcher), a fisherman, 6 feet tall, said to be of the best
Suffolk type, both in body and character. Posh reminded Fitzgerald of his
dead friend Browne; he made him captain of his lugger, and was thereafter
devoted to him. Posh was, said Fitzgerald, "a man of the finest Saxon
type, with a complexion _vif, mâle et flamboyant_, blue eyes, a nose less
than Roman, more than Greek, and strictly auburn hair that any woman might
envy. Further he was a man of simplicity; of soul, justice of thought,
tenderness of nature, a gentleman of Nature's grandest type," in fact the
"greatest man" Fitzgerald had ever met. Posh was not, however, quite so
absolutely perfect as this description suggests, and various
misunderstandings arose in consequence between the two friends so unequal
in culture and social traditions. These difficulties are reflected in some
of the yet extant letters from the enormous mass which Fitzgerald
addressed to "my dear Poshy."[94]
A great personality of recent times, widely regarded with reverence as the
prophet-poet of Democracy[95]--Walt Whitman--has aroused discussion by his
sympathetic attitude toward passionate friendship, or "manly love" as he
calls it, in _Leaves of Grass_. In this book--in "Calamus," "Drumtaps,"
and elsewhere--Whitman celebrates a friendship in which physical contact
and a kind of silent voluptuous emotion are essential elements. In order
to settle the question as to the precise significance of "Calamus," J.A.
Symonds wrote to Whitman, frankly posing the question. The answer (written
from Camden, N.J., on August 19, 1890) is the only statement of Whitman's
attitude toward homosexuality, and it is therefore desirable that it
should be set on record:--
"About the questions on 'Calamus,' etc., they quite daze me.
_Leaves of Grass_ is only to be rightly construed by and within
its own atmosphere and essential character--all its pages and
pieces so coming strictly under. That the 'Calamus' part has ever
allowed the possibility of such construction as mentioned is
terrible. I am fain to hope that the pages themselves are not to
be even mentioned for such gratuitous and quite at the time
undreamed and unwished possibility of morbid inferences--which
are disavowed by me and seem damnable."
It would seem from this letter[96] that Whitman had never realized that
there is any relationship whatever between the passionate emotion of
physical contact from man to man, as he had experienced it and sung it,
and the act which with other people he would regard as a crime against
nature. This may be singular, for there are many inverted persons who have
found satisfaction in friendships less physical and passionate than those
described in _Leaves of Grass_, but Whitman was a man of concrete,
emotional, instinctive temperament, lacking in analytical power, receptive
to all influences, and careless of harmonizing them. He would most
certainly have refused to admit that he was the subject of inverted
sexuality. It remains true, however, that "manly love" occupies in his
work a predominance which it would scarcely hold in the feelings of the
"average man," whom Whitman wishes to honor. A normally constituted
person, having assumed the very frank attitude taken up by Whitman, would
be impelled to devote far more space and far more ardor to the subject of
sexual relationships with women and all that is involved in maternity than
is accorded to them in _Leaves of Grass_. Some of Whitman's extant letters
to young men, though they do not throw definite light on this question,
are of a very affectionate character,[97] and, although a man of
remarkable physical vigor, he never felt inclined to marry.[98] It remains
somewhat difficult to classify him from the sexual point of view, but we
can scarcely fail to recognize the presence of a homosexual tendency.
I should add that some friends and admirers of Whitman are not
prepared to accept the evidence of the letter to Symonds. I am
indebted to "Q." for the following statement of the objections:--
"I think myself that it is a mistake to give much weight to this
letter--perhaps a mistake to introduce it at all, since if
introduced it will, of course, carry weight. And this for three
or four reasons:--
"1. That it is difficult to reconcile the letter itself (with its
strong tone of disapprobation) with the general 'atmosphere' of
_Leaves of Grass_, the tenor of which is to leave everything open
and free.
"2. That the letter is in hopeless conflict with the 'Calamus'
section of poems. For, whatever moral lines Whitman may have
drawn at the time of writing these poems, it seems to me quite
incredible that the possibility of certain inferences, morbid or
other, was undreamed of.
"3. That the letter was written only a few months before his last
illness and death, and is the only expression of the kind that he
appears to have given utterance to.
"4. That Symonds's letter, to which this was a reply, is not
forth coming; and we consequently do not know what rash
expressions it may have contained--leading Whitman (with his
extreme caution) to hedge his name from possible use to justify
dubious practices."
I may add that I endeavored to obtain Symonds's letter, but he
was unable to produce it, nor has any copy of it been found among
his papers.
It should be said that Whitman's attitude toward Symonds was
marked by high regard and admiration. "A wonderful man is
Addington Symonds," he remarked shortly before his own death;
"some ways the most indicative and penetrating and significant
man of our time. Symonds is a curious fellow; I love him dearly.
He is of college breed and education, horribly literary and
suspicious, and enjoys things. A great fellow for delving into
persons and into the concrete, and even into the physiological
and the gastric, and wonderfully cute." But on this occasion he
delved in vain.
The foregoing remarks (substantially contained in the previous
editions of this book) were based mainly on the information
received from J.A. Symonds's side. But of more recent years
interesting light has been thrown on this remarkable letter from
Walt Whitman's side. The Boswellian patience, enthusiasm, and
skill which Horace Traubel has brought to his full and elaborate
work, now in course of publication, _With Walt Whitman in
Camden_, clearly reveal, in the course of various conversations,
Whitman's attitude to Symonds's question and the state of mind
which led up to this letter.
Whitman talked to Traubel much about Symonds from the
twenty-seventh of April, 1888 (very soon after the date when
Traubel's work begins), onward. Symonds had written to him
repeatedly, it seems, concerning the "passional relations of men
with men," as Whitman expressed it. "He is always driving at me
about that: is that what Calamus means?--because of me or in
spite of me, is that what it means? I have said no, but no does
not satisfy him. [There is, however, no record from Symonds's
side of any letter by Whitman to Symonds in this sense up to this
date.] But read this letter--read the whole of it: it is very
shrewd, very cute, in deadliest earnest: it drives me hard,
almost compels me--it is urgent, persistent: he sort of stands in
the road and says 'I won't move till you answer my question.' You
see, this is an old letter--sixteen years old--and he is still
asking the question: he refers to it in one of his latest notes.
He is surely a wonderful man--a rare, cleaned-up man--a
white-souled, heroic character.... You will be writing something
about Calamus some day," said W. [to Traubel], "and this letter,
and what I say, may help to clear your ideas. Calamus needs clear
ideas; it may be easily, innocently distorted from its natural,
its motive, body of doctrine."
The letter, dated Feb. 7, 1872, of some length, is then
reproduced. It tells how much _Leaves of Grass_, and especially
the Calamus section, had helped the writer. "What the love of man
for man has been in the past," Symonds wrote, "I think I know.
What it is here now, I know also--alas! What you say it can and
should be I dimly discern in your Poems. But this hardly
satisfies me--so desirous am I of learning what you teach. Some
day, perhaps,--in some form, I know not what, but in your own
chosen form,--you will tell me more about the Love of Friends.
Till then I wait."
"Said W: 'Well, what do you think of that? Do you think that
could be answered?' 'I don't see why you call that letter driving
you hard. It's quiet enough--it only asks questions, and asks the
questions mildly enough,' 'I suppose you are right--"drive" is
not exactly the word: yet you know how I hate to be catechised.
Symonds is right, no doubt, to ask the questions: I am just as
much right if I do not answer them: just as much right if I do
answer them. I often say to myself about Calamus--perhaps it
means more or less than what I thought myself--means different:
perhaps I don't know what it all means--perhaps never did know.
My first instinct about all that Symonds writes is violently
reactionary--is strong and brutal for no, no, no. Then the
thought intervenes that I maybe do not know all my own meanings:
I say to myself: "You, too, go away, come back, study your own
book--as alien or stranger, study your own book, see what it
amounts to." Some time or other I will have to write to him
definitely about Calamus--give him my word for it what I meant or
mean it to mean.'"
Again, a month later (May 24, 1888), Whitman speaks to Traubel of
a "beautiful letter" from Symonds. "You will see that he harps on
the Calamus poems again. I don't see why it should, but his
recurrence to that subject irritates me a little. I suppose you
might say--why don't you shut him up by answering him? There is
no logical answer to that I suppose: but I may ask in my turn:
'What right has he to ask questions anyway?'" W. laughed a bit.
"Anyway the question comes back to me almost every time he
writes. He is courteous enough about it--that is the reason I do
not resent him. I suppose the whole thing will end in an answer
some day."
The letter follows. The chief point in it is that the writer
hopes he has not been importunate in the question he had asked
about Calamus three years before.
"I [Traubel] said to W.: 'That's a humble letter enough: I don't
see anything in that to get excited about. He doesn't ask you to
answer the old question. In fact he rather apologizes for having
asked it.' W. fired up 'Who is excited? As to that question, he
does ask it again and again: asks it, asks it, asks it.' I
laughed at his vehemence. 'Well, suppose he does? It does not
harm. Besides, you've got nothing to hide. I think your silence
might lead him to suppose there was a nigger in your wood pile.'
'Oh, nonsense! But for thirty years my enemies and friends have
been asking me questions about the _Leaves_: I'm tired of not
answering questions.' It was very funny to see his face when he
gave a humorous twist to the fling in his last phrase. Then he
relaxed and added: 'Anyway I love Symonds. Who could fail to love
a man who could write such a letter? I suppose he will yet have
to be answered, damn 'im!'"
It is clear that these conversations considerably diminish the force of
the declaration in Whitman's letter. We see that the letter which, on the
face of it, might have represented the swift and indignant reaction of a
man who, suddenly faced by the possibility that his work may be
interpreted in a perverse sense, emphatically repudiates that
interpretation, was really nothing of the kind. Symonds for at least
eighteen years had been gently, considerately, even humbly, yet
persistently, asking the same perfectly legitimate question. If the answer
was really an emphatic no, it would more naturally have been made in 1872
than 1890. Moreover, in the face of this ever-recurring question, Whitman
constantly speaks to his friends of his great affection for Symonds and
his admiration for his intellectual cuteness, feelings that would both be
singularly out of place if applied to a man who was all the time
suggesting the possibility that his writings contained inferences that
were "terrible," "morbid," and "damnable." Evidently, during all those
years, Whitman could not decide what to reply. On the one hand he was
moved by his horror of being questioned, by his caution, by his natural
aversion to express approval of anything that could be called unnatural or
abnormal. On the other hand, he was moved by the desire to let his work
speak for itself, by his declared determination to leave everything open,
and possibly by a more or less conscious sympathy with the inferences
presented to him. It was not until the last years of his life, when his
sexual life belonged to the past, when weakness was gaining on him, when
he wished to put aside every drain on his energies, that--being
constitutionally incapable of a balanced scientific statement--he chose
the simplest and easiest solution of the difficulty.[99]
Concerning another great modern writer--Paul Verlaine, the first of modern
French poets--it seems possible to speak with less hesitation. A man who
possessed in fullest measure the irresponsible impressionability of
genius, Verlaine--as his work shows and as he himself admitted--all his
life oscillated between normal and homosexual love, at one period
attracted to women, at another to men. He was without doubt, it seems to
me, bisexual. An early connection with another young poet, Arthur Rimbaud,
terminated in a violent quarrel with his friend, and led to Verlaine's
imprisonment at Mons. In after-years he gave expression to the exalted
passion of this relationship--_mon grand péché radieux_--in _Læti et
Errabundi_, published in the volume entitled _Parallèlement_; and in later
poems he has told of less passionate and less sensual relationships which
yet were more than friendship, for instance, in the poem, "_Mon ami, ma
plus belle amitié, ma Meilleure_" in _Bonheur_.[100]
In this brief glance at some of the ethnographical, historical, religious,
and literary aspects of homosexual passion there is one other phenomenon
which may be mentioned. This is the alleged fact that, while the phenomena
exist to some extent everywhere, we seem to find a special proclivity to
homosexuality (whether or not involving a greater frequency of congenital
inversion is not usually clear) among certain races and in certain
regions.[101] In Europe this would be best illustrated by the case of
southern Italy, which in this respect is held to be distinct from northern
Italy, although Italians generally are franker than men of northern race
in admitting their sexual practices.[102] How far the supposed greater
homosexuality of southern Italy may be due to Greek influence and Greek
blood it is not very easy to say.
It must be remembered that, in dealing with a northern country like
England, homosexual phenomena do not present themselves in the same way as
they do in southern Italy today, or in ancient Greece. In Greece the
homosexual impulse was recognized and idealized; a man could be an open
homosexual lover, and yet, like Epaminondas, be a great and honored
citizen of his country. There was no reason whatever why a man, who in
mental and physical constitution was perfectly normal, should not adopt a
custom that was regarded as respectable, and sometimes as even specially
honorable. But it is quite otherwise today in a country like England or
the United States.[103] In these countries all our traditions and all our
moral ideals, as well as the law, are energetically opposed to every
manifestation of homosexual passion. It requires a very strong impetus to
go against this compact social force which, on every side, constrains the
individual into the paths of heterosexual love. That impetus, in a
well-bred individual who leads the normal life of his fellow-men and who
feels the ordinary degree of respect for the social feeling surrounding
him, can only be supplied by a fundamental--usually, it is probable,
inborn--perversion of the sexual instinct, rendering the individual
organically abnormal. It is with this fundamental abnormality, usually
called sexual inversion, that we shall here be concerned. There is no
evidence to show that homosexuality in Greece was a congenital perversion,
although it appears that Coelius Aurelianus affirms that in the opinion of
Parmenides it was hereditary. Aristotle also, in his fragment on physical
love, though treating the whole matter with indulgence, seems to have
distinguished abnormal congenital homosexuality from acquired homosexual
vice. Doubtless in a certain proportion of cases the impulse was organic,
and it may well be that there was an organic and racial predisposition to
homosexuality among the Greeks, or, at all events, the Dorians. But the
state of social feeling, however it originated, induced a large proportion
of the ordinary population to adopt homosexuality as a fashion, or, it may
be said, the environment was peculiarly favorable to the development of
latent homosexual tendencies. So that any given number of homosexual
persons among the Greeks would have presented a far smaller proportion of
constitutionally abnormal individuals than a like number in England.
In a similar manner--though I do not regard the analogy as
complete--infanticide or the exposition of children was practised in some
of the early Greek States by parents who were completely healthy and
normal; in England a married woman who destroys her child is in nearly
every case demonstrably diseased or abnormal. For this reason I am unable
to see that homosexuality in ancient Greece--while of great interest as a
social and psychological problem--throws light on sexual inversion as we
know it in England or the United States.
Concerning the wide prevalence of sexual inversion and of homosexual
phenomena generally, there can be no manner of doubt. This question has
been most fully investigated in Germany. In Berlin, Moll states that he
has himself seen between 600 and 700 homosexual persons and heard of some
250 to 350 others. Hirschfeld states that he has known over 10,000
homosexual persons.
There are, I am informed, several large cafés in Berlin which are almost
exclusively patronized by inverts who come here to flirt and make
acquaintances; as these cafés are frequented by male street prostitutes
(Pupenjunge) the invert risks being blackmailed or robbed if he goes home
or to a hotel with a café acquaintance. There are also a considerable
number of homosexual _Kneipen_, small and unpretentious bar-rooms, which
are really male brothels, the inmates being sexually normal working men
and boys, out of employment or in quest of a few marks as pocket money;
these places are regarded by inverts as very safe, as the proprietors
insist on good order and allow no extortion, while the police, though of
course aware of their existence, never interfere. Homosexual cafés for
women are also found in Berlin.
There is some reason for believing that homosexuality is especially
prominent in Germany and among Germans. I have elsewhere referred to the
highly emotional and sentimental traits which have frequently marked
German friendships. Germany is the only country in which there is a
definite and well-supported movement for the defense and social
rehabilitation of inverts. The study of sexual inversion began in Germany,
and the scientific and literary publications dealing with homosexuality
issued from the German press probably surpass in quantity and importance
those issued from all other countries put together. The homosexual
tendencies of Germans outside Germany have been noted in various
countries. Among my English cases I have found that a strain of German
blood occurs much more frequently than we are entitled to expect; Parisian
prostitutes are said to be aware of the homosexual tastes of Germans; it
is significant that (as a German invert familiar with Turkey informed
Näcke), at Constantinople, the procurers, who naturally supply girls as
well as youths, regard Germans and Austrians as more tending to
homosexuality than the foreigners from any other land. Germans usually
deny, however, that there is any special German proclivity to inversion,
and it would not appear that such statistics as are available (though all
such statistics cannot be regarded as more than approximations) show any
pronounced predominance of inversion among Germans. It is to Hirschfeld
that we owe the chief attempt to gain some notion of the percentage of
homosexual persons among the general population.[104] It may be said to
vary in different regions and more especially in different occupations,
from 1 to 10 per cent. But the average when the individuals belonging to a
large number of groups are combined is generally found to be rather over 2
per cent. So that there are about a million and a half inverted persons in
Germany.[105] This would be a minimum which can scarcely fail to be below
the actual proportion, as no one can be certain that he is acquainted with
the real proclivities of all the persons comprising a larger group of
acquaintances.[106] It is not found in the estimates which have reached
Hirschfeld that the French groups show a smaller proportion of homosexual
persons than the German groups, and a Japanese group comes out near to
the general average for the whole. Various authorities, especially
Germans, believe that homosexuality is just as common in France as in
Germany.[107] Saint-Paul ("Dr. Laupts"), on the other hand, is unable to
accept this view. As an army surgeon who has long served in Africa he can
(as also Rebierre in his _Joyeux et demifous_) bear witness to the
frequency of homosexuality among the African battalions of the French
army, especially in the cavalry, less so in the infantry; in the French
army generally he finds it rare, as also in the general population.[108]
Näcke is also inclined to believe that homosexuality is rarer in Celtic
lands, and in the Latin countries generally, than in Teutonic and Slavonic
lands, and believes that it may be a question of race.[109] The question
is still undecided. It is possible that the undoubted fact that
homosexuality is less conspicuous in France and the other Latin countries
than in Teutonic lands, may be due not to the occurrence of a smaller
proportion of congenital inverts in the former lands, but mainly to
general difference in temperament and in the social reaction.[110] The
French idealize and emphasize the place of women to a much greater degree
than the Germans, while at the same time inverts in France have much less
occasion than in Germany to proclaim their legal grievances. Apart from
such considerations as these it seems very doubtful whether inborn
inversion is in any considerable degree rarer in France than in Germany.
As to the frequency of homosexuality in England[111] and the United
States there is much evidence. In England its manifestations are well
marked for those whose eyes have once been opened. The manifestations are
of the same character as those in Germany, modified by social and national
differences, and especially by the greater reserve, Puritanism, and
prudery of England.[112] In the United States these same influences exert
a still greater effect in restraining the outward manifestations of
homosexuality. Hirschfeld, though so acute and experienced in the
investigation of homosexuality, states that when visiting Philadelphia and
Boston he could scarcely detect any evidence of homosexuality, though he
was afterward assured by those acquainted with local conditions that its
extension in both cities is "colossal." There have been numerous criminal
cases and scandals in the United States in which homosexuality has come to
the surface, and the very frequently occurring cases of transvestism or
cross-dressing in the States seem to be in a large proportion associated
with homosexuality.
In the opinion of some, English homosexuality has become much more
conspicuous during recent years, and this is sometimes attributed to the
Oscar Wilde case. No doubt, the celebrity of Oscar Wilde and the universal
publicity given to the facts of the case by the newspapers may have
brought conviction of their perversion to many inverts who were before
only vaguely conscious of their abnormality, and, paradoxical though it
may seem, have imparted greater courage to others; but it can scarcely
have sufficed to increase the number of inverts. Rather, one may say, the
development of urban life renders easier the exhibition and satisfaction
of this as of all other forms of perversion. Regarding the proportion of
inverts among the general population, it is very difficult to speak
positively. The invert himself is a misleading guide because he has formed
round himself a special coterie of homosexual persons, and, moreover, he
is sometimes apt to overestimate the number of inverts through the
misinterpretation of small indications that are not always conclusive.
The estimate of the ordinary normal person, feeling the ordinary disgust
toward abnormal phenomena, is also misleading, because his homosexual
acquaintances are careful not to inform him concerning their proclivities.
A writer who has studied the phenomena of homosexuality is apt to be
misguided in the same way as the invert himself, and to overestimate the
prevalence of the perversion. Striving to put aside this source of
fallacy, and only considering those individuals with whom I have been
brought in contact by the ordinary circumstances of life, and with whose
modes of feeling I am acquainted, I am still led to the conclusion that
the proportion is considerable. Among the professional and most cultured
element of the middle class in England, there must be a distinct
percentage of inverts which may sometimes be as much as 5 per cent.,
though such estimates must always be hazardous. Among women of the same
class the percentage seems to be at least double, though here the
phenomena are less definite and deep-seated. This seems to be a moderate
estimate for this class, which includes, however, it must be remembered, a
considerable proportion of individuals who are somewhat abnormal in other
respects. As we descend the scale the phenomena are doubtless less common,
though when we reach the working class we come to that comparative
indifference to which allusion has already been made. Taken altogether we
may probably conclude that the proportion of inverts is the same as in
other related and neighboring lands, that is to say, slightly over 2 per
cent. That would give the homosexual population of Great Britain as
somewhere about a million.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Taking all its forms _en bloc_, as they are known to the police,
homosexuality is seen to possess formidable proportions. Thus in France,
from official papers which passed through M. Carlier's bureau during ten
years (1860-70), he compiled a list of 6342 pederasts who came within the
cognizance of the police; 2049 Parisians, 3709 provincials, and 584
foreigners. Of these, 3432, or more than the half, could not be convicted
of illegal acts.
[2] The chief general collection of data (not here drawn upon) concerning
homosexuality among animals is by the zoölogist Prof. Karsch, "Päderastie
und Tribadie bei den Tieren," _Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, vol.
ii. Brehm's _Tierleben_ also contains many examples. See also a short
chapter (ch. xxix) in Hirschfeld's _Homosexualität_.
[3] H. Sainte-Claire Deville, "De l'Internat et son influence sur
l'education de la jeunesse," a paper read to the Académie des Sciences
Morales et Politiques, July 27, 1871, and quoted by Chevalier,
_L'Inversion Sexuelle_, pp. 204-5.
[4] M. Bombarda, _Comptes rendus Congrès Internationale de l'Anthropologie
Criminelle_, Amsterdam, p. 212.
[5] Lacassagne, "De la Criminalité chez les Animaux," _Revue
Scientifique_, 1882.
[6] Steinach, "Utersuchungen zu vergleichende Physiologie," _Archiv für
die Gesammte Physiologie_, Bd. lvi, 1894, p. 320.
[7] Féré, _Comptes-rendus Société de Biologie_, July 30, 1898. We may
perhaps connect this with an observation of E. Selous (_Zoölogist_, May
and Sept., 1901) on a bird, the Great Crested Grebe; after pairing, the
male would crouch to the female, who played his part to him; the same
thing is found among pigeons. Selous suggests that this is a relic of
primitive hermaphroditism. But it may be remembered that in the male
generally sexual intercourse tends to be more exhausting than in the
female; this fact would favor a reversion of their respective parts.
[8] E. Selous, "Sexual Selection in Birds," _Zoölogist_, Feb., 1907, p.
65; ib., May, p. 169. Sexual aberrations generally are not uncommon among
birds; see, e.g., A. Heim, "Sexuelle Verirrungen bei Vögeln in den
Tropen," _Sexual-Probleme_, April, 1913.
[9] See Moll, _Untersuchungen über die Libido Sexualis_, 1898, Bd. i, pp.
369, 374-5. For a summary of facts concerning homosexuality in animals see
F. Karsch, "Päderastie und Tribadie bei den Tieren auf Grund der
Literatur," _Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, Bd. ii, 1899, pp.
126-154
[10] Muccioli, "Degenerazione e Criminalità nei Colombi," _Archivio di
Psichiatria_, 1893, p. 40.
[11] _L'Intermédiare des Biologistes_, November 20, 1897.
[12] R.I. Pocock, _Field_, 25 Oct., 1913.
[13] R.S. Rutherford, "Crowing Hens," _Poultry_, January 26, 1896.
[14] This has now been very thoroughly done by Prof. F. Karsch-Haack in a
large book, _Das Gleichgeschlechtliche Leben der Naturvölker_, 1911. An
earlier and shorter study by the same author was published in the
_Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, Bd. iii, 1901.
[15] See a brief and rather inconclusive treatment of the question by
Bruns Meissner, "Assyriologische Studien," iv, _Mitteilungen der
Vorderasiatischen Gesellschaft_, 1907.
[16] _Monatshefte für praktische Dermatologie_, Bd. xxix, 1899, p. 409.
[17] Hirschfeld, _Die Homosexualität_, p. 739.
[18] Beardmore also notes that sodomy is "regularly indulged in" in New
Guinea on this account. (_Journal of the Anthropological Institute_, May,
1890, p. 464.)
[19] I have been told by medical men in India that it is specially common
among the Sikhs, the finest soldier-race in India.
[20] Foley, _Bulletin Société d'Anthropologie de Paris_, October 9, 1879.
[21] See, e.g., O. Kiefer, "Plato's Stellung zu Homosexualität," _Jahrbuch
für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, vol. vii.
[22] Bethe, op. cit., p. 440. In old Japan (before the revolution of 1868)
also, however, according to F.S. Krauss (_Das Geschlechtsleben der
Japaner_, ch. xiii, 1911), the homosexual relations between knights and
their pages resembled those of ancient Greece.
[23] _Archiv für Kriminal-Anthropologie_, 1906, p. 106.
[24] _Zeitschrift für Sexualwissenschaft_, 1914, Heft 2, p. 73.
[25] Among the Sarts of Turkestan a class of well-trained and educated
homosexual prostitutes, resembling those found in China and many regions
of northern Asia, bearing also the same name of _batsha_, are said to be
especially common because fostered by the scarcity of women through
polygamy and by the women's ignorance and coarseness. The institution of
the _batsha_ is supposed to have come to Turkestan from Persia. (Herman,
"Die Päderastie bei den Sarten," _Sexual-Probleme_, June, 1911.) This
would seem to suggest that Persia may have been a general center of
diffusions of this kind of refined homosexuality in northern Asia.
[26] Morache, art. "Chine," _Dictionnaire Encyclopédique des Sciences
Médicales_; Matignon, "La Péderastie en Chine," _Archives d'Anthropologie
Criminelle_, Jan., 1899; Von der Choven, summarized in _Archives de
Neurologie_, March, 1907; Scié-Ton-Fa, "L'Homosexualité en Chine," _Revue
de l'Hypnotisme_, April, 1909.
[27] _Moeurs des Peuples de l'Inde_, 1825, vol. i, part ii, ch. xii. In
Lahore and Lucknow, as quoted by Burton, Daville describes "men dressed as
women, with flowing locks under crowns of flowers, imitating the feminine
walk and gestures, voice and fashion of speech, ogling their admirer with
all the coquetry of bayaderes."
[28] _Voyages and Travels_, 1814, part ii, p. 47.
[29] A. Lisiansky, _Voyage, etc._, London, 1814, p. 1899.
[30] _Ethnographische Skizzen_, 1855, p. 121.
[31] C.F.P. von Martius, _Zur Ethnographie Amerika's_, Leipzig, 1867, Bd.
i, p. 74. In Ancient Mexico Bernal Diaz wrote: _Erant quasi omnes sodomia
commaculati, et adolescentes multi, muliebriter vestiti, ibant publice,
cibum quarentes ab isto diabolico et abominabili labore_.
[32] Hammond, _Sexual Impotence_, pp. 163-174.
[33] _New York Medical Journal_, Dec. 7, 1889.
[34] J. Turnbull, "_A Voyage Round the World in the Year 1800_," etc.,
1813, p. 382.
[35] _Annales d'Hygiène et de Médecine Coloniale_, 1899, p. 494.
[36] Oskar Baumann, "Conträre Sexual-Erscheinungen bei die
Neger-Bevölkerung Zanzibars," _Zeitschrift für Ethnologie_, 1899, Heft 6,
p. 668.
[37] Rev. J.H. Weeks, _Journal Anthropological Institute_, 1909, p. 449. I
am informed by a medical correspondent in the United States that inversion
is extremely prevalent among American negroes. "I have good reason to
believe," he writes, "that it is far more prevalent among them than among
the white people of any nation. If inversion is to be regarded as a
penalty of 'civilization' this is remarkable. Perhaps, however, the Negro,
_relatively to his capacity_, is more highly civilized than we are; at any
rate his civilization has been thrust upon him, and not acquired through
the long throes of evolution. Colored inverts desire white men as a rule,
but are not averse to men of their own race. I believe that 10 per cent,
of Negroes in the United States are sexually inverted."
[38] Among the Papuans of German New Guinea, where the women have great
power, marriage is late, and the young men are compelled to live separated
from the women in communal houses. Here, says Moskowski (_Zeitschrift für
Ethnologie_, 1911, Heft 2, p. 339), homosexual orgies are openly carried
on.
[39] C.G. Seligmann, "Sexual Inversion Among Primitive Races," _Alienist
and Neurologist_, Jan., 1902. In a tale of the Western Solomon Islands,
reported by J.C. Wheeler (_Anthropophyteia_, vol. ix, p. 376) we find a
story of a man who would be a woman, and married another man and did
woman's work.
[40] Hardman, "Habits and Customs of Natives of Kimberley, Western
Australia," _Proceedings Royal Irish Academy_, 3d series, vol. i, 1889, p.
73.
[41] Klaatsch, "Some Notes on Scientific Travel Amongst the Black
Populations of Tropic Australia," Adelaide meeting of _Australian
Association for the Advancement of Science_, January, 1907, p. 5.
[42] In further illustration of this I have been told that among the
common people there is often no feeling against connection with a woman
_per anum_.
[43] Chevalier (_L'Inversion Sexuelle_, pp. 85-106) brings forward a
considerable amount of evidence regarding homosexuality at Rome under the
emperors. See also Moll, _Konträre Sexualempfindung_, 1899, pp. 56-66, and
Hirschfeld, _Homosexualität_, 1913, pp. 789-806. On the literary side,
Petronius best reveals the homosexual aspect of Roman life about the time
of Tiberius.
[44] J.A. Symonds wrote an interesting essay on this subject; see also
Kiefer, _Jahrbuch f. sex. Zwischenstufen_, vol. viii, 1906.
[45] See L. von Scheffler, "Elagabal," _Jahrbuch f. sex. Zwischenstufen_,
vol. iii, 1901; also Duviquet, _Héliogabale (Mercure de France_).
[46] The following note has been furnished to me: "Balzac, in _Une
Dernière Incarnation de Vautrin_, describes the morals of the French
_bagnes_. Dostoieffsky, in _Prison-Life in Siberia_, touches on the same
subject. See his portrait of Sirotkin, p. 52 et seq., p. 120 (edition J.
and R. Maxwell, London). We may compare Carlier, _Les Deux Prostitutions_,
pp. 300-1, for an account of the violence of homosexual passions in French
prisons. The initiated are familiar with the fact in English prisons.
Bouchard, in his _Confessions_, Paris, Liseux, 1881, describes the convict
station at Marseilles in 1630." Homosexuality among French recidivists at
Saint-Jean-du-Maroni in French Guiana has been described by Dr. Cazanova,
_Arch. d'Anth. Crim._, January, 1906, p. 44. See also Davitt's _Leaves
from a Prison Diary_, and Berkman's _Prison Memoirs of an Anarchist_; also
Rebierre, _Joyeux et Demifous_, 1909.
[47] D. McMurtrie, _Chicago Medical Recorder_, January, 1914.
[48] See Appendix A: "Homosexuality among Tramps," by "Josiah Flynt."
[49] _Inferno_, xv. The place of homosexuality in the _Divine Comedy_
itself has been briefly studied by Undine Freün von Verschuer, _Jahrbuch
für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, Bd. viii, 1906.
[50] Hirschfeld and others have pointed out, very truly, that inverts are
less prone than normal persons to regard caste and social position. This
innately democratic attitude renders it easier for them than for ordinary
people to rise to what Cyples has called the "ecstasy of humanity," the
emotional attitude, that is to say, of those rare souls of whom it may be
said, in the same writer's words, that "beggars' rags to their
unhesitating lips grew fit for kissing because humanity had touched the
garb." Edward Carpenter (_Intermediate Types among Primitive Folk_, p. 83)
remarks that great ethical leaders have often exhibited feminine traits,
and adds: "It becomes easy to suppose of those early figures--who once
probably were men--those Apollos, Buddhas, Dionysus, Osiris, and so
forth--to suppose that they too were somewhat bisexual in temperament, and
that it was really largely owing to that fact that they were endowed with
far-reaching powers and became leaders of mankind."
[51] English translation, _Primitive Folk_, in Contemporary Science
series.
[52] R. Horneffer, _Der Priester_, 2 vols., 1912. J.G. Frazer, in the
volume entitled "Adonis, Attis, Osiris" (pp. 428-435) of the third edition
of his _Golden Bough_, discusses priests dressed as women, and finds
various reasons for the custom.
[53] Edward Carpenter, _Intermediate Types among Primitive Folk_, 1914.
[54] Westermarck, _Origin and Development of Moral Ideas_, vol. ii, ch.
xliii.
[55] "Italian literature," remarks Symonds, "can show the _Rime
Burlesche_, Becadelli's _Hermaphroditus_, the _Canti Carnascialeschi_, the
Macaronic poems of Fidentius, and the remarkably outspoken romance
entitled _Alcibiade Fanciullo a Scola_."
[56] The life of Muret has been well written by C. Dejob, _Marc-Antoine
Muret_, 1881.
[57] F.M. Nichols, _Epistles of Erasmus_, vol. i, pp. 44-55.
[58] Burckhardt, _Die Kultur der Renaissance_, vol. ii, _Excursus_ ci.
[59] F. de Gaudenzi in ch. v of his _Studio Psico-patologico sopra T.
Tasso_ (1899) deals fully with the poet's homosexual tendencies.
[60] Herbert P. Horne, _Leonardo da Vinci_, 1903, p. 12.
[61] S. Freud, _Eine Kindheitserinnerung des Leonardo da Vinci_, 1910.
[62] See Parlagreco, _Michelangelo Buonarotti_, Naples, 1888; Ludwig von
Scheffler, _Michelangelo: Ein Renaissance Studie_, 1892; _Archivo di
Psichiatria_, vol. xv, fasc. i, ii, p. 129; J.A. Symonds, _Life of
Michelangelo_, 1893; Dr. Jur. Numa Praetorius, "Michel Angelo's
Urningtum," _Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, vol. ii, 1899, pp,
254-267.
[63] J.A. Symonds, _Life of Michelangelo_, vol. ii, p. 384.
[64] Sodoma's life and temperament have been studied and his pictures
copiously reproduced by Elisár von Kupffer, _Jahrbuch für sexuelle
Zwischenstufen_, Bd. ix, 1908, p. 71 et seq., and by R.H. Hobart Cust,
_Giovanni Antonio Bazzi_.
[65] Cellini, _Life_, translated by J.A. Symonds, introduction, p. xxxv,
and p. 448. Queringhi (_La Psiche di B. Cellini_, 1913) argues that
Cellini was not homosexual.
[66] See the interesting account of Duquesnoy by Eekhoud (_Jahrbuch für
sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, Bd. ii, 1899), an eminent Belgian novelist who
has himself been subjected to prosecution on account of the pictures of
homosexuality in his novels and stories, _Escal-Vigor_ and _Le Cycle
Patibulaire_ (see _Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, Bd. iii, 1901).
[67] See Justi's _Life of Winkelmann_, and also Moll's _Die Konträre
Sexualempfindung_, third edition, 1899, pp. 122-126. In this work, as well
as in Raffalovich's _Uranisme et Unisexualité_, as also in Moll's
_Berühmte Homosexuelle_ (1910) and Hirschfeld's _Die Homosexualität_, p.
650 et seq., there will be found some account of many eminent men who are,
on more or less reliable grounds, suspected of homosexuality. Other German
writers brought forward as inverted are Platen, K.P. Moritz, and Iffland.
Platen was clearly a congenital invert, who sought, however, the
satisfaction of his impulses in Platonic friendship; his homosexual poems
and the recently published unabridged edition of his diary render him an
interesting object of study; see for a sympathetic account of him, Ludwig
Frey, "Aus dem Seelenleben des Grafen Platen," _Jahrbuch für sexuelle
Zwischenstufen_, vols. i and vi. Various kings and potentates have been
mentioned in this connection, including the Sultan Baber; Henri III of
France; Edward II, William II, James I, and William III of England, and
perhaps Queen Anne and George III, Frederick the Great and his brother,
Heinrich, Popes Paul II, Sixtus IV, and Julius II, Ludwig II of Bavaria,
and others. Kings, indeed, seem peculiarly inclined to homosexuality.
[68] Schultz, _Das Höfische Leben_, Bd. i, ch. xiii.
[69] _De Planctu Naturæ_ has been translated by Douglas Moffat, _Yale
Studies in English_, No. xxxvi, 1908.
[70] P. de l'Estoile, _Mémoires-Journaux_, vol. ii, p. 326.
[71] Laborde, _Le Palais Mazarin_, p. 128.
[72] Thus she writes in 1701 (_Correspondence_, edited by Brunet, vol. i,
p. 58): "Our heroes take as their models Hercules, Theseus, Alexander, and
Cæsar, who all had their male favorites. Those who give themselves up to
this vice, while believing in Holy Scripture, imagine that it was only a
sin when there were few people in the world, and that now the earth is
populated it may be regarded as a _divertissement_. Among the common
people, indeed, accusations of this kind are, so far as possible, avoided;
but among persons of quality it is publicly spoken of; it is considered a
fine saying that since Sodom and Gomorrah, the Lord has punished no one
for such offences."
[73] Sérieux and Libert, "La Bastille et ses Prisonniers," _L'Encéphale_,
September, 1911.
[74] Witry, "Notes Historiques sur l'Homosexualité en France," _Revue de
l'Hypnotisme_, January, 1909.
[75] In early Teutonic days there was little or no trace of any punishment
for homosexual practices in Germany. This, according to Hermann Michaëlis,
only appeared after the Church had gained power among the West Goths; in
the Breviarium of Alaric II (506), the sodomist was condemned to the
stake, and later, in the seventh century, by an edict of King
Chindasvinds, to castration. The Frankish capitularies of Charlemange's
time adopted ecclesiastical penances. In the thirteenth and fourteenth
centuries death by fire was ordained, and the punishments enacted by the
German codes tended to become much more ferocious than that edicted by the
Justinian code on which they were modelled.
[76] Raffalovich discusses German friendship, _Uranisme et Unisexualité_,
pp. 157-9. See also Birnbaum, _Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, Bd.
viii, p. 611; he especially illustrates this kind of friendship by the
correspondence of the poets Gleim and Jacobi, who used to each other the
language of lovers, which, indeed, they constantly called themselves.
[77] This letter may be found in Ernst Schur's _Heinrich von Kleist in
seinen Briefen_, p. 295. Dr. J. Sadger has written a pathographic and
psychological study of Kleist, emphasizing the homosexual strain, in the
_Grenzfragen des Nerven- und Seelenlebens_ series.
[78] Alexander's not less distinguished brother, Wilhelm von Humboldt,
though not homosexual, possessed, a woman wrote to him, "the soul of a
woman and the most tender feeling for womanliness I have ever found in
your sex;" he himself admitted the feminine traits in his nature. Spranger
(_Wilhelm von Humboldt_, p. 288) says of him that "he had that dual
sexuality without which the moral summits of humanity cannot be reached."
[79] Krupp caused much scandal by his life at Capri, where he was
constantly surrounded by the handsome youths of the place, mandolinists
and street arabs, with whom he was on familiar terms, and on whom he
lavished money. H.D. Davray, a reliable eyewitness, has written "Souvenirs
sur M. Krupp à Capri," _L'Européen_, 29 November, 1902. It is not,
however, definitely agreed that Krupp was of fully developed homosexual
temperament (see, e.g., _Jahrbuch f. sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, Bd. v, p.
1303 et seq.) An account of his life at Capri was published in the
_Vorwärts_, against which Krupp finally brought a libel action; but he
died immediately afterward, it is widely believed, by his own hand, and
the libel action was withdrawn.
[80] Madame, the mother of the Regent, in her letters of 12th October, 4th
November, and 13th December, 1701, repeatedly makes this assertion, and
implies that it was supported by the English who at that time came over to
Paris with the English Ambassador, Lord Portland. The King was very
indifferent to women.
[81] Anselm, Epistola lxii, in Migne's _Patrologia_, vol. clix, col. 95.
John of Salisbury, in his _Polycrates_, describes the homosexual and
effeminate habits of his time.
[82] Pollock and Maitland, _History of English Law_, vol. ii, p. 556.
[83] Coleridge in his _Table Talk_ (14 May, 1833) remarked: "A man may,
under certain states of the moral feeling, entertain something deserving
the name of love towards a male object--an affection beyond friendship,
and wholly aloof from appetite. In Elizabeth's and James's time it seems
to have been almost fashionable to cherish such a feeling. Certainly the
language of the two friends Musidorus and Pyrocles in the _Arcadia_ is
such as we could not use except to women." This passage of Coleridge's is
interesting as an early English recognition by a distinguished man of
genius of what may be termed ideal homosexuality.
[84] See account of Udall in the _National Dictionary of Biography_.
[85] _Complete Poems of Richard Barnfield_, edited with an introduction by
A.B. Grosart, 1876. The poems of Barnfield were also edited by Arber, in
the English Scholar's Library, 1883. Arber, who always felt much horror
for the abnormal, argues that Barnfield's occupation with homosexual
topics was merely due to a search for novelty, that it was "for the most
part but an amusement and had little serious or personal in it." Those
readers of Barnfield, however, who are acquainted with homosexual
literature will scarcely fail to recognize a personal preoccupation in his
poems. This is also the opinion of Moll in his _Berühmte Homosexuelle_.
[86] See appendix to my edition of Marlowe in the _Mermaid Series_, first
edition. For a study of Marlowe's "Gaveston," regarded as "the
hermaphrodite in soul," see J.A. Nicklin, _Free Review_, December, 1895.
[87] As Raffalovich acutely points out, the twentieth sonnet, with its
reference to the "one thing to my purpose nothing," is alone enough to
show that Shakespeare was not a genuine invert, as then he would have
found the virility of the loved object beautiful. His sonnets may fairly
be compared to the _In Memoriam_ of Tennyson, whom it is impossible to
describe as inverted, though in his youth he cherished an ardent
friendship for another youth, such as was also felt in youth by Montaigne.
[88] A scene in Vanbrugh's _Relapse_, and the chapter (ch. li) in
Smollett's _Roderick Random_ describing Lord Strutwell, may also be
mentioned as evidencing familiarity with inversion. "In our country," said
Lord Strutwell to Rawdon, putting forward arguments familiar to modern
champions of homosexuality, "it gains ground apace, and in all probability
will become in a short time a more fashionable vice than simple
fornication."
[89] These observations on eighteenth century homosexuality in London are
chiefly based on the volumes of _Select Trials_ at the Old Bailey,
published in 1734.
[90] Numa Praetorius (_Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, Bd. iv, p.
885), who has studied Byron from this point of view, considers that,
though his biography has not yet been fully written on the sexual side, he
was probably of bisexual temperament; Raffalovich (_Uranisme et
Unisexualité_, p. 309) is of the same opinion.
[91] A youthful attraction of this kind in a poet is well illustrated by
Dolben, who died at the age of nineteen. In addition to a passion for
Greek poetry he cherished a romantic friendship of extraordinary ardor,
revealed in his poems, for a slightly older schoolfellow, who was never
even aware of the idolatry he aroused. Dolben's life has been written, and
his poems edited, by his friend the eminent poet, Robert Bridges (_The
Poems of D.M. Dolben_, edited with a Memoir by R. Bridges, 1911).
[92] A well-informed narrative of the Oscar Wilde trial is given by
Raffalovich in his _Uranisme et Unisexualité_, pp. 241-281; the full
report of the trial has been published by Mason. The best life of Wilde is
probably that of Arthur Ransome. André Gide's little volume of
reminiscences, _Oscar Wilde_ (also translated into English), is well worth
reading. Wilde has been discussed in relation to homosexuality by Numa
Praetorius (_Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, vol. iii, 1901). An
instructive document, an unpublished portion of _De Profundis_, in which
Wilde sought to lay the blame for his misfortune on a friend,--his
"ancient affection" for whom has, he declares, been turned to "loathing,
bitterness, and contempt,"--was published in the _Times_, 18th April,
1913; it clearly reveals an element of weakness of character.
[93] T. Wright, _Life of Edward Fitzgerald_, vol. i, p. 158.
[94] Most of these were carelessly lost or destroyed by Posh. A few have
been published by James Blyth, _Edward Fitzgerald and_ '_Posh_,' 1908.
[95] It is as such that Whitman should be approached, and I would desire
to protest against the tendency, now marked in many quarters, to treat him
merely as an invert, and to vilify him or glorify him accordingly. However
important inversion may be as a psychological key to Whitman's
personality, it plays but a small part in Whitman's work, and for many who
care for that work a negligible part. (I may be allowed to refer to my own
essay on Whitman, in _The New Spirit_, written nearly thirty years ago.)
[96] I may add that Symonds (in his book on Whitman) accepted this letter
as a candid and final statement showing that Whitman was absolutely
hostile to sexual inversion, that he had not even taken its phenomena into
account, and that he had "omitted to perceive that there are inevitable
points of contact between sexual inversion and his doctrine of
friendship." He recalls, however, Whitman's own lines at the end of
"Calamus" in the Camden edition of 1876:--
"Here my last words, and the most baffling,
Here the frailest leaves of me, and yet my strongest-lasting,
Here I shade down and hide my thoughts--I do not expose them,
And yet they expose me more than all my other poems."
[97] Whitman's letters to Peter Doyle, an uncultured young tram-conductor
deeply loved by the poet, have been edited by Dr. Bucke, and published at
Boston: _Calamus: A Series of Letters_, 1897.
[98] Whitman acknowledged, however (as in the letter to Symonds already
referred to), that he had had six children; they appear to have been born
in the earlier part of his life when he lived in the South. (See a chapter
on Walt Whitman's children in Edward Carpenter's interesting book, _Days
with Walt Whitman_, 1906.) Yet his brother George Whitman said: "I never
knew Walt to fall in love with young girls, or even to show them marked
attention." And Doyle, who knew him intimately during ten years of late
life, said: "Women in that sense never came into his head." The early
heterosexual relationship seems to have been an exception in his life.
With regard to the number of children I am informed that, in the opinion
of a lady who knew Whitman in the South, there can be no reasonable doubt
as to the existence of one child, but that when enumerating six he
possibly included grandchildren.
[99] While the homosexual strain in Walt Whitman has been more or less
definitely admitted by various writers, the most vigorous attempts to
present the homosexual character of his personality and work are due to
Eduard Bertz in Germany, and to Dr. W.C. Rivers in England. Bertz has
issued three publications on Whitman: see especially his _Der
Yankee-Heiland_, 1906, and _Whitman-Mysterien_, 1907. The arguments of
Rivers are concisely stated in a pamphlet entitled _Walt Whitman's
Anomaly_ (London: George Allen, 1913). Both Bertz and Rivers emphasize the
feminine traits in Whitman. An interesting independent picture of Whitman,
at about the date of the letter to Symonds, accompanied by the author's
excellent original photographs, is furnished by Dr. John Johnston, _A
Visit to Walt Whitman_, 1898. It may be added that, probably, both the
extent and the significance of the feminine traits in Whitman have been
overestimated by some writers. Most artists and men of genius have some
feminine traits; they do not prove the existence of inversion, nor does
their absence disprove it. Dr. Clark Bell writes to me in reference to the
little book by Dr. Rivers: "I knew Walt Whitman personally. To me Mr.
Whitman was one of the most robust and virile of men, extraordinarily so.
He was from my standpoint not feminine at all, but physically masculine
and robust. The difficulty is that a virile and strong man who is poetic
in temperament, ardent and tender, may have phases and moods of passion
and emotion which are apt to be misinterpreted." A somewhat similar view,
in opposition to Bertz and Rivers, has been vigorously set forth by
Bazalgette (who has written a very thorough study of Whitman in French),
especially in the _Mercure de France_ for 1st July, 1st Oct., and 15th
Nov., 1913.
[100] Lepelletier, in what may be regarded as the official biography of
Verlaine (_Paul Verlaine_, 1907) seeks to minimize or explain away the
homosexual aspect of the poet's life. So also Berrichon, Rimbaud's
brother-in-law, _Mercure de France_, 16 July, 1911 and 1 Feb., 1912. P.
Escoube, in a judicious essay (included in _Préférences_, 1913), presents
a more reasonable view of this aspect of Verlaine's temperament. Even
apart altogether from the evidence as to the poet's tendency to passionate
friendship, there can be no appeal from the poems themselves, which
clearly possess an absolute and unquestionable sincerity.
[101] Sir Richard Burton, who helped to popularize this view, regarded the
phenomenon as "geographical and climatic, not racial," and held that
within what he called the Sotadic Zone "the vice is popular and endemic,
held at the worst to be a mere peccadillo, while the races to the north
and south of the limits here defined practice it only sporadically, amid
the opprobrium of their fellows, who, as a rule, are physically incapable
of performing the operation, and look upon it with the liveliest disgust."
He adds: "The only physical cause for the practice which suggests itself
to me, and that must be owned to be purely conjectural, is that within the
Sotadic Zone there is a blending of the masculine and feminine
temperaments, a crasis which elsewhere only occurs sporadically" (_Arabian
Nights_, 1885, vol. x, pp. 205-254). The theory of the Sotadic Zone fails
to account for the custom among the Normans, Celts, Scythians, Bulgars,
and Tartars, and, moreover, in various of these regions different views
have prevailed at different periods. Burton was wholly unacquainted with
the psychological investigations into sexual inversion which had, indeed,
scarcely begun in his day.
[102] Spectator (_Anthropophyteia_, vol. vii, 1910), referring especially
to the neighborhood of Sorrento, states that the southern Italians regard
passive _pedicatio_ as disgraceful, but attach little or no shame to
active _pedicatio_. This indifference enables them to exploit the
homosexual foreigners who are specially attracted to southern Italy in the
development of a flourishing homosexual industry.
[103] It is true that in the solitude of great modern cities it is
possible for small homosexual coteries to form, in a certain sense, an
environment of their own, favorable to their abnormality; yet this fact
hardly modifies the general statement made in the text.
[104] See especially Hirschfeld, _Die Homosexualität_, chs. xxiv and xxv.
[105] Ulrichs, in his _Argonauticus_, in 1869, estimated the number as
only 25,000, but admitted that this was probably a decided underestimate.
Bloch (_Die Prostitution_, Bd. i, p. 792) has found reason to believe that
in Cologne in the fifteenth century the percentage was nearly as high as
Hirschfeld finds it today. A few years earlier Bloch had believed
(_Beiträge_, part i, p. 215, 1902) that Hirschfeld's estimate of 2 per
cent, was "sheer nonsense."
[106] Hirschfeld mentions the case of two men, artists, one of them
married, who were intimate friends for a great many years before each
discovered that the other was an invert.
[107] See articles by Numa Praetorius and Fernan, maintaining that
homosexuality is at least as frequent in France (_Sexual-Probleme_, March
and December, 1909).
[108] Dr. Laupts, _L'Homosexualité_, 1910, pp. 413, 420.
[109] Näcke, _Zeitschrift für Sexualwissenschaft_, 1908, Heft 6.
[110] It is a fact significant of the French attitude toward homosexuality
that the psychologist, Dr. Saint-Paul, when writing a book on this
subject, though in a completely normal and correct manner, thought it
desirable to adopt a pseudonym.
[111] A well-informed series of papers dealing with English
homosexuality generally, and especially with London (L. Pavia, "Die
männliche Homosexualität in England," _Vierteljahrsberichte des
wissenschaftlich-humanitären Komitees_, 1909-1911) will be found
instructive even by those who are familiar with London. And see also
Hirschfeld, _Die Homosexualität_, ch. xxvi. Much information of historical
nature concerning homosexuality in England will be found in Eugen Dühren
(Iwan Bloch), _Das Geschlechtsleben in England_.
[112] This: is doubtless the reason why so many English inverts establish
themselves outside England. Paris, Florence, Nice, Naples, Cairo, and
other places, are said to swarm with homosexual Englishmen.
CHAPTER II.
THE STUDY OF SEXUAL INVERSION.
Westphal--Hössli--Casper--Ulrichs--Krafft-Ebing--Moll--Féré--Kiernan--
Lydston--Raffalovich--Edward Carpenter--Hirschfeld.
Westphal, an eminent professor of psychiatry at Berlin, may be said to be
the first to put the study of sexual inversion on an assured scientific
basis. In 1870 he published, in the _Archiv für Psychiatrie_, of which he
was for many years editor, the detailed history of a young woman who, from
her earliest years, differed from other girls: she liked to dress as a
boy, only cared for boys' games, and as she grew up was sexually attracted
only to women, with whom she formed a series of tender relationships, in
which the friends obtained sexual gratification by mutual caresses; while
she blushed and was shy in the presence of women, more especially the girl
with whom she chanced to be in love, she was always absolutely indifferent
in the presence of men. Westphal--a pupil, it may be noted, of Griesinger,
who had already called attention to the high character sometimes shown by
subjects of this perversion--combined keen scientific insight with a rare
degree of personal sympathy for those who came under his care, and it was
this combination of qualities which enabled him to grasp the true nature
of a case such as this, which by most medical men at that time would have
been hastily dismissed as a vulgar instance of vice or insanity. Westphal
perceived that this abnormality was congenital, not acquired, so that it
could not be termed vice; and, while he insisted on the presence of
neurotic elements, his observations showed the absence of anything that
could legitimately be termed insanity. He gave to this condition the name
of "contrary sexual feeling" (_Konträre Sexualempfindung_), by which it
was long usually known in Germany. The way was thus made clear for the
rapid progress of our knowledge of this abnormality. New cases were
published in quick succession, at first exclusively in Germany, and more
especially in Westphal's _Archiv_, but soon in other countries also,
chiefly Italy and France.[113]
While Westphal was the first to place the study of sexual inversion on a
progressive footing, many persons had previously obtained glimpses into
the subject. Thus, in 1791, two cases were published[114] of men who
showed a typical emotional attraction to their own sex, though it was not
quite clearly made out that the inversion was congenital. In 1836, again,
a Swiss writer, Heinrich Hössli, published a rather diffuse but remarkable
work, entitled _Eros_, which contained much material of a literary
character bearing on this matter. He seems to have been moved to write
this book by a trial which had excited considerable attention at that
time. A man of good position had suddenly murdered a youth, and was
executed for the crime, which, according to Hössli, was due to homosexual
love and jealousy. Hössli was not a trained scholar; he was in business at
Glarus as a skillful milliner, the most successful in the town. His own
temperament is supposed to have been bisexual. His book was prohibited by
the local authorities and at a later period the entire remaining stock was
destroyed in a fire, so that its circulation was very small. It is now,
however, regarded by some as the first serious attempt to deal with the
problem of homosexuality since Plato's _Banquet_.[115]
Some years later, in 1852, Casper, the chief medico-legal authority of his
time in Germany,--for it is in Germany that the foundations of the study
of sexual inversion have been laid,--pointed out in Casper's
_Vierteljahrsschrift_ that pederasty, in a broad sense of the word, was
sometimes a kind of "moral hermaphroditism," due to a congenital psychic
condition, and also that it by no means necessarily involved sodomy
(_immissio penis in anum_). Casper brought forward a considerable amount
of valuable evidence concerning these cardinal points, which he was the
first to note,[116] but he failed to realize the full significance of his
observations, and they had no immediate influence, though Tardieu, in
1858, admitted a congenital element in some pederasts.
The man, however, who more than anyone else brought to light the phenomena
of sexual inversion had not been concerned either with the medical or the
criminal aspects of the matter. Karl Heinrich Ulrichs (born in 1825 near
Aurich), who for many years expounded and defended homosexual love, and
whose views are said to have had some influence in drawing Westphal's
attention to the matter, was a Hanoverian legal official (_Amtsassessor_),
himself sexually inverted. From 1864 onward, at first under the name of
"Numa Numantius" and subsequently under his own name, Ulrichs published,
in various parts of Germany, a long series of works dealing with this
question, and made various attempts to obtain a revision of the legal
position of the sexual invert in Germany.
Although not a writer whose psychological views can carry much scientific
weight, Ulrichs appears to have been a man of most brilliant ability, and
his knowledge is said to have been of almost universal extent; he was not
only well versed in his own special subjects of jurisprudence and
theology, but in many branches of natural science, as well as in
archeology; he was also regarded by many as the best Latinist of his time.
In 1880 he left Germany and settled in Naples, and afterward at Aquila in
the Abruzzi, whence he issued a Latin periodical. He died in 1895.[117]
John Addington Symonds, who went to Aquila in 1891, wrote: "Ulrichs is
_chrysostomos_ to the last degree, sweet, noble, a true gentleman and man
of genius. He must have been at one time a man of singular personal
distinction, so finely cut are his features, and so grand the lines of his
skull."[118]
For many years Ulrichs was alone in his efforts to gain scientific
recognition for congenital homosexuality. He devised (with allusion to
Uranos in Plato's _Symposium_) the word uranian or urning, ever since
frequently used for the homosexual lover, while he called the normal
heterosexual lover a dioning (from Dione). He regarded uranism, or
homosexual love, as a congenital abnormality by which a female soul had
become united with a male body--_anima muliebris in corpore virili
inclusa_--and his theoretical speculations have formed the starting point
for many similar speculations. His writings are remarkable in various
respects, although, on account of the polemical warmth with which, as one
pleading _pro domo_, he argued his cause, they had no marked influence on
scientific thought.[119]
This privilege was reserved for Westphal. After he had shown the way and
thrown open his journal for their publication, new cases appeared in rapid
succession. In Italy, also, Ritti, Tamassia, Lombroso, and others began to
study these phenomena. In 1882 Charcot and Magnan published in the
_Archives de Neurologie_ the first important study which appeared in
France concerning sexual inversion and allied sexual perversions. They
regarded sexual inversion as an episode (_syndrome_) in a more fundamental
process of hereditary degeneration, and compared it with such morbid
obsessions as dipsomania and kleptomania. From a somewhat more
medico-legal standpoint, the study of sexual inversion in France was
furthered by Brouardel, and still more by Lacassagne, whose stimulating
influence at Lyons has produced fruitful results in the work of many
pupils.[120]
Of much more importance in the history of the theory of sexual inversion
was the work of Richard von Krafft-Ebing (born at Mannheim in 1840 and
died at Graz in 1902), for many years professor of psychiatry at Vienna
University and one of the most distinguished alienists of his time. While
active in all departments of psychiatry and author of a famous textbook,
from 1877 onward he took special interest in the pathology of the sexual
impulse. His _Psychopathia Sexualis_ contained over two hundred histories,
not only of sexual inversion but of all other forms of sexual perversion.
For many years it was the only book on the subject and it long remained
the chief storehouse of facts. It passed through many editions and was
translated into many languages (there are two translations in English),
enjoying an immense and not altogether enviable vogue.
Krafft-Ebing's methods were open to some objection. His mind was not of a
severely critical order. He poured out the new and ever-enlarged editions
of his book with extraordinary rapidity, sometimes remodelling them. He
introduced new subdivisions from time to time into his classification of
sexual perversions, and, although this rather fine-spun classification has
doubtless contributed to give precision to the subject and to advance its
scientific study, it was at no time generally accepted. Krafft-Ebing's
great service lay in the clinical enthusiasm with which he approached the
study of sexual perversions. With the firm conviction that he was
conquering a great neglected field of morbid psychology which rightly
belongs to the physician, he accumulated without any false shame a vast
mass of detailed histories, and his reputation induced sexually abnormal
individuals in all directions to send him their autobiographies, in the
desire to benefit their fellow-sufferers.
It is as a clinician, rather than as a psychologist, that we must regard
Krafft-Ebing. At the outset he considered inversion to be a functional
sign of degeneration, a partial manifestation of a neuropathic and
psychopathic state which is in most cases hereditary. This perverse
sexuality appears spontaneously with the developing sexual life, without
external causes, as the individual manifestation of an abnormal
modification of the _vita sexualis_, and must then be regarded as
congenital; or it develops as a result of special injurious influences
working on a sexuality which had at first been normal, and must then be
regarded as acquired. Careful investigation of these so-called acquired
cases, however, Krafft-Ebing in the end finally believed, would indicate
that the predisposition consists in a latent homosexuality, or at least
bisexuality, which requires for its manifestation the operation of
accidental causes. In the last edition of his work Krafft-Ebing was
inclined to regard inversion as being not so much a degeneration as a
variation, a simple anomaly, and acknowledged that his opinion thus
approximated to that which had long been held by inverts themselves.[121]
At the time of his death, Krafft-Ebing, who had begun by accepting the
view, at that time prevalent among alienists, that homosexuality is a sign
of degeneration, thus fully adopted and set the seal of his authority on
the view, already expressed alike by some scientific investigators as well
as by inverts themselves, that sexual inversion is to be regarded simply
as an anomaly, whatever difference of opinion there might be as to the
value of the anomaly. The way was even opened for such a view as that of
Freud and most of the psychoanalysts today who regard a strain of
homosexuality as normal and almost constant, with a profound significance
for the psychonervous life. In 1891 Dr. Albert Moll, of Berlin, published
his work, _Die Konträre Sexualempfindung_, which subsequently appeared in
much enlarged and revised editions. It speedily superseded all previous
books as a complete statement and judicious discussion of sexual
inversion. Moll was not content merely to present fresh clinical material.
He attacked the problem which had now become of primary importance: the
nature and causes of sexual inversion. He discussed the phenomena as a
psychologist even more than as a physician, bearing in mind the broader
aspects of the problem, keenly critical of accepted opinions, but
judiciously cautious in the statement of conclusions. He cleared away
various ancient prejudices and superstitions which even Krafft-Ebing
sometimes incautiously repeated. He accepted the generally received
doctrine that the sexually inverted usually belong to families in which
various nervous and mental disorders prevail, but he pointed out at the
same time that it is not in all cases possible to prove that we are
concerned with individuals possessing a hereditary neurotic taint. He also
rejected any minute classification of sexual inverts, only recognizing
psycho-sexual hermaphroditism and homosexuality. At the same time he cast
doubt on the existence of acquired homosexuality, in a strict sense,
except in occasional cases, and he pointed out that even when a normal
heterosexual impulse appears at puberty, and a homosexual impulse later,
it may still be the former that was acquired and the latter that was
inborn.
In America attention had been given to the phenomena at a fairly early
period. Mention may be specially made of J.G. Kiernan and G. Frank
Lydston, both of whom put forward convenient classifications of homosexual
manifestations some thirty years ago.[122] More recently (1911) an
American writer, under the pseudonym of Xavier Mayne, privately printed an
extensive work entitled _The Intersexes: A History of Similisexualism as
a Problem in Social Life_, popularly written and compiled from many
sources. This book, from a subjective and scarcely scientific standpoint,
claims that homosexual relationships are natural, necessary, and
legitimate.[123]
In England the first attempts to deal seriously, from the modern point of
view, with the problem of homosexuality came late, and were either
published privately or abroad. In 1883 John Addington Symonds privately
printed his discussion of _paiderastia_ in ancient Greece, under the title
of _A Problem in Greek Ethics_, and in 1889-1890 he further wrote, and in
1891 privately printed, _A Problem of Modern Ethics: Being an Enquiry into
the Phenomena of Sexual Inversion_. In 1886 Sir Richard Burton added to
his translation of the _Arabian Nights_ a Terminal Essay on the same
subject. In 1894 Edward Carpenter privately printed in Manchester a
pamphlet entitled _Homogenic Love_, in which he criticised various
psychiatric views of inversion at that time current, and claimed that the
laws of homosexual love are the same as those of heterosexual love,
urging, however, that the former possesses a special aptitude to be
exalted to a higher and more spiritual level of comradeship, so fulfilling
a beneficent social function. More recently (1907) Edward Carpenter
published a volume of papers on homosexuality and its problems, under the
title of _The Intermediate Sex_, and later (1914) a more special study of
the invert in early religion and in warfare, _Intermediate Types among
Primitive Folk_.
In 1896 the most comprehensive book so far written on the subject in
England was published in French by Mr. André Raffalovich (in Lacassagne's
_Bibliothèque de Criminologie_), _Uranisme et Unisexualité_. This book
dealt chiefly with congenital inversion, publishing no new cases, but
revealing a wide knowledge of the matter. Raffalovich put forward many
just and sagacious reflections on the nature and treatment of inversion,
and the attitude of society toward perverted sexuality. The historical
portions of the book, which are of special interest, deal largely with the
remarkable prevalence of inversion in England, neglected by previous
investigators. Raffalovich, whose attitude is, on the whole, philosophical
rather than scientific, regards congenital inversion as a large and
inevitable factor in human life, but, taking the Catholic standpoint, he
condemns all sexuality, either heterosexual or homosexual, and urges the
invert to restrain the physical manifestations of his instinct and to aim
at an ideal of chastity. On the whole, it may be said that the book is the
work of a thinker who has reached his own results in his own way, and
those results bear an imprint of originality and freedom from tradition.
In recent years no one has so largely contributed to place our knowledge
of sexual inversion on a broad and accurate basis as Dr. Magnus Hirschfeld
of Berlin, who possesses an unequalled acquaintance with the phenomena of
homosexuality in all their aspects. He has studied the matter exhaustively
in Germany and to some extent in other countries also; he has received the
histories of a thousand inverts; he is said to have met over ten thousand
homosexual persons. As editor of the _Jahrbuch für sexuelle
Zwischenstufen_, which he established in 1899, and author of various
important monographs--more especially on transitional psychic and physical
stages between masculinity and femininity--Hirschfeld had already
contributed greatly to the progress of investigation in this field before
the appearance in 1914 of his great work, _Die Homosexualität des Mannes
und des Weibes_. This is not only the largest but the most precise,
detailed, and comprehensive--even the most condensed--work which has yet
appeared on the subject. It is, indeed, an encyclopedia of homosexuality.
For such a task Hirschfeld had been prepared by many years of strenuous
activity as a physician, an investigator, a medico-legal expert before the
courts, and his position as president of the _Wissenschaftlich-humanitären
Komitee_ which is concerned with the defense of the interests of the
homosexual in Germany. In Hirschfeld's book the pathological conception
of inversion has entirely disappeared; homosexuality is regarded as
primarily a biological phenomenon of universal extension, and secondarily
as a social phenomenon of serious importance. There is no attempt to
invent new theories; the main value of Hirschfeld's work lies, indeed, in
the constant endeavor to keep close to definite facts. It is this quality
which renders the book an indispensable source for all who seek
enlightened and precise information on this question.
Even the existence of such a treatise as this of Hirschfeld's is enough to
show how rapidly the study of this subject has grown. A few years ago--for
instance, when Dr. Paul Moreau wrote his _Aberrations du Sens
Génésique_--sexual inversion was scarcely even a name. It was a loathsome
and nameless vice, only to be touched with a pair of tongs, rapidly and
with precautions. As it now presents itself, it is a psychological and
medico-legal problem so full of interest that we need not fear to face it,
and so full of grave social actuality that we are bound to face it.
FOOTNOTES:
[113] In England aberration of the sexual instinct, or the tendency of men
to feminine occupations and of women to masculine occupations, had been
referred to in the _Medical Times and Gazette_, February 9, 1867; Sir G.
Savage first described a case of "Sexual Perversion" in the _Journal of
Mental Science_, vol. xxx, October, 1884.
[114] Moritz, _Magazin für Erfahrungsseelenkunde_, Berlin, Bd. viii.
[115] A full and interesting account of Hössli and his book is given by
Karsch in the _Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, Bd. v, 1903, pp.
449-556.
[116] "Eugen Dühren" (Iwan Bloch) remarks, however (_Neue Forschungen über
den Marquis de Sade und seine Zeit_, p. 436), that de Sade in his _Aline
et Valcour_ seems to recognize that inversion is sometimes inborn, or at
least natural, and apt to develop at a very early age, in spite of all
provocations to the normal attitude. "And if this inclination were not
natural," he makes Sarmiento say, "would the impression of it be received
in childhood?... Let us study better this indulgent Nature before daring
to fix her limits." Still earlier, in 1676 (as Schouten has pointed out,
_Sexual-Probleme_, January, 1910, p. 66), an Italian priest called
Carretto recognized that homosexual tendencies are innate.
[117] For some account of Ulrichs see _Jahrbuch für sexuelle
Zwischenstufen_, Bd. i, 1899, p. 36.
[118] Horatio Brown, _John Addington Symonds, a Biography_, vol. ii, p.
344.
[119] Ulrichs scarcely went so far as to assert that both homosexual and
heterosexual love are equally normal and healthy; this has, however, been
argued more recently.
[120] Special mention may be made of _L'Inversion Sexuelle_, a copious and
comprehensive, though sometimes uncritical book by Dr. J. Chevalier,
published in 1893, and the _Perversion et Perversité Sexuelles_ of Dr.
Saint-Paul, writing under the pseudonym of "Dr. Laupts," published in 1896
and republished in an enlarged form, under the title of _L'Homosexualité
et les Types Homosexuels_, in 1910.
[121] Krafft-Ebing set forth his latest views in a paper read before the
International Medical Congress, at Paris, in 1900 (_Comptes-rendus_,
"Section de Psychiatrie," pp. 421, 462; also in contributions to the
_Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, Bd. iii, 1901).
[122] Kiernan, _Detroit Lancet_, 1884, _Alienist and Neurologist_, April,
1891; Lydston, _Philadelphia Medical and Surgical Reporter_, September 7,
1889, and _Addresses and Essays_, 1892.
[123] A summary of the conclusion of this book, of which but few copies
were printed, will be found in Hirschfeld's _Vierteljahrsberichte_,
October, 1911, pp. 78-91.
CHAPTER III.
SEXUAL INVERSION IN MEN.
Relatively Undifferentiated State of the Sexual Impulse in Early Life--The
Freudian View--Homosexuality in Schools--The Question of Acquired
Homosexuality--Latent Inversion--Retarded Inversion--Bisexuality--The
Question of the Invert's Truthfulness--Histories.
When the sexual instinct first appears in early youth, it is much less
specialized than normally it becomes later. Not only is it, at the outset,
less definitely directed to a specific sexual end, but even the sex of its
object is sometimes uncertain.[124] This has always been so well
recognized that those in authority over young men have sometimes forced
women upon them to avoid the risk of possible unnatural offenses.[125]
The institution which presents these phenomena to us in the most marked
and the most important manner is, naturally, the school, in England
especially the Public School. In France, where the same phenomena are
noted, Tarde called attention to these relationships, "most usually
Platonic in the primitive meaning of the word, which indicate a simple
indecision of frontier between friendship and love, still undifferentiated
in the dawn of the awakening heart," and he regretted that no one had
studied them. In England we are very familiar with vague allusions to the
vices of public schools. From time to time we read letters in the
newspapers denouncing public schools as "hot-beds of vice" and one
anonymous writer remarks that "some of our public schools almost provoke
the punishment of the cities of the Plain."[126] But these allegations are
rarely or never submitted to accurate investigation. The physicians and
masters of public schools who are in a position to study the matter
usually possess no psychological training, and appear to view
homosexuality with too much disgust to care to pay any careful attention
to it. What knowledge they possess they keep to themselves, for it is
considered to be in the interests of public schools that these things
should be hushed up. When anything very scandalous occurs one or two lads
are expelled, to their own grave and, perhaps, lifelong injury, and
without benefit to those who remain, whose awakening sexual life rarely
receives intelligent sympathy.
In several of the Histories which follow in this chapter, as well
as in Histories contained in other volumes of these _Studies_,
details will be found concerning homosexuality as it occurs in
English schools, public or private. (See also the study
"Auto-erotism" in vol. i.) The prevalence of homosexual and
erotic phenomena in schools varies greatly at different schools
and at different times in the same school, while in small private
schools such phenomena may be entirely unknown. As an English
schoolboy I never myself saw or heard anything of such practices,
and in Germany, Professor Gurlitt (_Die Neue Generation_,
January, 1909), among others, testifies to similar absence of
experience during his whole school life, although there was much
talk and joking among the boys over sexual things. I have added
some observations by a correspondent whose experiences of English
public school life are still recent:--
"In the years I was a member of a public school, I saw and heard
a good deal of homosexuality, though till my last two years I did
not understand its meaning. As a prefect, I discussed with other
prefects the methods of checking it, and of punishing it when
detected. My own observations, supported by those of others, led
me to think that the fault of the usual method of dealing with
homosexuality in schools is that it regards all school
homosexualists as being in one class together, and has only one
way of dealing with them--the birch for a first offense,
expulsion for a second. Now, I think we may distinguish _three_
classes of school homosexualists:--
"(a) A very small number who are probably radically inverted, and
who do not scruple to sacrifice young and innocent boys to their
passions. These, and these only, are a real moral danger to
others, and I believe them to be rare.
"(b) Boys of various ages who, having been initiated into the
passive part in their young days, continue practices of an active
or passive kind; but only with boys already known to be
homosexualists; they draw the line at corrupting fresh victims.
This class realize more or less what they are about, but cannot
be called a danger to the morals of pure boys.
"(c) Young boys who, whether in the development of their own
physical nature, or by the instruction of older boys of the class
(a), find out the pleasures of masturbation or intercrural
connection. (I never heard of a case of _pedicatio_ at my school,
and only once of _fellatio_, which was attempted on a quite young
boy, who complained to his house master, and the offender was
expelled). Boys in this class have probably little or no idea of
what sexual morality means, and can hardly be accused of a
_moral_ offense at all.
"I submit that these three classes should receive quite different
treatment. Expulsion may occasionally be necessary for class (a),
but the few who belong to this class are usually too cunning to
get caught. It used to be notorious at school that it was almost
always the wrong people who got dropped on. I do not think a boy
in the other two classes should ever be expelled, and even when
expulsion is unavoidable, it should, if possible, be deferred
till the end of the term, so as to make it indistinguishable from
an ordinary departure. After all, there is no reason to ruin a
boy's prospects because he is a little beast at sixteen; there
are very few hopeless incorrigibles at that age.
"As regards the other two classes, I should begin by giving boys
very much fuller enlightenment on sexual subjects than is usually
done, before they go to a public school at all. Either a boy is
pitchforked into the place in utter innocence and ignorance, and
yields to temptations to do things which he vaguely, if at all,
realizes are wrong, and that only because a puzzling sort of
instinct tells him so; or else he is given just enough
information to whet his curiosity, usually in the shape of
warnings against certain apparently harmless bodily acts, which
he not unnaturally tries out of curiosity, and finds them very
pleasant. It may be undesirable that a boy should have full
knowledge, at the time he goes to school, but it is more
undesirable that he should go with a burning curiosity, or a
total ignorance on the subject. I am convinced that much might
be done in the way of prevention if boys were told more, and
allowed to be _open_. Much of the pleasure of sexual talk among
boys I believe to be due to the spurious interest aroused by the
fact that it is forbidden fruit, and involves risk if caught. It
seems to me that frankness is far more moral than suggestion. I
would not 'expurgate' school editions of great authors; the frank
obscenity of parts of Shakespeare is far less immoral than the
prurient prudishness which declines to print it, but numbers the
lines in such a way that the boy can go home and look up the
omitted passage in a complete edition, with a distinct sense of
guilt, which is where the harm comes in."
It is probable that only a small proportion of homosexual boys in
schools can properly be described as "vicious." A. Hoche,
describing homosexuality in German schools ("Zür Frage der
forensischen Beurteilung sexuellen Vergehen," _Neurologisches
Centralblatt_, 1896, No. 2), and putting together communications
received from various medical men regarding their own youthful
experiences at school, finds relationships of the kind very
common, usually between boys of different ages and
school-classes. According to one observer, the feminine, or
passive, part was always played by a boy of girlish form and
complexion, and the relationships were somewhat like those of
normal lovers, with kissing, poems, love-letters, scenes of
jealousy, sometimes visits to each other in bed, but without
masturbation, pederasty, or other grossly physical
manifestations. From his own youthful experience Hoche records
precisely similar observations, and remarks that the lovers were
by no means recruited from the vicious elements in the school.
(The elder scholars, of 21 or 22 years of age, formed regular
sexual relationships with the servant-girls in the house.) It is
probable that the homosexual relationships in English schools
are, as a rule, not more vicious than those described by Hoche,
but that the concealment in which they are wrapped leads to
exaggeration. In the course of a discussion on this matter over
thirty years ago, "Olim Etoniensis" wrote (_Journal of
Education_, 1882, p. 85) that, on making a list of the vicious
boys he had known at Eton, he found that "these very boys had
become cabinet ministers, statesmen, officers, clergymen,
country-gentlemen, etc., and that they are nearly all of them
fathers of thriving families, respected and prosperous." But, as
Marro has remarked, the question is not thus settled. Public
distinction by no means necessarily implies any fine degree of
private morality.
Sometimes the manifestations thus appearing in schools or
wherever youths are congregated together are not truly
homosexual, but exhibit a more or less brutal or even sadistic
perversion of the immature sexual instinct. This may be
illustrated by the following narrative concerning a large London
city warehouse: "A youth left my class at the age of 16½," writes
a correspondent, "to take up an apprenticeship in a large
wholesale firm in G---- Street. Fortunately he went on probation
of three weeks before articling. He came to me at the end of the
first week asking me to intercede with his mother (he had no
father) not to let him return. He told me that almost nightly,
and especially when new fellows came, the youths in his dormitory
(eleven in number) would waylay him, hold him down, and rub his
parts to the tune of some comic song or dance-music. The boy who
could choose the fastest time had the privilege of performing the
operation, and most had to be the victim in turn unless new boys
entered, when they would sometimes be subjected to this for a
week. This boy, having been brought up strictly, was shocked,
dazed, and alarmed; but they stopped him from calling out, and he
dared not report it. Most boys entered direct on their
apprenticeship without probation, and had no chance to get out. I
procured the boy's release from the place and gave the manager to
understand what went on." In such a case as this it has usually
happened that a strong boy of brutal and perverse instincts and
some force of character initiates proceedings which the others
either fall into with complacency or are too weak to resist.
Max Dessoir[127] came to the conclusion that "an undifferentiated sexual
feeling is normal, on the average, during the first years of
puberty,--i.e., from 13 to 15 in boys and from 12 to 14 in girls,--while
in later years it must be regarded as pathological." He added very truly
that in this early period the sexual emotion has not become centered in
the sexual organs. This latter fact is certainly far too often forgotten
by grown-up persons who suspect the idealized passion of boys and girls of
a physical side which children have often no suspicion of, and would view
with repulsion and horror. How far the sexual instinct may be said to be
undifferentiated in early puberty as regards sex is a little doubtful. It
is comparatively undifferentiated, but except in rare cases it is not
absolutely undifferentiated.
We have to admit, however, that, in the opinion of the latest
physiologists of sex, such as Castle, Heape, and Marshall, each sex
contains the latent characters of the other or recessive sex. Each sex is
latent in the other, and each, as it contains the characters of both
sexes (and can transmit those of the recessive sex) is latently
hermaphrodite. A homosexual tendency may thus be regarded as simply the
psychical manifestation of special characters of the recessive sex,
susceptible of being evolved under changed circumstances, such as may
occur near puberty, and associated with changed metabolism.[128]
William James (_Principles of Psychology_, vol. ii, p. 439)
considered inversion "a kind of sexual appetite of which very
likely most men possess the germinal possibility." Conolly Norman
(Article "Sexual Perversion," Tuke's _Dictionary of Psychological
Medicine_) also stated that "the sexual passion, at its first
appearance, is always indefinite, and is very easily turned in a
wrong direction," and he apparently accounted for inversion by
this fact, and by the precocity of neurotics. Obici and
Marchesini (_Le 'Amicizie' di collegio_, p. 126) refer to the
indeterminate character of the sexual feelings when they first
begin to develop. A correspondent believes that sexual feelings
are undifferentiated in the early years about puberty, but at the
same time considers that school life is to some extent
responsible; "the holidays," he adds, "are sufficiently long to
counteract it, however, provided the boy has sisters and they
have friends; the change from school fare and work to home
naturally results in a greater surplus of nerve-force, and I
think most boys 'fool about' with servants or their sisters'
friends." Moll (_Konträre Sexualempfindung_, 1889, pp. 6 and 356)
does not think it proved that a stage of undifferentiated sexual
feeling always occurs, although we have to recognize that it is
of frequent occurrence. In his later work (1909, _Das Sexualleben
des Kindes_, English translation, _The Sexual Life of the Child_,
ch. iv), Moll remains of the same opinion that a homosexual
tendency is very frequent in normal children, whose later
development is quite normal; it begins between the ages of 7 and
10 (or even at 5) and may last to 20.
In recent years Freud has accepted and developed the conception
of the homosexual strain; as normal in early life. Thus, in 1905,
in his "Bruchstück einer Hysterie-Analyse" (reprinted in the
second series of _Sammlung Kleiner Schriften zur Neurosenlehre_,
1909), Freud regards it as a well-known fact that boys and girls
at puberty normally show plain signs of the existence of a
homosexual tendency. Under favorable circumstances this tendency
is overcome, but when a happy heterosexual love is not
established it remains liable to reappear under the influence of
an appropriate stimulus. In the neurotic these homosexual germs
are more highly developed. "I have never carried through any
psychoanalysis of a man or a woman," Freud states, "without
discovering a very significant homosexual tendency." Ferenczi,
again (_Jahrbuch für Psychoanalytische Forschungen_, Bd. iii,
1911, p. 119), without reference to any physical basis of the
impulse, accepts "the psychic capacity of the child to direct his
originally objectless eroticism to one or both sexes," and terms
this disposition _ambisexuality_. The normality of a homosexual
element in early life may be said to be accepted by most
psychoanalysts, even of the schools that are separated from
Freud. Stekel would go farther, and regards various psychic
sexual anomalies as signs of a concealed bisexual tendency;
psychic impotence, the admiration of men for masculine women and
of women for feminine men, various forms of fetichism,--they are
all masks of homosexuality (Stekel, _Zentralblatt für
Psychoanalyse_, vol. ii, April, 1912).
These schoolboy affections and passions arise, to a large extent,
spontaneously, with the evolution of the sexual emotions, though the
method of manifestation may be a matter of example or suggestion. As the
sexual emotions become stronger, and as the lad leaves school or college
to mix with men and women in the world, the instinct usually turns into
the normal channel, in which channel the instincts of the majority of boys
have been directed from the earliest appearance of puberty, if not
earlier. But a certain proportion remain insensitive to the influence of
women, and these may be regarded as true sexual inverts. Some of them are
probably individuals of somewhat undeveloped sexual instincts. The members
of this group are of some interest psychologically, although from the
comparative quiescence of their sexual emotions they have received little
attention. The following communication which I have received from a
well-accredited source is noteworthy from this point of view:--
"The following facts may possibly be of interest to you, though
my statement of them is necessarily general and vague. I happen
to know intimately three cases of men whose affections have
chiefly been directed exclusively to persons of their own sex.
The first, having practised masturbation as a boy, and then for
some ten years ceased to practise it (to such an extent that he
even inhibited his erotic dreams), has since recurred to it
deliberately (at about fortnightly intervals) as a substitute for
copulation, for which he has never felt the least desire. But
occasionally, when sleeping with a male friend, he has emissions
in the act of embracing. The second is constantly and to an
abnormal extent (I should say) troubled with erotic dreams and
emissions, and takes drugs, by doctor's advice, to reduce this
activity. He has recently developed a sexual interest in women,
but for ethical and other reasons does not copulate with them. Of
the third I can say little, as he has not talked to me on the
subject; but I know that he has never had intercourse with women,
and has always had a natural and instinctive repulsion to the
idea. In all these, I imagine, the physical impulse of sex is
less imperative than in the average man. The emotional impulse,
on the other hand, is very strong. It has given birth to
friendships of which I find no adequate description anywhere but
in the dialogues of Plato; and, beyond a certain feeling of
strangeness at the gradual discovery of a temperament apparently
different to that of most men, it has provoked no kind of
self-reproach or shame. On the contrary, the feeling has been
rather one of elation in the consciousness of a capacity of
affection which appears to be finer and more spiritual than that
which commonly subsists between persons of different sexes. These
men are all of intellectual capacity above the average; and one
is actively engaged in the world, where he is both respected for
his capacity and admired for his character. I mention this
particularly, because it appears to be the habit, in books upon
this subject, to regard the relation in question as pathological,
and to select cases where those who are concerned in it are
tormented with shame and remorse. In the cases to which I am
referring nothing of the kind subsists.
"In all these cases a physical sexual attraction is recognized as
the basis of the relation, but as a matter of feeling, and partly
also of theory, the ascetic ideal is adopted.
"These are the only cases with which I am personally and
intimately acquainted. But no one can have passed through a
public-school and college life without constantly observing
indications of the phenomenon in question. It is clear to me that
in a large number of instances there is no fixed line between
what is called distinctively 'friendship' and love; and it is
probably the influence of custom and public opinion that in most
cases finally specializes the physical passion in the direction
of the opposite sex."
The classification of the varieties of homosexuality is a matter of
difficulty, and no classification is very fundamental. The early attempts
of Krafft-Ebing and others at elaborate classification are no longer
acceptable. Even the most elementary groupings become doubtful when we
have definitely to fit our cases into them. The old distinction between
congenital and acquired homosexuality has ceased to possess significance.
When we have recognized that there is a tendency for homosexuality to
arise in persons of usually normal tendency who are placed under
conditions (as on board ship or in prison) where the exercise of normal
sexuality is impossible, there is little further classification to be
achieved along this line.[129] We have gone as far as is necessary by
admitting a general undefined homosexuality,--a relationship of
unspecified nature to persons of the same sex,--in addition to the more
specific sexual inversion.[130]
It may now be said to be recognized by all authorities, even by Freud who
emphasizes a special psychological mechanism by which homosexuality may
become established, that a congenital predisposition as well as an
acquired tendency is necessary to constitute true inversion, apparent
exceptions being too few to carry much weight. Krafft-Ebing, Näcke, Iwan
Bloch, who at one time believed in the possibility of acquired inversion,
all finally abandoned that view, and even Schrenck-Notzing, a vigorous
champion of the doctrine of acquired inversion twenty years ago, admits
the necessity of a favoring predisposition, an admission which renders the
distinction between innate and acquired an unimportant, if not a merely
verbal, distinction.[131] Supposing, indeed, that we are prepared to admit
that true inversion may be purely acquired the decision in any particular
case must be extremely difficult, and I have found very few cases which,
even with imperfect knowledge, could fairly so be termed.
Even the cases (to which Schopenhauer long since referred) in which
inversion is only established late in life, are no longer regarded as
constituting a difficulty in accepting the doctrine of the congenital
nature of inversion; in such cases the inversion is merely retarded. The
conception of retarded inversion,--that is to say a latent congenital
inversion becoming manifest at a late period in life,--was first brought
forward by Thoinot in 1898 in his _Attentats aux Moeurs_, in order to
supersede the unsatisfactory conception, as he considered it to be, of
acquired inversion. Thoinot regarded retarded inversion as relatively rare
and of no great importance but more accessible to therapeutic measures.
Three years later, Krafft-Ebing, toward the close of his life, adopted the
same conception; the cases to which he applied it were all, he considered,
of bisexual disposition and usually, also, marked by sexual hyperesthesia.
This way of looking at the matter was speedily championed by Näcke and may
now be said to be widely accepted.[132]
Moll, earlier than Thoinot, had pointed out that it is difficult to
believe that homosexuality in late life can ever be produced without at
least some inborn weakness of the heterosexual impulse, and that we must
not deny the possibility of heredity even when homosexuality appears at
the age of 50 or 60.[133]
Moll believes it is very doubtful whether heterosexual satiety
alone can ever suffice to produce homosexuality. Näcke was
careful to set aside the cases, to which much significance was
once attached, in which old men with failing sexual powers, or
younger men exhausted by heterosexual debauchery, are attracted
to boys. In such cases, which include the majority of those
appearing late, Näcke regarded the inversion as merely spurious,
the _faute de mieux_ of persons no longer apt for normal sexual
activity.
Such cases no doubt need more careful psychological study than
they usually receive. Féré once investigated a case of this kind
in which a healthy young man (though with slightly neurotic
heredity on one side) practised sexual intercourse excessively
between the ages of 20 and 23--often impelled more by _amour
propre_ (or what Adler would term the "masculine protest" of the
organically inferior) than sexual desire--and then suddenly
became impotent, at the same time losing all desire, but without
any other loss of health. Six months later potency slowly
returned, though never to the same extent, and he married. At the
age of 35 symptoms of locomotor ataxia began to appear, and some
years later he again became impotent, but without losing sexual
desire. Suddenly one day, on sitting in close contact with a
young man at a _table d'hôte_, he experienced a violent erection;
he afterward found that the same thing occurred with other young
men, and, though he had no psychic desire for men, he was
constrained to seek such contact, and a repugnance for women and
their sexuality arose. Five months later a complete paraplegic
impotence set in; and then both the homosexual tendency and the
aversion to women disappeared. (Féré, _L'Instinct Sexuel_, p.
184.) In such a case, under the influence of disease, excessive
stimulation seems to result in more or less complete sexual
anesthesia, just as temporarily we may be more or less blinded by
excess of light; and functional power reasserts itself under the
influence of a different and normally much weaker stimulus.
Leppmann, who has studied the homosexual manifestations of
previously normal old men toward boys ("Greisenalter und
Kriminalität," _Zeitschrift für Psychotherapie_, Bd. i, Heft 4,
1909), considers the chief factor to be a flaring up of the
sexual impulse in a perverted direction in an early stage of
morbid cerebral disturbance, not amounting to insanity and not
involving complete irresponsibility. In such cases, Leppmann
believes, the subject may, through his lack of power, be brought
back to the beginning of his sexual life and to the perhaps
unconsciously homosexual attractions of that age.
With the recognition that homosexuality in youth may be due to an as yet
undifferentiated sexual impulse, homosexuality in mature age to a retarded
development on a congenital basis, and homosexuality in sold age to a
return to the attitude of youth, the area of spurious or "pseudo"
homosexuality seems to me to be very much restricted. Most, perhaps all,
authorities still accept the reality of this spurious homosexuality in
heterosexual persons. But they enter into no details concerning it, and
they bring forward no minutely observed cases in which it occurred.
Hirschfeld, in discussing the diagnosis of homosexuality and seeking to
distinguish genuine from spurious inverts,[134] enumerates three classes
of the latter: (1) those who practise homosexuality for purposes of gain,
more especially male prostitutes and blackmailers; (2) persons who, from
motives of pity, good nature, friendship, etc., allow themselves to be the
objects of homosexual desire; (3) normal persons who, when excluded from
the society of the opposite sex, as in schools, barracks, on board ship,
or in prison, have sexual relations with persons of their own sex. Now
Hirschfeld clearly realizes that the mere sexual act is no proof of the
direction of the sexual impulse; it may be rendered possible by mechanical
irritation (as by the stimulation of a full bladder) and in women without
any stimulation at all; such cases can have little psychological
significance. Moreover, he seems to admit that some subdivisions of his
first class are true inverts. He further mentions that some 75 per cent.
of the individuals included in these classes are between 15 and 25 years
of age, that is to say, that they have scarcely emerged from the period
when we have reason to believe that, in a large number of individuals at
all events, the sexual impulse is not yet definitely differentiated; so
that neither its homosexual nor its heterosexual tendencies can properly
be regarded as spurious.
If, indeed, we really accept the very reasonable view, that the basis of
the sexual life is bisexual, although its direction may be definitely
fixed in a heterosexual or homosexual direction at a very early period in
life, it becomes difficult to see how we can any longer speak with
certainty of a definitely spurious class of homosexual persons. Everyone
of Hirschfeld's three classes may well contain a majority of genuinely
homosexual or bisexual persons. The prostitutes and even the blackmailers
are certainly genuine inverts in very many cases. Those persons, again,
who allow themselves to be the recipients of homosexual attentions may
well possess traces of homosexual feeling, and are undoubtedly in very
many cases lacking in vigorous heterosexual impulse. Finally, the persons
who turn to their own sex when forcibly excluded from the society of the
opposite sex, can by no means be assumed, without question, to be normal
heterosexual persons. It is only a small proportion of heterosexual
persons who experience these impulses under such conditions. There are
always others who under the same conditions remain emotionally attracted
to the opposite sex and sexually indifferent to their own sex. There is
evidently a difference, and that difference may most reasonably be
supposed to be in the existence of a trace of homosexual feeling which is
called into activity under the abnormal conditions, and subsides when the
stronger heterosexual impulse can again be gratified.
The real distinction would seem, therefore, to be between a homosexual
impulse so strong that it subsists even in the presence of the
heterosexual object, and a homosexual impulse so weak that it is eclipsed
by the presence of the heterosexual object. We could not, however,
properly speak of the latter as any more "spurious" or "pseudo" than the
former. A heterosexual person who experiences a homosexual impulse in the
absence of any homosexual disposition is not today easy to accept. We can
certainly accept the possibility of a mechanical or other non-sexual
stimulus leading to a sexual act contrary to the individual's disposition.
But usually it is somewhat difficult to prove, and when proved it has
little psychological significance or importance. We may expect, therefore,
to find "pseudo-homosexuality," or spurious homosexuality, playing a
dwindling part in classification.
The simplest of all possible classifications, and that which I adopted in
the earlier editions of the present _Study_, merely seeks to distinguish
between those who, not being exclusively attracted to the opposite sex,
are exclusively attracted to the same sex, and those who are attracted to
both sexes. The first are the homosexual, whether or not the attraction
springs from genuine inversion. The second are the bisexual, or, as they
were formerly more often termed, following Krafft-Ebing, psycho-sexual
hermaphrodites.[135] There would thus seem to be a broad and simple
grouping of all sexually functioning persons into three comprehensive
divisions: the heterosexual, the bisexual, and the homosexual.
Even this elementary classification seems however of no great practical
use. The bisexual group is found to introduce uncertainty and doubt. Not
only a large proportion of persons who may fairly be considered normally
heterosexual have at some time in their lives experienced a feeling which
may be termed sexual toward individuals of their own sex, but a very large
proportion of persons who are definitely and markedly homosexual are found
to have experienced sexual attraction toward, and have had relationships
with, persons of the opposite sex. The social pressure, urging all persons
into the normal sexual channel, suffices to develop such slight germs of
heterosexuality as homosexual persons may possess, and so to render them
bisexual. In the majority of adult bisexual persons it would seem that the
homosexual tendency is stronger and more organic than the heterosexual
tendency. Bisexuality would thus in a large number of cases be comparable
to ambidexterity, which Biervliet has found to occur most usually in
people who are organically left-handed.[136] While therefore the division
into heterosexual, bisexual, and homosexual is a useful superficial
division, it is scarcely a scientific classification.
In the face of these various considerations, and in view of the fact that,
while I feel justified in regarding the histories of my cases as reliable
so far as they go, I have not been always able to explore them
extensively, it has seemed best to me to attempt no classification at all.
The order in which the following histories appear is not, therefore, to be
regarded as possessing any significance.
It may be proper, at this point, to say a few words as to the
reliability of the statements furnished by homosexual persons.
This has sometimes been called in question. Many years ago we
used to be told that inverts are such lying and deceitful
degenerates that it was impossible to place reliance on anything
they said. It was also usual to say that when they wrote
autobiographical accounts of themselves they merely sought to
mold them in the fashion of those published by Krafft-Ebing. More
recently the psychoanalysts have made a more radical attack on
all histories not obtained by their own methods as being quite
unreliable, even when put forth in good faith, in part because
the subject withholds much that he either regards as too trivial
or too unpleasant to bring forward, and in part because he cannot
draw on that unconscious field within himself wherein, it is
held, the most significant facts in his own sexual history are
concealed. Thus Sadger ("Ueber den Wert der Autobiographien
Sexuell Perverser," _Fortschritte der Medizin_, nos. 26-28, 1913)
vigorously puts forward this view and asserts that the
autobiographies of inverts are worthless, although his assertions
are somewhat discounted by the fact that they accompany an
autobiography, written in the usual manner, to which he
attributes much value.
The objection to homosexual autobiographic statements dates from
a period when the homosexual were very little known, and it was
supposed that their moral character generally was fairly
represented by a small section among them which attracted more
attention than the rest by reason of discreditable conduct. But,
in reality, as we now know, there are all sorts of people, with
all varieties of moral character, to be found among inverts, just
as among normal people. Sadger (_Archiv für
Kriminal-Anthropologie_, 1913, p. 199) complains of the "great
insincerity of inverts in not acknowledging their inversion;"
but, as Sadger himself admits, we cannot be surprised at this so
long as inversion is counted a crime. The most normal persons,
under similar conditions, would be similarly insincere. If the
homosexual differ in any respect, under this aspect, from the
heterosexual, it is by exhibiting a more frequent tendency to be
slightly neuropathic, nervously sensitive, and femininely
emotional. These tendencies, while on the one hand they are
liable to induce a very easily detectable vanity, may also lead
to an unusual self-subordination to veracity. On the whole, it
may be said, in my own experience, that the best histories
written by the homosexual compare favorably for frankness,
intelligence, and power of self-analysis with those written by
the heterosexual.
The ancient allegation that inverts have written their own
histories on the model, or under the suggestion, of those
published in Krafft-Ebing's _Psychopathia Sexualis_ can scarcely
have much force now that the published histories are so extremely
varied and numerous that they cannot possibly produce any uniform
impression on the most sensitively receptive mind. As a matter of
fact, there is no doubt that inverts have frequently been
stimulated to set down the narrative of their own experiences
through reading those written by others. But the stimulation has,
as often as not, lain in the fact that their own experiences have
seemed different, not that they have seemed identical. The
histories that they read only serve as models in the sense that
they indicate the points on which information is desired. I have
often been able to verify this influence, which would in any case
seem to be fairly obvious.
Psycho-analysis is, in theory, an ideal method of exploring many
psychic conditions, such as hysteria and obsessions, which are
obscure and largely concealed beneath the psychic surface. In
most homosexual cases the main facts are, with the patient's
good-will and the investigator's tact, not difficult to
ascertain. Any difficulties which psychoanalysis may help to
elucidate mainly concern the early history of the case in
childhood, and, regarding these, psychoanalysis may sometimes
raise questions which it cannot definitely settle.
Psycho-analysis reveals an immense mass of small details, any of
which may or may not possess significance, and in determining
which are significant the individuality of the psychoanalyst
cannot fail to come into play. He will necessarily tend to
arrange them according to a system. If, for instance, he regards
infantile incestuous emotions or early Narcissism as an essential
feature of the mechanism of homosexuality, a conscientious
investigator will not rest until he has discovered traces of
them, as he very probably will. (See, e.g., Sadger, "Fragment der
Psychoanalyse eines Homosexuellen," _Jahrbuch für sexuelle
Zwischenstufen_, Bd. ix, 1908; and cf. Hirschfeld, _Die
Homosexualität_, p. 164). But the exact weight and significance
of these traces may still be doubtful, and, even if considerable
in one case, may be inconsiderable in another. Freud, who sets
forth one type of homosexual mechanism, admits that there may be
others. Moreover, it must be added that the psychoanalytic method
by no means excludes unconscious deception by the subject, as
Freud found, and so was compelled to admit the patient's tendency
to "fantasy," as Adler has to "fictions," as a fundamental
psychic tendency of the "unconscious."
The force of these considerations is now beginning to be
generally recognized. Thus Moll (art. "Homosexualität," in 4th
ed. of Eulenburg's _Realencyclopädie der gesamten Heilkunde_,
1909, p. 611) rightly says that while the invert may occasionally
embroider his story, "the expert can usually distinguish between
the truth and the poetry, though it is unnecessary to add that
complete confidence on the patient's part is necessary," Näcke,
again (_Sexual-Probleme_, September, 1911, p. 619), after quoting
with approval the remark of one of the chief German authorities,
Dr. Numa Praetorius, that "a great number of inverts' histories
are at the least as trustworthy as the attempts of
psychoanalysts, especially when they come from persons skillful
in self-analysis," adds that "even Freudian analysis gives no
absolute guarantee for truth. A healthy skepticism is
justifiable--but not an unhealthy skepticism!" Hirschfeld, also
(_Die Homosexualität_, p. 164), whose knowledge of such histories
is unrivalled, remarks that while we may now and then meet with a
case of _pseudo-logia fantastica_ in connection with psychic
debility on the basis of a psychopathic constitution, "taken all
in all any generalized assertion of the falsehood of inverts is
an empty fiction, and is merely a sign that the physicians who
make it have not been able to win the trust of the men and women
who consult them." My own experience has fully convinced me of
the truth of this, statement. I am assured that many of the
inverts I have met not only possess a rare power of intellectual
self-analysis (stimulated by the constant and inevitable contrast
between their own feelings and those of the world around them),
but an unsparing sincerity in that self-analysis not so very
often attained by normal people.
The histories which follow have been obtained in various ways,
and are of varying degrees of value. Some are of persons whom I
have known very well for very long periods, and concerning whom I
can speak very positively. A few are from complete strangers
whose good faith, however, I judge from internal evidence that I
am able to accept. Two or three were written by persons
who--though educated, in one case a journalist--had never heard
of inversion, and imagined that their own homosexual feelings
were absolutely unique in the world. A fair number were written
by persons whom I do not myself know, but who are well known to
others in whose judgment I feel confidence. Perhaps the largest
number are concerned with individuals who wrote to me
spontaneously in the first place, and whom I have at intervals
seen or heard from since, in some cases during a very long
period, so that I have slowly been able to fill in their
histories, although the narratives, as finally completed, may
have the air of being written down at a single sitting. I have
not admitted any narrative which I do not feel that I am
entitled to regard as a substantially accurate statement of the
facts, although allowance must occasionally be made for the
emotional coloring of these facts, the invert sometimes
cherishing too high an opinion, and sometimes too low an opinion,
of his own personality.
HISTORY I.--Both parents healthy; father of unusually fine
_physique_. He is himself a manual worker and also of
exceptionally fine _physique_. He is, however, of nervous
temperament. He is mentally bright, though not highly educated, a
keen sportsman, and in general a good example of an all-around
healthy Englishman.
While very affectionate, his sexual desires are not strongly
developed on the physical side, and seem never to have been so.
He sometimes masturbated about the age of puberty, but never
afterward. He does not appear to have well-marked erotic dreams.
There used to be some attraction toward women, though it was
never strong. At the age of 26 he was seduced by a woman and had
connection with her once. Afterward he had reason to think she
had played him false in various ways. This induced the strongest
antipathy, not only to this woman, but to all marriageable women.
A year after this episode homosexual feeling first became clear
and defined. He is now 33, and feels the same antipathy to women;
he hates even to speak of marriage.
There has only been one really strong attraction, toward a man of
about the same age, but of different social class, and somewhat a
contrast to him, both physically and mentally. So far as the
physical act is concerned this relationship is not definitely
sexual, but it is of the most intimate possible kind, and the
absence of the physical act is probably largely due to
circumstances. At the same time there is no conscious desire for
the act for its own sake, and the existing harmony and
satisfaction are described as very complete. There is no
repulsion to the physical side, and he regards the whole
relationship as quite natural.
HISTORY II.--B.O., English, aged 35, missionary abroad. A brother
is more definitely inverted. B.O. has never had any definitely
homosexual relationships, although he has always been devoted to
boys; nor has he had any relationships with women. "As regards
women," he says, "I feel I have not the patience to try and
understand them; they are petulant and changeable," etc. He
objects to being called "abnormal," and thinks that people like
himself are "_extremely_ common."
"I have never wanted to kiss boys," he writes, "nor to handle
them in any way except to put my arm around them at their studies
and at other similar times. Of course, with really little boys,
it is different, but boys and girls under 14 seem to me much
alike, and I can love either equally well. As to any sort of
sexual connection between myself and one of my own sex, I cannot
think of it otherwise than with disgust. I can imagine great
pleasure in having connection with a woman, but their natures do
not attract me. Indeed, my liking for my own sex seems to consist
almost entirely in a preference for the masculine character, and
the feeling that as an object to _look at_ the male body is
really more beautiful than the female. When any strong
temptations to sexual passion come over me in my waking moments,
it is of women I think. On the other hand, I have to confess that
after being with some lad I love for an hour or two, I have
sometimes felt my sexual organs roused. But only once in my life
have I experienced a strong desire to sleep in the same bed with
a particular lad, and even then no idea of doing anything entered
my mind. Needless to say, I did not sleep with him.
"I never feel tempted by any girls here, although I see so many
with their bodies freely exposed, and plenty of them have really
pretty faces. Neither do I feel tempted to do anything improper
with any of the boys, although I frequently sit talking with one
who has very little on. But I find the constant sight of
well-shaped bare limbs has a curious effect on the mind and comes
before one's imagination as a picture at unlooked-for times. But
the most curious thing of all is this: There are several lads
here of whom I am very fond. Now when they are near me I think of
them with only the purest and most tender feelings, but sometimes
at night when I am half asleep, or when I am taking my midday
siesta, my imagination pictures one of these lads approaching a
girl, or actually lying with her, and the strange thing is that I
do not feel any desire myself to approach the girl, but I feel I
wish I were in _her_ place and the lad was coming to _me_. In my
calm, waking moments it disgusts and rather horrifies me to find
myself apparently so unsexed--yet such is the fact, and the
experience, with only slight changes, repeats itself over and
over again. It is not that I, as a man, wish even in imagination
to act improperly with a boy, but I feel I would like to be in
the girl's place, and the strange thing is that in all these
dreams and imaginings I can always apparently enter into the
feelings of the woman better than into those of the man.
Sometimes I fancy for a moment that perhaps reincarnation is true
and I was a woman in my last life. Sometimes I fancy that when I
was in the womb I was formed as a girl and the sexual organs
changed just at the last moment. It is a curious problem. Don't
think I worry about it. Only at long intervals do I think of
it.... The thing has its bright side. Boys and men seem to have
tender feelings toward me, such as one expects them to have for
members of the opposite sex, and I get into all the closer
contact with them in consequence."
HISTORY III.--F.R., English, aged 50, Belongs on both sides to
healthy, normal families, of more than average ability. Father
was 35 at birth, and mother 27. He is the second of four
children. There was a considerable interval between the births of
the children, which were spread over twenty-one years. All are
normal, except F.R., two of them married and with families.
Owing to the difference of age between the children, F.R. (who
was three years younger than his elder brother, and more than
four years older than his sister, the third child) had no male
companionship and was constantly alone with his mother. "Being
naturally imitative," he remarks, "I think I acquired her tastes
and interests and habits of thought. However that may be, I feel
sure that my interests and amusements were more girlish than
boyish. By way of illustration, I may mention that I have often
been told by a friend of my mother's that, on one occasion, I was
wanting a new hat, and none being found of a size to fit me, I
congratulated myself that I should therefore be obliged to have a
_bonnet!_ As regards my feminine tastes and instincts, I have
always been conscious of taking interest in questions of family
relationships, etiquette, dress (women's as much as, or more
than, men's) and other things of that kind, which, as a rule,
were treated with indifference or contempt. In the house I take
more notice than my sister does of the servants' deficiencies and
neglects, and am much more orderly in my arrangements than she
is."
There is nothing markedly feminine in the general appearance.
Pubertal development took place at an early age, long before
fourteen, with nocturnal emissions, but without erotic dreams.
The testicles are well developed, the penis perhaps rather below
the average in size, and the prepuce long and narrow. Erection
occurs with much facility, especially at night. When young he
knew nothing of masturbation, but he began the habit about ten
years ago, and has practised it occasionally ever since.
Although he likes the society of women to a certain extent, he
soon grows tired of it, and has never had any desire to marry.
His sexual dreams never have any relation to women. "I am
generally doing or saying something," he remarks, "to some man
whom I know when awake, something which I admit I might wish to
do or say if it were not quite out of the question on grounds of
propriety and self-respect."
He has, however, never had any intimate relationships with men,
and much that he has heard of such relationships fills him with
horror.
"What I feel about myself is," he writes, "that I have to a
certain extent, or in some respects, a feminine mind in a male
body; or, I might put it that I am a combination of an immoral
(in tendency, rather than in act) woman and a religious man.
From time to time I have felt strong affection for young men, but
I cannot flatter myself that my affection has been reciprocated.
At the present time there is a young fellow (23 years old) who
acts as my clerk and sits in my room. He is extremely
good-looking, and of a type which is generally considered
'aristocratic,' but so far as I (or he) know, he is quite of the
lower middle class. He has little to recommend him but a fine
face and figure, and there is nothing approaching to mental or
social equality between us. But I constantly feel the strongest
desire to treat him as a man might a young girl he warmly loved.
Various obvious considerations keep me from more than
quasi-paternal caresses, and I feel sure he would resent very
strongly anything more. This constant repression is trying beyond
measure to the nerves, and I often feel quite ill from that
cause. Having had no experiences of my own, I am always anxious
to learn anything I can of the sexual relations of other men, and
their organs, but I have no curiosity whatever concerning the
other sex. My chief pleasure and source of gratification is found
in the opportunities afforded by Turkish and other baths;
wherever, in fact, there is the nude male to be found. But I
seldom find in these places anyone who seems to have the same
tendency as myself, and certainly I have not met with more than
two cases among the attendants, who responded to my hinted desire
to see everything. Under a shampooer, particularly an unfamiliar
one, I occasionally experience an orgasm, but less often now than
when I was younger."
F.R. is very short-sighted. His favorite color is blue. He is
able to whistle. His tastes are chiefly of a literary character,
and he has never had any liking for sports. "I have been
generally considered ineffective in the use of my hands," he
writes, "and I am certainly not skillful. All I have ever been
able to do in that way is to net and do the simpler forms of
needlework; but it seems more natural to me to do, or try to do,
everything of that sort, and to play on the piano, rather than to
shoot or play games. I may add that I am fonder of babies than
many women, and am generally considered to be surprisingly
capable of holding them! Certainly I enjoy doing so. As a youth,
I used to act in charades; but I was too shy to do so unless I
was dressed as a woman and veiled; and when I took a woman's part
I _felt_ less like _acting_ than I have done in _propria
persona_. A remark made by an uncle once rather annoyed me: that
it seemed more like nature than art. But he was quite right."
HISTORY IV.--Of Lowland Scotch parentage. Both sides of house
healthy and without cerebral or nervous disease. Homosexual
desires began at puberty. He practised onanism to a limited
extent at school and up to the age of about 22. His erotic dreams
are exclusively about males. While very friendly and intimate
with women of all ages, he is instantly repelled by any display
of sexual affection on their side. This has happened in varying
degree in three or four cases. With regard to marriage, he
remarks: "As there seems no immediate danger of the race dying
out, I leave marriage to those who like it." His male ideal has
varied to some extent. It has for some years tended toward a
healthy, well-developed, athletic or out-of-door working type,
intelligent and sympathetic, but not specially intellectual.
At school his sexual relations were of the simplest type. Since
then there have been none. "This," he says, "is not due either to
absence of desire or presence of 'morals.' To put it shortly,
'there were never the time and the place and the loved one
together.' In another view, physical desire and the general
affection have not always coexisted toward the same person; and
the former without the latter is comparatively transient; while
the latter stops the gratification of the former, if it is felt
that that gratification could in any way make the object of
affection unhappy, mentally or emotionally."
He is healthy and fairly well developed; of sensitive, emotional
nature, but self-controlled; mentally he is receptive and
aggressive by turns, sometimes uncritical, sometimes analytical.
His temper is equable, and he is strongly affectionate. Very fond
of music and other arts, but not highly imaginative.
Of sexual inversion in the abstract he says he has no views, but
he thus sums up his moral attitude: "I presume that, if it is
there, it is there for use or abuse, as men please. I condemn
gratification of bodily desire at the expense of others, in
whatever form it may take. I condemn it no more in its inverted
form than in the ordinary. I believe that affection between
persons of the same sex, even when it includes the sexual passion
and its indulgences, may lead to results as splendid as human
nature can ever attain to. In short, I place it on an absolute
equality with love as ordinarily understood."
HISTORY V.--S.W., aged 64, English, musical journalist. The
communication which follows (somewhat abbreviated) was written
before S.W. had heard or read anything about sexual inversion,
and when he still believed that his own case was absolutely
unique.
"I am the son of a clergyman, and lived for the first thirteen
years of my life in the country town where I was born. Then my
father became the vicar of a country village, where I lived until
I went out into the world at the age of 18. As during the whole
of this time my father had a few pupils, I was educated with
them, and never went to school. I was born, I fancy, with sexual
passions about as strong as can well be imagined, and at the same
time was very precocious in my entry into the stage of puberty.
Semen began to form a little before my twelfth birthday; hair
soon followed, and in a year I was in that respect the equal of
an average boy of 15 or 16. I conversed freely with my companions
on the relations of the sexes, but, unlike them, had no personal
feeling toward girls. In time I became conscious that I was
different, as I then believed, and believe now, from all other
men. My sexual organs were quite perfect. But in the frame of a
man I had the sexual mind of a female. I distinctly disclaim the
faintest inclination to perform unnatural acts; the idea of
committing sodomy would be _most disgusting_.
"To come to my actual condition of mind: While totally
indifferent to the person of woman (I always enjoyed their
friendship and companionship, and many of my best friends have
been ladies), I had a burning desire to have carnal intercourse
with a male, and had the capacity for falling in love, as it is
called, to the utmost extent. In imagination, I possessed the
female organ, and felt toward man exactly as an amorous female
would. At the time when I became fully conscious of my condition,
I attached little importance to it; I had not a notion of its
terrible import, nor of the future misery it would entail. All
that I had to learn by bitter experience.
"I did once think of forcing myself to have connection with a
prostitute in order to see whether the actual sensual enjoyment
might bring a change, and so have the power to marry. But when it
came to thinking over ways and means, my repugnance to the act
became so strong that it was quite out of the question. In the
case of any male to whom I became attached, I wanted to feel
ourselves together, skin to skin, and to be privileged to take
such liberties as an amorous female would take if that were all
permitted. I sought no purely sensual gratification of any kind;
my love was far too genuine for that.
"During the rather more than half a century which has elapsed
since my twelfth birthday, I have been genuinely in love about
thirteen times. I despair attempting to give an idea of the depth
and reality of my feelings. I have alluded to my precocity. I was
in love when 12 years old, the object being a man of 24, a
well-known analytical chemist. He came to my father's house very
frequently; and my heart beat almost at the mention of his name.
"The next serious time I was about 15. It was a farmer's son,
about two years older. I don't think that I was ever alone with
him, and really only knew him as a member of his family, yet for
a time he was my chief interest in life.
"When 21 I had a 'chum,' a youth of 17, who entertained for me,
at any rate, a brotherly affection. We were under the same roof,
and early one summer morning he got out of bed and came direct to
my room to talk about some matter or other. In order to talk more
comfortably he got into bed with me and we lay there just as two
school-girls might have done. This proximity was more than I
could stand, and my heart began to beat so that it was impossible
that he should not notice it. As, of course, he could not have
the slightest notion of the reason, he said in all innocence,
'Why, how your heart beats. I can hear it quite plainly.'
"So far my details are purely innocent. Up to 18, familiarities
passed at intervals between me and the son of the village doctor,
a youth about two years older than myself, and precociously
immoral. I did not really care for him much, but he was my chief
companion. Then I became a school-assistant, and for about six
years managed to control myself, only, alas, to fall again.
Another resolution I kept for eight years, one long fight with my
nature. Again I sinned in three instances, extending over three
or four years. I now come to a very painful and eventful episode
in my unhappy life which I would gladly pass over were it
possible. It was a case, in middle life, of sin, discovery, and
great folly in addition.
"Before going into details, so far as may be necessary, I cannot
help asking you to consider calmly and dispassionately my exact
condition compared with that of my fellow-creatures as a whole.
In my struggles to resist in the past, I have at times felt as if
wrestling in the folds of a python. I again sinned, then, with a
youth and his friend. Oddly enough, discovery followed through a
man who was actuated by a feeling of revenge for a strictly right
act on my part. The lads refused to state more than the truth,
and this did not satisfy the man, and a _third_ lad was
introduced, who was prepared to say anything. This was not all;
some twelve or fifteen more boys made similar accusations! The
general belief, in consequence, was that I had committed
'nameless' crimes in all directions, _ad lib_. If you were to ask
me for an explanation of the action of all these boys beyond the
_third_, who, of course, had some special inducements, I can
offer none. They may have thought that the original trio were
regarded rather in the light of _heroes_; why should _they_ not
be heroes, too?
"I might well feel crushed under such a load of accusations, but
that does not excuse the incredible folly of my conduct. I denied
alike the modicum of truth and the mass of lying, and went off to
America. However, as time passed on and my mind got into a proper
state, I felt that the truth must be told some time or other. I
accordingly wrote from America to the proper quarter a full
confession of my sin with regard to the two youths who had told
merely the truth, at the same time pointing out the falsehood of
all the rest of the accusations.
"I remained in America six years, and actually made money, so
that I could return to England with a small capital. I was also
under a promise to my three sisters (all older than myself) that
I would return in their lifetime. My programme was to purchase a
small, light business in London, and quietly earn my living; at
the same time making my presence known to no one. I _did_ buy
such a business, got swindled in the most clever way, and lost
every farthing I possessed in the world! I had to make my plight
known to old friends who all either gave or lent me money. Still
my position was a very precarious one. I tried an insurance
agency, one of the last resources of the educated destitute, but
soon found out that I was unfitted for work in which _impudence_
is a prime factor. Then an extraordinary stroke of good fortune
took place; almost simultaneously I began to get a few music
pupils, and literary work in connection with a good musical
journal.
"Making my presence known to old friends involved the same
information to those who were _not_ friends. My identity as a
journalist became known, and as time passed by it seemed to me as
if half the world had heard of my alleged iniquities. People who
have never set eyes on me seem to regard me in the light of a
monster of iniquity who ought not to be suffered to exist. All
these outsiders believe that I have committed 'nameless' offenses
times innumerable and lift up their hands in speechless horror at
the audacity of a man who, so situated, dares to appear openly in
public, under his own name, and look people in the face. They
have not even the brains to see that this very fearlessness
proves the fictitious character of their beliefs. Next, they
believe that if only they could get my dismissal from my
journalistic post I should be brought to starvation point. This
up to a year ago was true. Then an old relative died and left me
some property which I sold to invest in an annuity, and thus have
just enough to live on quietly, apart from what I may earn. Under
such strange conditions it might be asked whether life was not
unendurable. Frankly speaking, I cannot say that I find it so. I
have in London a few bachelor friends who go with me to theaters,
etc. In the suburbs I have about half a dozen family friends.
Here I meet with pleasant society and a hearty welcome. I am
passionately fond of music, have an excellent piano, and can hear
the best concerts in Europe. I go to all good plays. I am a good
chess player. Lastly, I am an omnivorous reader. You will allow
that my resources for passing the time are not limited.
"Of course, I am sorry that I sinned, and wish that I had not
done so. But I disclaim any feeling of shame."
S.W. was the youngest of four children and the only boy. His
father was 40 at his birth, his mother 33. The father was an
intellectual man of weak character, the mother a woman of violent
and eccentric temper, with, he believes, strong sexual passions.
S.W. knows of nothing in the family to account for his own
abnormal condition.
He is short (five feet five inches), but well built, with strong
chest and a powerful voice. His arms are weak and flabby
(feminine, he thinks), but the legs muscular. As a boy of 14 he
could walk forty miles with ease, and he played football till
near the age of 45. He is considered manly in character and
tastes, but is easily moved to tears under strong excitement.
There is no information as to the type of man to whom he is
attracted. I may observe, however, that the analytical chemist
who first evoked S.W.'s admiration was well known to me some
thirty years later, as he was my own teacher in chemistry. At
that time he was an elderly man of attractive appearance and
character, sympathetic and winning in manner to an almost
feminine extent.
S.W. has never felt the slightest sexual attraction toward the
opposite sex. The first indications of inverted feeling were at
the age of 6 or 7. Watching his father's pupils, boys of 13 or
14, from the windows, he speculated on what their organs of
generation were like. "In connection with a girl," he writes, "I
should no more have thought of such a thing than in the case of a
block of marble." About this time, indeed, he at times slept with
a sister of 10, who induced him to go through the form of sexual
connection, saying that it felt "so funny;" but he merely did
this to please her, and without the slightest interest or feeling
on his own part. This attitude became more marked with increased
knowledge, until he fell ardently in love at the age of 12.
Throughout life he has practised masturbation to a certain
extent, and is prepared to defend the practice in his own case.
His erotic dreams have been of only the vaguest and most shadowy
character. He is able to whistle. He takes a warm interest in
politics and in philanthropic work. But his chief love is for
music and he has published many musical compositions. On the
whole, and notwithstanding the persecution he has endured, he
does not regard his life as unhappy. At the same time he is
keenly conscious of the atmosphere of "Pariahdom" which surrounds
inverts, and in his own case this has never been alleviated by
any sense of companionship in misery. The facility with which
some inverts are said to recognize others of their own kind is
quite incomprehensible to him; he has never to his knowledge met
one.
HISTORY VI.--E.S., physician, aged 50.
"I have some reason," he writes, "for believing that some of my
relatives (on the paternal side) were not normal in their sexual
life. But I am sure that no such suspicion was entertained by
their friends or associates; they were very reticent people. A
great proportion of my near relatives have remained unmarried or
deferred marriage until late in life. None of them have been good
business men; all seem to have been more deeply concerned in
other things than in making--or in keeping--money. They have
mostly taken little or no share in public life, and not cared
much for society. Yet they have been folk of more than average
ability, with intellectual and æsthetic interests. We are prone
to enthusiasms, but lack perseverance. We are discursive and
superficial, perhaps, but none would call us stupid. We are
perhaps abnormally self-centered and self-conscious--never cruel
or vicious. Our powers of self-control are considerable; we are
conventional people only because we are lazy and intensely
dislike any open self-assertion. Yet we are nervous rather than
phlegmatic. All that is on the father's side. My maternal
ancestors have been concerned with farming and the sea and have
also had a similar lack of business capacity, but with less
mental adaptiveness and alertness, with more steadiness of
purpose, however, always doers rather than dreamers. Among them I
remember one cousin who was probably abnormal, although he died
when I was too young to notice much. Again, they were all rather
reserved people, but more genial with strangers, more socially
inclined, and with less self-control.
"I was an only child and a spoilt one. I was always quick at
school, fond of learning, and finding my lessons no trouble.
Serious study I disliked. But for school purposes I did not find
it necessary, and had no difficulty in carrying all before me. I
was never fond of games, although very fond of being out of doors
and of walking. Few of my relatives have been at all keen on
sport. I made no close friendships at school and was never very
popular with my schoolfellows, who, however, tolerated my odd
ways better than might have been expected. I was easily brought
to appreciate good literature, but I never had much power of
expression or of strenuous thought. I was extremely susceptible
and impressible, moved by beauty of any kind, but never at all
ambitious or in any way creative. I was easily stimulated to
work, and then loved to work; but, unless the stimulus were
maintained the natural indolence of my disposition asserted
itself, and I wasted my powers in dreams and trifles. My memory
was very quick and retentive, in the main, but curiously
capricious. I always lacked initiative and decision. At college
my successes were continued. I gained medals and prizes, passed
my examinations easily, and graduated 'with first-class honors.'
In my professional lifework I have been successful rather beyond
the average. I love it with all my heart.
"I cannot speak with any confidence about the first stirrings of
my sexual instincts, but I think I can assert that they have at
no time led me to any desire for the opposite sex. It is true
that my earliest recollection of the kind is concerned with
intimacies with a girl play-fellow, but as we had at the time
reached only the mature age of 7 (at the most) I fancy that our
mutual exhibitions--for there was nothing more--simply satisfied
our natural curiosity. Certainly these memories are, in my mind,
in no way set apart from the recollections of other kinds of
play. Next to that I remember the usual schoolboy talk about
things hidden and forbidden, but up till I was 12 or so this was
simply dirty talk, concerned more with renal and intestinal
functions than with any sexual feelings or understanding. One boy
was known to us all (and of my not inconsiderable circle of early
friends, all grew up to be normal people, who married and had
children in due course) for the unusual size of his parts and for
the freedom with which he invited and satisfied the curiosity of
his friends. He must have been precocious, for he could not have
been more than 12, and I remember to have heard that he had a
thick growth of pubic hair. Even then, although I know that my
curiosity--to put it at that only--was active, I never allowed
myself to have any dealings with him; and I think I should have
discouraged them had they been suggested to me. That is the odd
thing about my life: the things I longed intensely to do I would
not let myself do, not from any religious or moral scruple, but
from some inexplicable fastidiousness or scrupulosity which is
yet as active as ever, although I am sure that it would not be
able to hold its own could these favorable conditions be
repeated, but would be overcome by the imperious and fully grown
desires which, by long repression, or by unsatisfactory
diversion, have grown to be so strong. Indeed, given the
opportunity, and the assurance that no first seduction or
corruption of anyone was in question, they would prove quite
irrepressible.
"Certainly, long before puberty--which was early with me--I
remember being greatly attracted to certain boys, and wishing to
have an opportunity of sleeping with them. Had I been able to do
so, I am sure I should have been impelled to get into as close
contact with their naked body as possible, and I do not think I
should then have craved for anything more. I knew some
boys--perhaps a little older--who even then had relations, which
were certainly not innocent, with a girl who was a year or two
older than any of us. She once kissed me, to my intense shame.
But I felt that these relations would have been unspeakably
disgusting and I took no particular interest in hearing about
them. I remember being fondled and caressed by a very
good-looking boy of 16 when I was three or four years younger and
had sustained some hurt at play; and I am still able to recall
the thrill of delight that I experienced at his touch. Nothing
took place that all the world might not have seen, but I remember
being taken between his knees as he sat, and his arms being put
around my neck, and the warm, soft pressure of his thighs had an
unspeakable effect on me.
"About this time, too, an older boy, perhaps about 18, used to
get hold of smaller boys when on country walks, to throw them
down and then look at and toy with their genitals. He was
himself a handsome boy, and I was greatly excited when told about
this by boys who had experienced it, and wished greatly to have
it done to me. It never was; and if it had been attempted I know
I should have resisted with all my strength, although my desires
would have set me aflame. This boy died before he was 20, with a
psoas abscess, and I remember crying myself to sleep the night I
learned of his death. Another boy, about three years older than
myself, who had very silky hair, I used to be attracted by and I
was always trying to stroke his hair, but he always objected.
"I must have been about 12 when I first was taught to masturbate
by a cousin who was slightly older. At first I thought it silly,
but I used to watch him at it, and practised it myself from time
to time until I became old enough to experience the proper
sensation. Then I have reason to think I gave myself up to it
rather freely, but it was generally done in solitude, although it
was long before I realized that there was anything wrong about it
or that it might prove hurtful. Looking back now, I feel
perfectly certain that my instincts were wholly homosexual from
the very first. This cousin, who possessed notable intellectual
and artistic gifts, married, but I feel sure his liking for his
own sex was not normal.
"With another cousin, almost years my junior, I was always on
terms of the most affectionate intimacy. My holidays at his
parents' house were my greatest delight. We were always together
by night or day; we slept in the same bed, literally in each
other's arms. To me it afforded the keenest sexual pleasure to
press close to his naked body. We used mutually to handle and
caress our parts, but without any attempt at mutual masturbation,
although at that period I regularly practised it on myself. I
asked him once about it, but he had not been taught it by others;
and to my great pride and satisfaction I can say that I never
either did it to him or asked him to do it to me. This I mention
as an instance of my restraint in act, although my thoughts and
desires knew no such curb. I remember also an elder brother of
his, perhaps three or four years my senior, once showing me (then
about 12, I suppose) his semierect penis. He would not allow me
to touch it, but showed me how to draw back the foreskin so as to
uncover the glans. His penis was large, and the incident was not
forgotten. We had no other relation and I know that both he and
my own friend grew up to be quite normal men.
"I think I must have been about 17 when I got frightened about
the occurrence of nocturnal emissions, which I believed were the
evil result of masturbation, and for two or three years I
continued in considerable mental distress until, when in my
second or third year at college, I summoned up courage enough to
consult our good old family doctor, who reassured me, but made, I
now think, too light of my confidences, so that I relapsed the
more readily, although much later on, into old habits.
"From our windows at home we looked over a bit of common or down
to the beach, and I used to keep watch on warm summer afternoons;
over boys who might be bathing, to observe them through our
telescope. All this I kept strictly secret and I was never
surprised. I might just as well, and without arousing the
slightest suspicion of my motive, have walked down to the beach
and seen them and chatted with them; but this I could not have
brought myself to do. It gave me considerable sexual satisfaction
when I was able to see them bathing without pants. I also used to
watch them at play on the common, and felt rewarded when I saw,
as I not infrequently did, sexual familiarities taking place.
These violently excited me and sometimes brought on orgasm,
always erection with pleasure. Indeed, it was an experience of
this kind that made me return to masturbation after I had given
it up for a while. I remember one day seeing two lads of about 16
lying on the grass in the sunshine; all at once the bigger lad
put out his hand and tried to open his companion's trousers. He
resisted with all his might, and a long struggle ensued, ending
in the smaller lad having his penis exposed and manipulated by
the other. Even at this day the recollection of this excites me.
Both lads grew up to be normal men.
"Twice only have I been approached by grown-up people. When I was
about 13 I used to meet often, when going to school by train, an
old gentleman who courted me, as it were, used often to talk to
me and asked me to come to see his well-known scientific
collections, but I always had a vague distrust of him and never
went. One day in the summer during a spare hour I met him in an
empty room in the museum, where there were usually very few
visitors at that time of day, and where large show-cases gave
concealment. He came up to me and told me he had been away in the
country, and that, when making his way home through hedges and
thorny bushes, some of the thorns got stuck amongst his clothes
and were still giving him uneasiness. 'I would be very grateful,'
he said, 'if you would put your hand down and try if you can feel
any thorns sticking in my underflannels and pull them out.' He
then unbuttoned his braces on one side, undid his trousers and
made me thrust my hand over his groin and lower abdomen. I
avoided touching his genitals, but he pushed my hand down in that
direction until, burning with shame, I made my escape and ran
off, not stopping until I was safe in school. I scarcely
understood it, but never spoke of it, and avoided him ever
afterward. I learned later on that he was a well-off bachelor
who took a great interest in working lads and young men and did
much to help them on in life and keep them, so it was said, from
falling into bad company. He died at a great age and left most of
his fortune to an institution for lads, as well as large legacies
to youths in whom he had been interested.
"The other time was on top of a tramcar when a grown-up man who
was near pressed as close to me as he could, began to talk,
praised my dark eyes, then put his hand on my thigh under my
loose cloak and felt up toward my parts. At the same time he took
hold of my hand, caressed it and put it over his parts (it was in
the dusk). This excited me and, if we had not been at our
destination, I think I would gladly have permitted further
familiarities. He tried to ask me where I lived, but there was no
time to answer, and the female relative who was with me (on
another seat) would no doubt have prevented this from having any
further sequel.
"On more than one occasion I have experienced the sexual orgasm
as the result of mental anxiety. The first time this occurred was
when I was hurrying to avoid being late for school. Another time
was when I was about 24, and was extremely anxious to fill an
appointment for which I was late. So copious was the emission
that I had to go home and change.
"As a medical student, the first reference bearing definitely on
the subject of sexual inversion was made in the class of Medical
Jurisprudence, where certain sexual crimes were alluded to--very
summarily and inadequately--but nothing was said of the existence
of sexual inversion as the 'normal' condition of certain unhappy
people, nor was any distinction drawn between the various
non-normal acts, which were all classed together as
manifestations of the criminal depravity of ordinary or insane
people. To a student beginning to be acutely conscious that his
sexual nature differed profoundly from that of his fellows,
nothing could be more perplexing and disturbing, and it shut me
up more completely in my reserve than ever. I felt that this
teaching must be based on some radical error or prejudice or
misapprehension, for I knew from my own very clear remembrance of
my own development that my peculiarity was not acquired, but
inborn; my great misfortune undoubtedly, but not my fault.
"It was still more unfortunate that in the course of the lectures
on Clinical Medicine there was not the slightest allusion to the
subject. All sorts of rare diseases--some of which I have not yet
met with in the course of twenty-one years of a busy
practice--were fully discussed, but we were left entirely
ignorant of a subject so vitally important to me personally, and,
as it seems to me, to the profession to which I aspired. There
might have been an incidental reference to masturbation--although
I do not remember it--but its real significance received no
attention; and what we students knew of it was the result of our
reading or of our personal experiences.
"In the class of Mental Disease there was, naturally, more
detailed and systematic reference to facts in the sexual life and
to sexual inversion as a rare pathological condition. But still
there was not a comforting word to reassure me, growing ever more
hopelessly ashamed of what it seemed was a criminal or a gravely
morbid nature.
"Among all my fellow-students I knew of no one constituted like
myself; but my natural reserve--increased, of course, by my
consciousness of what I saw would be thought to be a criminal
tendency--did not urge me to exchange of confidences or to the
formation of; close friendships.
"After graduation I became a resident medical officer in the
hospital and private assistant to one of the professors--a
physician and teacher of worldwide reputation. With him I
associated on the most cordial and affectionate terms; and often
in the course of conversation I tried to bring him to discuss the
subject, but without success. It was obviously unpleasant and
uninteresting to him. Enough was said, however, to enable me to
realize that he held the current ideas on the subject; and I
would not for worlds have allowed him, to guess that I myself
came under the despised and tainted category.
"I have seldom heard sexual inversion discussed among my
professional friends. They speak of it with disgust or amusement.
I have never met a professional man who would consider it
dispassionately and scientifically. For them it was a subject
entirely belonging to psychological medicine.
"I have had no admitted case of it among my patients; but I have
often instinctively felt that some who consulted me about other
matters would have taken me into their confidence about that, but
for their fear of being cruelly misunderstood.
"As to my moral attitude I fear to speak. Grossness disgusts me;
but I am not sure that I should be able to resist temptation
placed in my way. But I am absolutely sure that I should never,
under any circumstances, tempt others to any disgraceful act. If
I ever committed any sexual act with one of my own sex whom I
loved, I could not look at it or approach it in any other than a
sacramental way. This sounds blasphemous and shocking, but I
cannot otherwise express my meaning.
"As regards the marriage of inverts, my own feeling is that for a
congenital invert--no matter how fully the situation be explained
beforehand--it is a step fraught with too great possibilities of
tragedy and of the deepest unhappiness, to be advised at all. My
view is that for the invert, far more than for the ordinary
person, there is no escape from the supreme necessity of
self-control in any relationship he may form. If that be attained
then the ideal is a relationship with another man of similar
temperament--not a platonic one, necessarily--by means of which
the highest happiness of both may be reached. But this can occur
_very_ seldom.
"To poetry and the fine arts I am very susceptible, and I have
given a great deal of time to this study. I am devoted heart and
soul to music, which is more and more to me every year I live.
Trivial or light music I cannot endure, but of Beethoven, Bach,
Händel, Schumann, Schubert, Brahms, Tschaikowsky, and Wagner I
should never hear enough. Here, too, my sympathies, are very
catholic, and I delight in McDowell, Debussy, Richard Strauss,
and Hugo Wolf."
HISTORY VII.--"My parentage is very sound and healthy. Both my
parents (who belong to the professional middle class) have good
general health; nor can I trace any marked abnormal or diseased
tendency, of mind or body, in any records of the family.
"Though of a strongly nervous temperament myself, and sensitive,
my health is good. I am not aware of any tendency to physical
disease. In early manhood, however, owing, I believe, to the
great emotional tension under which I lived, my nervous system
was a good deal shattered and exhausted. Mentally and morally my
nature is pretty well balanced, and I have never had any serious
perturbations in these departments.
"At the age of 8 or 9, and long before distinct sexual feelings
declared themselves, I felt a friendly attraction toward my own
sex, and this developed after the age of puberty into a
passionate sense of love, which, however, never found any
expression for itself till I was fully 20 years of age. I was a
day-boarder at school and heard little of school-talk on sex
subjects, was very reserved and modest besides; no elder person
or parent ever spoke to me on such matters; and the passion for
my own sex developed gradually, utterly uninfluenced from the
outside. I never even, during all this period, and till a good
deal later, learned the practice of masturbation. My own sexual
nature was a mystery to me. I found myself cut off from the
understanding of others, felt myself an outcast, and, with a
highly loving and clinging temperament, was intensely miserable.
I thought about my male friends--sometimes boys of my own age,
sometimes elder boys, and once even a master--during the day and
dreamed about them at night, but was too convinced that I was a
hopeless monstrosity ever to make any effectual advances. Later
on it was much the same, but gradually, though slowly, I came to
find that there were others like myself. I made a few special
friends, and at last it came to me occasionally to sleep with
them and to satisfy my imperious need by mutual embraces and
emissions. Before this happened, however, I was once or twice on
the brink of despair and madness with repressed passion and
torment.
"Meanwhile, from the first, my feeling, physically, toward the
female sex was one of indifference, and later on, with the more
special development of sex desires, one of positive repulsion.
Though having several female friends, whose society I like and to
whom I am sincerely attached, the thought of marriage or
cohabitation with any such has always been odious to me.
"As a boy I was attracted in general by boys rather older than
myself; after leaving school I still fell in love, in a romantic
vein, with comrades of my own standing. Now,--at the age of
37,--my ideal of love is a powerful, strongly built man, of my
own age or rather younger--preferably of the working class.
Though having solid sense and character, he need not be specially
intellectual. If endowed in the latter way, he must not be too
glib or refined. Anything effeminate in a man, or anything of the
cheap intellectual style, repels me very decisively.
"I have never had to do with actual pederasty, so called. My
chief desire in love is bodily nearness or contact, as to sleep
naked with a naked friend; the specially sexual, though urgent
enough, seems a secondary matter. Pederasty, either active or
passive, might seem in place to me with one I loved very
devotedly and who also loved me to that degree; but I think not
otherwise. I am an artist by temperament and choice, fond of all
beautiful things, especially the male human form; of active,
slight, muscular build; and sympathetic, but somewhat indecisive
character, though possessing self-control.
"I cannot regard my sexual feelings as unnatural or abnormal,
since they have disclosed themselves so perfectly naturally and
spontaneously within me. All that I have read in books or heard
spoken about the ordinary sexual love, its intensity and passion,
lifelong devotion, love at first sight, etc., seems to me to be
easily matched by my own experiences in the homosexual form; and,
with regard to the morality of this complex subject, my feeling
is that it is the same as should prevail in love between man and
woman, namely: that no bodily satisfaction should be sought at
the cost of another person's distress or degradation. I am sure
that this kind of love is, notwithstanding the physical
difficulties that attend it, as deeply stirring and ennobling as
the other kind, if not more so; and I think that for a perfect
relationship the actual sex gratifications (whatever they may be)
probably hold a less important place in this love than in the
other."
HISTORY VIII.--M.N., aged 30. "My grandfather might be said to be
of abnormal temperament, for, though of very humble origin, he
organized and carried out an extremely arduous mission work and
became an accomplished linguist, translating the Bible into an
Eastern tongue and compiling the first dictionary of that
language. He died, practically of overwork, at the age of 45. He
was twice married, my father being his third son by the second
wife. I believe that two, if not more, of the family (numbering
seven in all) were inverted, and the only one of them to marry
was my father. My grandmother was the last representative of an
old and very 'wild' Irish family. She died at an advanced age, of
paralysis. My father was 36 and my mother 21 at the time of their
marriage. I was born three years after and was their only child.
The marriage proved a most unhappy one, they being utterly
unsuited to each other in every way.
"My father's health during the first years of his marriage was
very delicate, and I have reason to believe that it had been
undermined in certain ways by his life abroad. I understand I was
born with slight gonorrheal affection, and as a child my health
was very indifferent. This latter may have been brought about by
the peculiarly unhappy and unnatural life I led. I had no
companions of my own age, and did not even attend any school
until after my mother's death. My father superintended my
education up to that time, and I had free access to a large and
very varied library, and a great deal of solitary leisure to
enjoy it in. There were a number of medical and scientific books
in it, which were my principal favorites, and I remember deciding
at a very early age to be a doctor. When about 5 years old I
recollect having a sexual dream connected with a railway porter.
It afforded me great pleasure to recall this dream, and about
that time I discovered a method of self-gratification (there is
not much 'teaching' required in these matters!).
"I cannot say that the dream I have mentioned constituted
absolutely the first intimation of inverted feeling, but rather
that it crystallized vague ideas which I might have already had
on the subject. I can recollect that when about between 3 and 4
years of age a young fellow of about 20 came to our house several
times as a visitor. He was fond of children, I suppose, and I
generally sat on his knee and was kissed by him. This was a
source of great pleasure to me, but I cannot remember if it was
accompanied by erection. I can only recall that his attention and
caresses made a greater impression upon me than those of women.
When about that age too I was often aroused when sleeping with my
mother, and told not to lie on my face. I remember that erection
was always present on these occasions. The dream was the first of
many of its kind, and in my case they have never been accompanied
by emission. They have always been of an 'inverted' character,
though I have occasionally had dreams about women. These latter,
however, have usually partaken somewhat of the nature of a
nightmare!
"Up to the age of 14 I felt much perplexed and depressed by my
views on sexual desire, and was convinced that they were peculiar
to myself. This, combined with the solitary condition of my
life, and about four years' continued ill-treatment prior to my
mother's death (she had given way to drink for that period), had
a very injurious effect on my health, mental and bodily. Looking
back from my present point of view, I can understand and forgive
many things which appeared monstrous and unjust to me as a child.
My mother's life must have been a very unhappy one, and she was
bitterly disappointed in many ways, very likely in me as well. My
unfortunate, misunderstood temperament led me to be shy and
secretive, and I was often ailing, and my training was not
calculated to improve matters. At last, however, change and
freedom came, and I was sent to a boarding-school. Here, of
course, I soon met with attachments and gratifications with other
boys. I arrived at puberty, and my health improved under happier
surroundings. I was not long in discovering that my companions
viewed the pleasures that meant so much to me from an entirely
different standpoint. Their gratifications were usually
accompanied by conversation about, and a general direction of
thought toward, females. When I had turned 15, owing to monetary
difficulties I was obliged to leave school, and was soon not only
thrown on my own resources, but accountable to no one but myself
for my conduct. Of course, my next discovery was that my case, so
far from being peculiar, was a most common one, and I was quickly
initiated into all the mysteries of inversion, with its
freemasonry and 'argot.' Altogether my experience of inverts has
been a pretty wide and varied one, and I have always endeavored
to classify and compare cases which have come under my notice
with a view to arriving at some sort of conclusion or
explanation.
"I suppose it is due to female versatility or impressibility that
it is possible for me to experience mentally the emotions
attributable to either sex, according to the age and temperament
of my companion; for instance, with one older than myself,
possessing well-marked male characteristics, I am able to feel
all that surrender and dependence which is so essentially
feminine. On the other hand, if with a youth of feminine type and
behavior I can realize, with an equal amount of pleasure, the
tender, yet dominant, attitude of the male.
"I experience no particular 'horror' of women sexually. I should
imagine that my feeling toward them resembles very much what
normal people feel with regard to others of their own sex." M.N.
remarks that he cannot whistle, and that his favorite color is
green.
In this case the subject easily found a moral _modus vivendi_ with his
inverted instinct, and he takes its gratification for granted. In the
following case, which, I believe, is typical of a large group, the subject
has never yielded to his inverted impulses, and, except so far as
masturbation is concerned, has preserved strict chastity.
HISTORY IX.--R.S., aged 31, American of French descent. "Upon the
question of heredity I may say that I belong to a reasonably
healthy, prolific, and long-lived family. On my father's side,
however, there is a tendency toward pulmonary troubles. He
himself died of pneumonia, and two of his brothers and a nephew
of consumption. Neither of my parents were morbid or eccentric.
Excepting for a certain shyness with strangers, my father was a
very masculine man. My mother is somewhat nervous, but is not
imaginative, nor at all demonstrative in her affections. I think
that my own imaginative and artistic temperament must come from
my father's side. Perhaps my French ancestry has something to do
with it. With the exception of my maternal grandfather, all my
progenitors have been of French descent. My mother's father was
English.
"I possess a mercurial temperament and a strong sense of the
ludicrous. Though my _physique_ is slight, my health has always
been excellent. Of late years especially I have been greatly
given to introspection and self-scrutiny, but have never had any
hallucinations, mental delusions, nor hysterics, and am not at
all superstitious. Spiritualistic manifestations, hypnotic
dabblings, and the other psychical fads of the day have little or
no attraction for me. In fact, I have always been skeptical of
them, and they rather bore me.
"At school I was an indolent, dreamy boy, shirking study, but
otherwise fairly docile to my teachers. From earliest childhood I
have indulged in omnivorous taste for reading, my particular
likings being for travels, esthetics, metaphysical and
theological subjects, and more recently for poetry and certain
forms of mysticism. I never cared much for history or for
scientific subjects. From the beginning, too, I showed a strong
artistic bent, and possessed an overpowering love for all things
beautiful. As a child I was passionately fond of flowers, loved
to be in the woods and alone, and wanted to become an artist. My
parents opposed the latter wish and I gave way before their
opposition.
"In me the homosexual nature is singularly complete, and is
undoubtedly congenital. The most intense delight of my childhood
(even when a tiny boy in a nurse's charge) was to watch acrobats
and riders at the circus. This was not so much for the skillful
feats as on account of the beauty of their persons. Even then I
cared chiefly for the more lithe and graceful fellows. People
told me that circus actors were wicked, and would steal little
boys, and so I came to look upon my favorites as half-devil and
half-angel. When I was older and could go about alone, I would
often hang around the tents of travelling shows in hope of
catching a glimpse of the actors. I longed to see them naked,
without their tights, and used to lie awake at night thinking of
them and longing to be loved and embraced by them. A certain
bareback rider, a sort of jockey, used especially to please me on
account of his handsome legs, which were clothed in fleshlings up
to his waist, leaving his beautiful loins uncovered by a
breech-clout. There was nothing consciously sensual about these
reveries, because at the time I had no sensual feelings or
knowledge. Curiously enough, the women-actors repelled me then
(as they do to this day) quite as strongly as I was attracted by
the men.
"I used, also, to take great pleasure in watching men and boys in
swimming, but my opportunities for seeing them thus were
extremely rare. I never dared let my comrades know how I felt
about these matters, but the sight of a well-formed, naked youth
or man would fill me (and does now) with mingled feelings of
bashfulness, anguish, and delight. I used to tell myself endless
stories of a visionary castle inhabited by beautiful boys, one of
whom was especially my dear chum.
"It was always the _prince_, in fairy tales, who held my interest
or affection. I was constantly falling in love with handsome boys
whom I never knew; nor did I ever try to mix in their company,
for I was abashed before them, and had no liking nor aptitude for
boyish games. Sometimes I played with girls because they were
more quiet and gentler, but I cared for them little or not at
all.
"As is usually the case, my parents neglected to impart to me any
sexual knowledge, and such as I possessed was gathered furtively
from tainted sources, bad boys' talk at school and elsewhere. My
elders let me know, in a vague way, that talk of the kind was
wicked, and natural timidity and a wish to be 'good' kept me from
learning much about sexual matters. As I never went to
boarding-school, I was spared, perhaps, many of the degrading
initiations administered by knowing boys at such institutions.
"In spite of what has been said above, I do not believe that I
was sexually very precocious, and even now I feel that more
pleasure would ensue from merely contemplating than from personal
contact with the object of my amorous attentions.
"As I grew older there came, of course, an undefined physical
longing, but it was the _beauty_ of those I admired which mainly
appealed to me. At the time of puberty I spontaneously acquired
the habit of masturbation. Once while bathing I found that a
pleasant feeling came with touching the sexual organs. It was not
long before I was confirmed in the habit. At first I practised it
but seldom, but afterward much more frequently (say, once a
week), though at times months have elapsed without any
indulgences on my part. I have only had erotic dreams three or
four times in my life. The masturbation habit I regard as
morally reprehensible and have made many resolutions to break it,
but without avail. It affords me only the most momentary
satisfaction, and is always followed by remorseful scruples.
"I have never in my life had any sexual feeling for a woman, nor
any sexual connection with any woman whatsoever. The very thought
of such a thing is excessively repugnant and disgusting to me.
This is true, apart from any moral considerations, and I do not
think I could bring myself to it. I am not attracted by young
women in any way. Even their physical beauty has little or no
charm for me, and I often wonder how men can be so affected by
it. On the other hand, I am not a woman-hater, and have several
strong friends of the opposite sex. They are, however, women
older than myself, and our friendship is based solely on certain
intellectual or esthetic tastes we have in common.
"I have had practically no physical relations with men; at any
rate, none specifically sexual. Once, when about 19 or 21, I
started to embrace a beautifully formed youth with whom I was
sleeping, but timidity and scruples got the better of my
feelings, and, as my bedfellow was not amorously inclined toward
me, nothing came of it. A few years after this I became strongly
attached to a friend whom I had already known for several years.
Circumstances threw us very much together during one summer. It
was now that I felt for the first time the full shock of love. He
returned my affection, but both of us were shy of showing our
feelings or speaking of them. Often when walking together after
night-fall we would put our arms about each other. Sometimes,
too, when sleeping together we would lie in close contact, and my
friend once suggested that I put my legs against his. He
frequently begged me to spend the night with him; but I began to
fear my feelings, and slept with him but seldom. We neither of us
had any definite ideas about homosexual relations, and, apart
from what I have related above, we had no further contact with
each other. A few months after our amorous feelings had developed
my friend died. His death caused me great distress, and my
naturally religious temperament began to manifest itself quite
strongly. At this time, too, I first read some writings of Mr.
Addington Symonds, and certain allusions in his work, coupled
with my recent experience, soon stirred me to a full
consciousness of my inverted nature.
"About eight months after my friend's death I happened to meet in
a strange town a youth of about my own age who exerted upon me a
strong and instant attraction. He possessed a refined, handsome
face, was gracefully built, and, though he was rather
undemonstrative, we soon became fast friends.
"We were together only for a few days, when I was obliged to
leave for my home, and the parting caused me great unhappiness
and depression. A few months after we spent a vacation together.
One day during our trip we went swimming, and undressed in the
same bathhouse. When I saw my friend naked for the first time he
seemed to me so beautiful that I longed to throw my arms about
him and cover him with kisses. I kept my feelings hidden,
however, hardly daring to look at him for fear of being unable to
restrain my desires. Several times afterward, in his room, I saw
him stripped, with the same effect upon my emotions. Until I had
seen him naked my feelings for him were not of a physical
character, but afterward I longed for actual contact, but only by
embraces and kisses. Though he was fond of me, he had absolutely
no amorous longings for me, and being a simple, pure-minded
fellow, would have loathed me for mine and my inverted nature. I
was careful never to let him discover it, and I was made very
unhappy when he confided that he was in love with a young girl
whom he wished to marry. This episode took place several years
ago, and though we are still friends my emotional feelings for
him have cooled considerably.
"I have always been very shy of showing any affectionate
tendencies. Most of my acquaintances (and close friends even)
think me curiously cold, and often wonder why I have never fallen
in love or married. For obvious reasons I have never been able to
tell them.
"Three or four years ago a little book by Coventry Patmore fell
into my hands, and from its perusal resulted a strange blending
of my religious and erotic notions. The desire to love and be
loved is hard to drown, and, when I realized that homosexually it
was neither lawful nor possible for me to love in this world, I
began to project my longings into the next. By birth I am a Roman
Catholic, and in spite of a somewhat skeptical temper, manage to
remain one by conviction.
"From the doctrines of the Trinity, Incarnation, and Eucharist, I
have drawn conclusions which would fill the minds of the average
pietist with holy horror; nevertheless I believe that (granting
the premises) these conclusions are both logically and
theologically defensible. The Divinity of my fancied paradise
resembles in no way the vapid conceptions of Fra Angelico, or the
Quartier St. Sulpice. His physical aspect, at least, would be
better represented by some Praxitilean demigod or Flandrin's
naked, brooding boy.
"While these imaginings have caused me considerable moral
disquietude, they do not seem wholly reprehensible, because I
feel that the chief happiness I would derive by their realization
would be mainly from the contemplation of the loved one, rather
than from closer joys.
"I possess only a slight knowledge of the history and particulars
of erotic mysticism, but it is likely that my notions are neither
new nor peculiar, and many utterances of the few mystical writers
with whose works I am acquainted seem substantially in accord
with my own longings and conclusions. In endeavoring to find for
them some sanction of valid authority, I have always sought
corroboration from members of my own sex; hence am less likely to
have fashioned my views after those of hypersensitive or
hysterical women.
"You will rightly infer that it is difficult for me to say
exactly how I regard (morally) the homosexual tendency. Of this
much, however, I am certain, that, even, if it were possible, I
would not exchange my inverted nature for a normal one. I suspect
that the sexual emotions and even inverted ones have a more
subtle significance than is generally attributed to them; but
modern moralists either fight shy of transcendental
interpretations or see none, and I am ignorant and unable to
solve the mystery these feelings seem to imply.
"Patmore speaks boldly enough, in his way, and Lacordaire has
hinted at things, but in a very guarded manner. I have neither
the ability nor opportunity to study what the mystics of the
Middle Ages have to say along these lines, and, besides, the
medieval way of looking at things is not congenial to me. The
chief characteristic of my tendency is an overpowering admiration
for male beauty, and in this I am more akin to the Greeks.
"I have absolutely no words to tell you how powerfully such
beauty affects me. Moral and intellectual worth is, I know, of
greater value, but physical beauty I _see_ more clearly, and it
appears to me the most _vivid_ (if not the most perfect)
manifestation of the divine. A little incident may, perhaps,
reveal to you my feelings more completely. Not long ago I
happened to see an unusually well-formed young fellow enter a
house of assignation with a common woman of the streets. The
sight filled me with the keenest anguish, and the thought that
his beauty would soon be at the disposal of a prostitute made me
feel as if I were a powerless and unhappy witness to a sacrilege.
It may be that my rage for male loveliness is only another
outbreaking of the old Platonic mania, for as time goes on I find
that I long less for the actual youth before me, and more and
more for some ideal, perfect being whose bodily splendor and
loving heart are the realities whose reflections only we see in
this cave of shadows. Since the birth and development within me
of what, for lack of a better name, I term my homosexualized
Patmorean ideal, life has become, in the main, a weary business.
I am not despondent, however, because many things still hold for
me a certain interest. When that interest dies down, as it is
wont from time to time, I endeavor to be patient. God grant that,
after the end _here_, I may be drawn from the shadow, and
seemingly vain imaginings into the possession of their
never-ending reality _hereafter_."
HISTORY X.--A.H., aged 62. Belongs to a family which cannot be
regarded as healthy, but there is no insanity among near
relations. Father a very virile man of high character and good
intelligence, but not sound physical health. Mother was
high-strung and nervous, but possessed of indomitable courage and
very affectionate; she lived very happily with her husband. She
became a chronic invalid and died of consumption. A.H. was a
seven months' child, the third in the family, who were born very
rapidly, so that there is only three years difference in the ages
of the first and third children. A.H. believes that one of his
brothers, who has never married and prefers men to women, is also
inverted, though not to the same degree as himself, and he also
suspects that a relation of his mother's may have been an invert.
Sister, who resembles the father in character, is married, but is
spoken of as a woman's woman rather than a man's woman. The
family generally are considered proud and reserved, but of
superior mental endowment.
In early life A.H. was delicate and his studies were often
interrupted by illness. Though living under happy conditions he
was shy and nervous, often depressed. In later life his health
has been up to the average, and he has usually been able to
conceal his mental doubts and diffidence.
As a child he played with dolls and made girls his companions
until an age when he grew conscious that his conduct was unusual
and became ashamed, while his father seemed troubled about him.
He regards himself as having been a very childish child.
His conscious sexual life began between the ages of 8 and 10. He
was playing in the garden when he saw a manservant who had long
been with the family, standing at the door of a shed with his
penis exposed and erect. The boy had never seen anything of the
kind before, but felt great delight in the exhibition and moved
shyly toward the man, who retreated into the shed. The boy
followed and was allowed to caress and play with the penis until
ejaculation took place, the man replying, in reply to the child's
innocent inquiries, that it "felt good." This experience was
frequently repeated with the same man, and the boy confided in a
boy friend, with whom he tried to ascertain by personal
experience what the "good feeling" was like, but they were too
young to derive any pleasure from the attempt beyond the joy of
what was instinctively felt to be "eating forbidden fruit."
From this period his sexual tendencies began to become fixed and
self-conscious. He has never at any period of life had a moment's
conscious sexual attraction toward a person of the opposite sex.
His warmest friendships have, indeed, been with women and much,
perhaps most, of the happiness he has enjoyed has been furnished
by those friendships. But passion has only been aroused by
persons of his own sex, generally by men much younger than
himself. He feels shy and uncomfortable in the presence of men
of his own age. But even at his present age, a touch of a man or
boy may cause the liveliest gratification.
Shortly after the incident in boyhood, already narrated, A.H.
induced a little boy companion to go to a quiet spot, where, at
A.H.'s suggestion, each placed the other's penis in his mouth by
turns. A.H. had never heard of such a proceeding. It was a
natural instinct. He began to masturbate at an early age. But he
soon found a companion to share his passion. An older man,
especially, married and with a family, became his accomplice on
every possible opportunity, and they would manipulate each other.
At the age of 21, _fellatio_ began to be practised with this man.
It became a lifelong practice, and the preferred method of sexual
gratification. He likes best to have it performed on himself, but
he has never asked anyone to do for him what he would not himself
do for the other if desired. There has never been _pedicatio_.
The penis, it may be added, is of good size, and the testicles
rather large.
No one has ever suspected A.H.'s sexual perversion, not even his
physician, with whom he has long had a close friendship, until at
a time of great mental distress A.H. voluntarily revealed his
state. He is accustomed to refined society, has always read much,
abhorred athletic pursuits, and loved poetry, children, and
flowers. His love of nature amounts, indeed, to a passion.
Wherever he has been he has made friends among the best people.
He confesses to occasional periods of addiction to intoxicants,
induced by sociable companionship, and only controlled by force
of will.
For business he has not the slightest aptitude, and cannot look
after his own affairs. He is always dreading poverty and
destitution. He believes, however, that he passes among his
friends as fairly capable.
He considers that inversion is natural in his case and that he
has a perfect right to gratify his own natural instincts, though
he also admits they may be vices. He has never sought to
influence an innocent person toward his own tendencies.
HISTORY XI.--T.D., knows of nothing abnormal in his ancestry. His
brother has homosexual tendencies, but is also attracted to
women. A sister, who is very religious, states that she has
little or no sexual inclinations. They were all of a dreamy
disposition when young, to the disgust of their teachers. He sent
the following account of himself from the University at the age
of 20:--
"When I was a child (before I went to school at 9)," he writes,
"I was already of an affectionate disposition, an affection
turned readily to either sex. No boy was the cause of my
inclinations, which were quite spontaneous. (No doubt, part of
the cause may be found in our social system, by which ladies are
rather drawing-room creatures to be treated with distant
respect.) When I was 10, at a preparatory school, I first began
to form attachments with other boys of my own age, in which I
always had regard to physical beauty. It is this stage, in which
the sexual element is latent, that Shelley speaks of as preceding
love in ardent natures.
"At 12 I learned masturbation, apparently by instinct, and, I
regret to say, practised it to excess for the next seven years,
always secretly and with shame, and often with the accompaniment
of prurient imaginings which did not prevent my relations with
those I loved being of a very spiritual nature. Masturbation was
often practised daily, with bursts of repentance and abstinence,
latterly more rarely. But until I was 15 I really knew nothing of
sexual matters, and it was not till I was at least 17 that I was
conscious of sexual desire, which I repressed with shame.
"Owing to excessive self-abuse, I am unable to emit except
manually, but desire is strong. I think naked contact would
suffice, and in any case intercrural connection. _Pedicatio_ and
_fellatio_ I abhor. I love boys between the ages of 12 and 15;
they must be of my own class, refined, and lovable. I only desire
the active masculine part. I now regard my inclinations as
natural and normal to me. The difficulty is that of leading the
other party to regard it as such, besides the young age required
and clandestine nature of proceedings necessary. The moral
difficulties of circumstances are so strong that I have little
hope of ever gratifying my passion fully. I have found myself
deceived in the character of the boy twice. The last friendship
lasted three years, during which time I only saw him naked two or
three times (this caused erection), never touched him pruriently,
and only kissed him once.
"I have never found a satisfactory object of my affections, and
my happiness, perhaps my health, have been seriously injured. At
my public school a master helped me to a truer understanding of
these things. The merely animal sodomy which exists in many
public schools was unknown. What I learned of sex I learned for
myself. I am recommended to turn my aspirations to the abstract
universal maid; but so far at least I cannot do it.
"Male Greek statuary and the _Phoedrus_ of Plato have had a
great, though only confirmatory, influence on my feelings. My
ideal is that of Theocritus XIII, wherein Hercules was bringing
Hylas to the perfect measure of a man. My first thought is the
good of my friend, but, except for the good subjective influence
of passion, I have failed utterly.
"I am very tall, dark, rather strong, fond of games, though I do
not excel, owing to short sight. I am English, though I have
French blood, which may account for an unreservedly passionate
disposition. Though unlike other people, I am not in the least
feminine, nor has anyone thought so to my knowledge. I can
whistle easily and well. I am so masculine that I cannot even
conceive of passive sexual pleasure in women, much less in men.
(That is one of the difficulties in boy-love.) My affections are
inextricably bound up in the ideals of protection of one weaker
than myself. In the earlier days, when sexuality was less
conscious, this was a great source of romantic feeling, the
glamour of which is rather departing. I cannot understand love of
adult males, much less if they are of lower class, and the idea
of prostitution is nauseous to me.
"I think I may say that I have the esthetic and moral sense very
strongly ingrained. Indeed, they are largely synonymous with me.
I have no dramatic aptitude, and, though I flatter myself that my
taste is good in music, I have no knowledge of music. If I have a
favorite color, it is a dark crimson or blue, of the nature of
old stained glass. I derive great pleasure from all literary and
pictorial art and architecture; indeed, art of all kinds. I have
facility in writing personal lyrical verse; it affords me relief.
"I think my inversion must be congenital, as the desire of
contact with those boys I loved began before masturbation and has
lasted through private and public resorts and into university
life. The other sex does not attract me, but I am very fond of
children, girls as well as boys. (If there is sexuality in this,
which I trust there is not, it is latent)."
This statement is of interest because it may well lead us to
suppose that the writer, who is of balanced mind and sound
judgment, possesses a confirmed homosexual outlook on life.
While, however, it is the rule for the permanent direction of the
sexual impulse to be decided by the age of 20, that age is too
early to permit us to speak positively, especially in a youth
whose adolescent undifferentiated or homosexual impulses are
fostered by university life. This proved to be! the case with
T.D., who, though doubtless possessing a psychically anomalous
strain, is yet predominantly masculine. On leaving the university
his heterosexuality asserted itself normally. About six years
after the earlier statement, he wrote that he had fallen in love.
"I am on the eve of marrying a girl of nearly my own age. She has
sympathy as well as knowledge in my fields of study; it was thus
easier for me to explain my past, and I found that she could not
understand the moral objections to homosexual practices. My own
opinion always was that the moral objections were very
considerable, but might in some cases be overcome. In any case I
have entirely lost my sexual attraction toward boys; though I am
glad to say that the appreciation of their charm and grace
remains. My instincts, therefore, have undergone a considerable
change, but the change is not entirely in the direction of
normality. The instinct for sodomy in the proper sense of the
word used to be unintelligible to me; since the object of
attraction has become a woman this instinct is mixed with the
normal in my desire. Further, an element which much troubled me,
as being most foreign to my ideal feelings, has not quite left
me--the indecent and often scatologic curiosity about immature
girls. I can only hope that the realization of the normal in
marriage may finally kill these painful aberrations. I should add
that the practice of masturbation has been abandoned."
HISTORY XII.--Aged 24. Father and mother both living; the latter
is of a better social standing than the father. He is much
attached to his mother, and she gives him some sympathy. He has a
brother who is normally attracted to women. He himself has never
been attracted to women, and takes no interest in them nor in
their society.
At the age of 4 he first became conscious of an attraction for
older males. From the ages of 11 and 19, at a large
grammar-school, he had relationships with about one hundred boys.
Needless to add, he considers homosexuality extremely common in
schools. It was, however, the Oscar Wilde case which first opened
his eyes to the wide prevalence of homosexuality, and he
considers that the publicity of that case has done much, if not
to increase homosexuality, at all events to make it more
conspicuous and outspoken.
He is now attracted to youths about 5 or 6 years younger than
himself; they must be good-looking. He has never perverted a boy
not already inclined to homosexuality. In his relationship he
does not feel exclusively like a male or a female: sometimes one,
sometimes the other. He is often liked, he says, because of his
masculine character.
He is fully developed and healthy, well over middle height,
inclined to be plump, with full face and small moustache. He
smokes many cigarettes and cannot get on without them. Though his
manners are very slightly if at all feminine, he acknowledges
many feminine ways. He is fond of jewelry, until lately always
wore a bangle, and likes women's rings; he is very particular
about fine ties, and uses very delicate women's handkerchiefs. He
has always had a taste for music, and sings. He has a special
predilection for green; it is the predominant color in the
decoration of his room, and everything green appeals to him. He
finds that the love of green (and also of violet and purple) is
very widespread among his inverted friends.
HISTORY XIII.--Artist, aged 34. "The earliest sex impression that
I am conscious of," he writes, "is at the age of 9 or 10 falling
in love with a handsome boy who must have been about two years my
senior. I do not recollect ever having spoken to him, but my
desire, so far as I can recall, was that he should seize hold of
and handle me. I have a distinct impression yet of how
pleasurable even physical pain or cruelty would have been at his
hands. (I have noticed that in young children it is often
difficult to differentiate the sexual emotions from what in the
grown up would be definite cruelty.)
"It must have been at about this time that I discovered--entirely
by myself--the act of masturbation. The process grew up quite
naturally, though I cannot but think that the cooped-up life in a
London street and a London school, with want of physical
exercise, as well as want of landscape, color, and beautiful
form, had much to do with it. The tone of the school I was at was
singularly clean, but I question whether the vaunted cleanliness
of tone of day-schools can compensate for the open life and large
discipline of an English public school.
"How far the rather frequent masturbation between the ages of 10
and 13 may have had to do with weakly health I do not know, but
when I was 12 I was taken by my mother to a famous doctor. He
made no inquiries of a sexual nature, but he advised that I
should be sent away from London. He had a sentimental horror of
violent games, etc., for boys, and put aside various suggested
public schools. Finally I was sent to a private school at the
seaside.
"The private school was clean and wholesome. The plunge into the
sexual cocytus of the great public school that followed was
effectually sudden. In my day ---- was a perfect stew of
uncleanness. There was plenty of incontinence, not much cruelty,
no end of dirty conversation, and a great deal of genuine
affection, even to heroism, shown among the boys in their
relations to one another. All these things were treated by
masters and boys alike as more or less unholy, with the result
that they were either sought after or flung aside, according to
the sexual or emotional instinct of each. No attempt was made at
discrimination. A kiss was as unclean as the act of _fellatio_,
and no one had any gauge or principle whatever on which to guide
the cravings of boyhood.
"My first initiation into the mysteries of sex was at the hands
of the dormitory servant, who showed me his penis when he woke me
in the mornings, and masturbated me when he gave me my hot bath
on a Saturday night. This old reprobate of 45 committed the act
of _fellatio_ with most of the boys in turn as he went the
dormitory rounds. For the older lads I cannot speak, but over us
younger ones of 14 and 15 he exercised a sort of unholy terror
and fascination. He was very popular; we came to him like doves
to a snake. When I revisited my old school many years later he
was occupying a very responsible position in the college chapel,
and I noticed that he wore that expression of sly reverence which
I think I can now instantly detect when I see it in a man.
"For the rest the dormitory was boisterous and lewd, and there
was a good deal of bullying, which probably did little harm. My
principal recollection now is of the filthy mystery of foul talk,
that I neither cared for nor understood. What I really needed,
like all the other boys, was a little timely help over the
sexual problems, but this we none of us got, and each had to work
out his own principle of conduct for himself. It was a long,
difficult, and wasteful process, and I cannot but believe that
many of us failed in the endeavor. We had come unprepared with
any advice. The principle upon which we were apparently trained
was the repression of every instinct. My mother was ignorant from
innocence, my father from indifference, and so between them I was
sent out helpless. A mother incurs great responsibility in
sending her child away unprepared. A parent should not seek to
shift his responsibility upon the schoolmaster. Love alone should
be the fount from which revelations should flow; the master, from
the very nature of his position, cannot reveal.
"An imminent breakdown in health--due, it would now appear, to
quite obvious causes--relieved me from the purgatory of the
college dormitory, and I was removed to one of the private
houses. These establishments were considered more select and less
'rough.' The social atmosphere was, however, perhaps more
unwholesome, because more effeminate, and was full of noble young
sucklings. The nominal head of the house under normal conditions
might have been a real leader; as it was, the real head of the
house was a gilded young pariah, fairly low down in the school
and full of hypocrisy and unnatural lusts. The boy who occupied
the cubicle next to mine was also a bad case of sexual
misdirection, though he had not the social distinction to make
him quite so refined a terror. I had every opportunity of
watching him until, two years later, he was fortunately asked to
leave. He talked bawd from morning till night, got drunk on one
or two occasions, masturbated constantly without concealment, had
several of the younger boys _inter femora_, though without
evincing any care or affection for them, and gave one the
impression of having been born for a brothel. His one redeeming
quality was an element of good nature: a characteristic one often
finds among such as are selfish and irresponsible. I have since
been told that he has gone completely to the dogs. Whether this
young cub's sexual instincts could have been turned or guided I
do not know; but in a rougher and simpler life than that of a
public school, in a more open and less hypocritical atmosphere,
he might, perhaps, have been licked into better shape. Hypocrisy
is a vice, however, that schoolboys themselves are fortunately
free from. It comes later. The tone among the boys was frankly
and violently unclean, though unclean not from instinct, but from
want of direction and from repression.
"I have not a single happy recollection of this period of my
school life. Yet out of this morass of misbegotten virtues I
plucked my first blossom of genuine affection. I call it a
blossom because it never ripened even to flower. I had been given
the extreme of filth to feed upon at the outset, and now I found
for myself the extreme of chastity. It will be a matter of
lifelong regret to me that the love which was the lodestar of my
school years was never fulfilled or set upon a sound basis of
comradeship.
"When I was about 16½ years old there came into the house a boy
about two years younger than myself, and who became the absorbing
thought of my school days. I do not remember a moment, from the
time I first saw him to the time I left school, that I was not in
love with him, and the affection was reciprocated, if somewhat
reservedly. He was always a little ahead of me in books and
scholarship, but as our affection ripened we spent most of our
spare time together, and he received my advances much as a girl
who is being wooed, a little mockingly, perhaps, but with real
pleasure. He allowed me to fondle and caress him, but our
intimacy never went further than a kiss, and about that even was
the slur of shame; there was always a barrier between us, and we
never so much as whispered to one another concerning those things
of which all the school obscenely talked. Any connection between
our own emotions and the sexual morals of the school never
occurred to us. In fact, we lived a dream-life of chastity that
could not relate itself to any human conditions. This was
suddenly broken in upon. My friend was very beautiful and an
object of attraction to others. That some of the elder boys had
made offers of sexual intercourse to him I knew, but to him, as
to me, that was unspeakable wickedness. One day I heard that four
or five of these suitors of his had mishandled him; they had, I
believe, taken off his trousers and attempted to masturbate him.
The offense was probably horse play of an animal nature; to me it
seemed an unpardonable offense. The matter had been reported to
the master by a servant, but confirmatory evidence was needed
before punishment could follow. I was torn asunder by passions I
could not then analyze and in the end committed the greatest of
schoolboy crimes,--I sneaked. The action under the circumstances
was courageous, but I was indifferent so long as the boy I loved
judged me rightly. The result was that at the close of the term
four or five of the senior boys were 'asked to leave.' The
remaining brief period of my school life, which had previously
been a living hell, became really happy. That this should have
been brought about to the harm of four or five boys whose sin,
after all, was but a misdirected impulse for which the system was
responsible, seems to me now all very wrong. Of the boys sent
away, however, certainly three have made honorable careers. For
my friend and I, we became more afraid of each other than before;
as our affections increased, so our fear of them increased also.
The friendship was too ethereal to live; but even yet we still
have a deep respect for one another.
"When at the age of 19 I left school I was allowed to knock about
for a year before entering college. During this time I picked up
a sexual experience that may or may not have been a valuable one,
I certainly look back upon it now, with regret, if not with
horror. My father had discovered, some months before this date,
that I was in the habit of masturbating, and he gave me what he
conceived to be the right counsel under the circumstances: 'If
you do this,' he said, 'you will never be able to use your penis
with a woman. Therefore your best plan will be to go with a
prostitute. Should you do this, however, you will probably pick
up a beastly disease. Therefore the safest way would be to do it
abroad if you get the chance, for there the houses are licensed.'
Having delivered himself of this advice he troubled himself no
further in the matter, but left me to work out my own destiny.
The great physician, to whom I was taken about this time, also
gave me his advice on this point. 'Masturbation,' he said, 'is
death. A number of young men come to me with the same story. I
tell them they are killing themselves, and you will kill
yourself, too.' The doctor's hope was apparently to frighten his
young patients into what he conceived to be natural conditions of
life, and one went away from him with the impression that every
sexual manifestation in one's self was a physical infirmity, due
to one's own moral weakness. It took me some time before I could
make up my mind to follow my father's advice, but after a period
of real moral agony I deliberately and entirely in cold blood
acted upon it. I sought out a scarlet woman in the streets of
---- and went home with her. From something she said to me I know
that I gave her pleasure, and she asked me to come to her again.
This I did twice, but without any real pleasure. The whole thing
was too sordid and soulless, and the man who decides to take an
evil medicine regularly has first to make up his mind that he
really needs it.
"At about the same time I chanced to be, for a few months, in a
German university town, and I determined, as I had the
opportunity, to carry the parental advice to the logical
conclusion. I tried a licensed house. The place was clean and
decent, and the conditions, I take it, such as one would normally
find in any properly regulated continental city; but to me the
whole thing appeared unspeakably horrible. It was a purely
commercial transaction, and it had not even the redeeming element
of risk to one's self, or of offense against a social or
disciplinary code. I came away feeling that I had touched bottom
in my sexual experiences, and I understood what it was that Faust
saw when the red mouse sprang from the mouth of the witch in the
Walpurgis dance.
"These were the only occasions upon which I have had sexual
intercourse with women. Looking back to them now, they appear to
me to have been almost inevitable; but if I had my life over
again I would shun them as I would a lethal draught. I believe I
came out of the fire unscathed; probably, indeed, it did me good,
in the sense that it made it possible for me to look deeper into
life; though to what extent seeing the torments of the damned
makes us do this, perhaps only a Dante could tell. To gain
knowledge at the expense of the shame and misery of others I hold
to be fundamentally wrong and immoral. What is to me, however,
the chief and bitterest thought is that I flung away the first
spring of manhood where I got no love in return. His virginity
is, or should be, as glorious and sacred a possession to a youth
as to a maiden; to be guarded jealously; to be given only at the
call of love, to one who loves him--be it comrade, mistress, or
wife--and whom he can love in return.
"The full university life into which I now entered at the age of
20 brought with it a flood of new ideas, feelings and sensations.
The friendships I made there will always remain the central ones
in my life. Up to my last term at college at the age of 24 I
still wore my chain-mail of artificial chastity; but then a
change gradually set in, and I began to understand the
relationship of the physical phenomena of sex to its intellectual
and imaginative manifestations. (I was not destined to fully
realize this for some years and then exclusively through and out
of my own personal experience.) It was the study of Walt
Whitman's _Leaves of Grass_ that first brought me light upon this
question. Hitherto I had kept the two things locked up, as it
were, in two separate air-tight compartments,--my friendships in
one, my sex instincts in another,--to be kept under and repressed
by the public-school code as I conceived it.
"It is needless to say that I was continually troubled by the
customary sex phenomena: erotic dreams, loss of semen,
troublesome erections at night, etc. These I repressed as best I
could, by habitual masturbation and by the regular diet and
exercise which academic life made possible. At one time, for the
period of a year I should say, I tried to overcome the desire for
masturbation by gradual stages, on the principle of the
drunkard's cure by which he took every day less tipple by the
insertion of one pebble more in his bottle. I marked on my
calendar the erotic dreams and the nights on which I masturbated,
and sought gradually to extend the intervening periods. Six
weeks, however, was the longest time for which I was able to
abstain."
A few years later the writer of this communication formed an
intimate relationship (in which he did not make the first
advances) with a youth, some years younger than himself and of
lower social class, whose development he was able to assist. "But
for my part," he remarks, "I owe him as much as I gave him, for
his love lighted up the gold of affection that was in me and
consumed the dross. It was from him that I first learned that
there was no such thing as a hard-and-fast line between the
physical and the spiritual in friendship." This relationship
lasted for some years, when the young man married; its effects
are described as very beneficial to both parties; all the sexual
troubles vanished, together with the desire to masturbate.
"Everything in life began to sing with joy, and what little of
real creative work I may have done I attribute largely to the
power of work that was born in me during those years."
HISTORY XIV.--Scotchman, aged 38. His paternal ancestors were
normal, so far as he knows. His mother belonged to a very
eccentric old Celtic family. Soon after 5 he became so enamored
of a young shepherd that the boy had to be sent away. He
practised masturbation many years before the age of puberty, and
attaches importance to this as a factor in the evolution of his
homosexual life.
He has had erotic dreams rarely about men, about women more
frequently. While indifferent to women, he has no repulsion
toward them. He has had connection with women two or three times,
but without experiencing the same passionate emotions as with
men.
He would like a son, but he has never been able to get up the
necessary amount of passion to lead to marriage.
He has always had a sentimental and Platonic affection for men.
Of late years he has formed two friendships with adults of an
affectionate and also erotic character. He cares little for
anything beyond mutual masturbation and kissing; what he desires
is the love of the male.
In appearance there is nothing abnormal about him except an air
of youth. He is vigorous both in body and mind, and has enormous
power of resisting fatigue. He is an excellent man of business.
Is a patient student. He sees no harm in his homosexual passions.
He is averse to promiscuity. His ideal is a permanent union which
includes sexual relations.
HISTORY XV.--T.S., artist, aged 32. "I was born in England. My
father was a Jew, the first to marry out of his family and to
marry a Christian. My great-grandparents were cousins; he was a
German and she was a Dane. My grandparents were also cousins; he
was a Swede and she was a Dane.
"My maternal grandfather was an English Protestant, and my
maternal grandmother was Irish, fanatically Roman Catholic, and a
very eccentric woman.
"In my father's family there have been many members of note. In
my mother's family there were many renowned lawyers.
"My father had an elder brother who was homosexual. He was
already, at 31 years of age, a prominent author, when he died of
consumption. I have also a second cousin on my father's side who
is a very good tenor; he is also homosexual. In my mother's
family I know of nothing abnormal.
"In neither family is there or has there been any insanity, but
rather an overwealth of brain.
"My parents were an ideally happy couple. They were engaged after
knowing each other six days, and after being separated three
months they married. They were married thirty-five years without
a quarrel. I have a brother three years older, born a year after
their marriage, and a sister seven years younger.
"My brother takes after his father in appearance. He is a great
lover of women and much spoiled by them. He is quite normal and
abstemious.
"My sister is a very womanly woman. As a girl she disapproved
very much of girl friendships and always confided in her mother.
At 13 years of age she met the man she is now married to. They
waited ten years before marrying and are now an ideally happy
couple. My sister is perfectly normal and very abstemious.
"I lived my first ten years in England, eighteen years in Sweden,
two years in Denmark, two years in Bavaria, Austria, and Italy,
and am now living in Berlin. I consider myself English. I am
mentally a man, but all my physical feelings and desires are
those of a woman.
"I am middle height and very slight. Weigh 106 English pounds,
without clothes. My hands and feet are small and well-shaped.
Head of normal size. Features small. Eyes green. Have worn
glasses since I was 7 years old. Complexion fair. Appearance not
Jewish. The skin of my body is very white, without blemish. Very
little hair on my face. Hair on head and abdomen luxuriant. No
hair whatever on stomach and chest. Color of hair auburn
everywhere except below navel, that black. (My father's,
mother's, and brother's hair was brown. My sister has auburn
hair, and so had the aforementioned uncle.) My breasts are
slightly round; my hips are normal. I do not gesticulate much.
From my material self it would be difficult to draw the
conclusion that I was homosexual. My sexual organs are normal.
"My disposition is apparently bright, but in reality melancholy.
Have very little love for human nature, but have a partiality for
the British and Jewish races. Hate business, politics, sports,
and society. Love music, art, literature, and nature. Deep
interest in mysticism. Am clairvoyant. Have been used many times
as a medium. Lead two separate lives, an outer and inner psychic
life. Am a fatalist and a theosophist. Profound belief in
reincarnation, always have had, because when I was a little child
I could 'remember' so much. Have an excellent memory, dating back
to my third year. Have always been too self-analytical. Have from
my earliest childhood felt myself an alien. Am very sensitive,
physically and psychically. Have no wish to wear woman's clothing
or do woman's work. As to clothes for myself, I prefer black and
not much jewelry.
"I could only love a perfectly manly man from 21 to 40 years of
age. He must be physically beautiful and well made. Size of
sexual organs plays no part. The muscles must be developed and
the hands must be especially well shaped. Hands are my fetish. (I
could never love anyone with ugly hands.) He must have no odor
issuing from his body (though I do not dislike faint perfume when
clothed), and, above all, never have a bad breath. He must be
intelligent, love music, art, literature, and nature. He must be
refined and cultured and have been about the world. He must have
simplicity in behavior, dress, and manner, and, above all, be
clean-bodied as clean-minded. Cynicism I cannot stand. (Here I
may state I once owned a St. Bernard dog which reminded me much
of my ideal. He was always sedate, always loving, and faithful;
generally quiet. He only got excited when out in the elements.) I
have not been able to get on with people who have no sense of
humor. From my birth I was physically weak. First I suffered from
eczema. Being born with a double squint, I was operated on at 2½
and again at 3½ years of age, with excellent result. From 4 to 12
years of age I had convulsions (often), and all the illnesses of
childhood. At the age of 12½ years I took scarlet fever, followed
by a weak heart, which grew stronger after a year, and Bright's
disease, which lasted fifteen years with hardly a break. This
illness had its wonted effect of producing melancholia and
upsetting the whole nervous system. Bright's disease stopped
suddenly but was followed by a succession of illnesses. Then I
had neuritis very badly. I then removed to Bavaria, and to regain
nervous strength I was treated by Freud's psychoanalytical
method, with great success. I had a very bad relapse, as my
brother, who had just heard I was homosexual, came to visit me
and threatened to have me put under guardians, if my father
should die. It took me weeks to recover from the shock. We broke
off all intercourse and though my brother has been several times
in the same town where I have been, we remain strangers. At this
time my father died suddenly. Last spring four suicides of
friends in so many weeks had a very bad effect on my nerves. I am
now in Berlin in better spirits, but the cramp continues badly at
times.
"To this I must add that since my fourteenth year, independent of
any illness, I have suffered mentally and physically from
menstrual pains recurring every twenty-eight days and lasting
from six to eight days. That these were the equivalent pains to a
woman's menstruation periods I could get no doctor to admit till
I was treated for a length of time by a German nerve specialist.
"The physical pains begin abruptly. Sudden congestions of blood
in the brain and in the abdomen. Sudden perspirations, heat and
cold. Great nervous pains in the small of the back, also in the
nerve-centers of abdomen and stomach. Sharp, shooting pains in
the breasts and especially the nipples. Sudden toothache which
stops as suddenly. The skin becomes darker, sometimes mottled. I
have the whole time a taste of blood in my mouth and often
everything I eat tastes of blood. I have great difficulty at that
time in eating meat. Physical longings for erotic adventure,
counterbalanced by mental nausea at the bare idea.
"The mental symptoms are: sudden feeling of deep depression,
suicidal tendencies, alternating with sudden inexplicable
lightheartedness. Capriciousness and great dissatisfaction with
myself and life generally. Horror at my own incompleteness of sex
and sudden fits of hatred toward women and a great longing to be
loved by men. This condition changes slowly back to the normal
one. It takes several days for me to lose my physical weakness
owing to it.
"Physically I was developed at 16 years of age. Mentally I was
developed at a very early age, but I kept my inner life quite
dark, always playing the innocent. Nobody at home believed me to
know anything about life. They were at times very surprised when
I fell out of the rôle I had planned for myself. Up till I was 17
years of age nothing to do with other people's morals was ever
discussed before me. I looked so pure, and do now, that people
are always careful in front of me. My father never discussed such
things with me. From my earliest childhood I loved men dearly,
though I was always at daggers drawn with my father and brother.
I worshipped my mother then, as I do now. My sister and I did not
at all get on as children, though we are the best of friends now.
She and her husband as well as my mother have been kindness
itself ever since they knew of my condition. Not till I was over
30 years did I meet a man I loved as well as my mother, and he is
heterosexual. I must have loved my father and brother at first,
but continual conflicts, incompatible temperaments and mutual
misunderstandings and want of sympathy made life at home
horrible. I must admit from my earliest childhood I had a certain
contempt for my father and brother because I found them so
materialistic. I had all my childhood rows with my brother. My
father took his part, my mother mine. After I had recovered from
my father's sudden death (my first words were after reading the
letter: 'Thank God it isn't mother!') I felt a great relief, but
it took a long time for me to grasp that I was really free.
"I have always liked women's society and, as a youth, I was very
fond of gossip, which I by no means am now. I have many women
friends, more than men friends. These women friends are all
heterosexual except one. I very often like elderly women; I
suppose I see mother in such women. A woman never could make me
blush, but a man I admired could easily.
"I was 23 years of age when a married woman of good family asked
me to come and spend the night with her. I went, and though she
was beautifully built, cleanly, and though her garments and
apartments were of the utmost good taste, I did not have any
erection. On the other hand, I felt myself to be most unclean and
bathed three times each of the following three days. Since then I
have never tried to have sexual intercourse with women.
"In Copenhagen I tried to excite my feelings with every class of
woman, in vain. I suppose it is that my nature is so like woman's
that there can be no reaction. With men I am often very shy and
nervous, tongue-tied, and my hands perspire. Never so with women.
"As a child I loved men and used to fall desperately in love with
some who came to the house. I would, when no one was there, kiss
their hats, or gloves, or even their sticks.
"I can remember, when I was about 6 years, how I fell in love
with a very good-looking 26-year-old German. He had very curly
hair and his hands were very beautiful. He was very fond of me
and I used to call him 'my Boy.' When visiting us he often used
to 'tuck me in' after the nurse had gone down. He always had
sweets or something for me. I can remember how I used to fling my
arms round his neck and cover his face with kisses. I would then
draw his head down on my pillow and he would tell me fairy-tales
and I would go off to sleep quite happy.
"At 7 years of age, while staying in the country, a very
good-looking groom, about 25 years of age, misbehaved himself
with me. I often used to visit him in the stables, as this man
had a strange attraction for me. One day he tickled me. While
doing so he produced my penis and also his own, which was in full
erection. He tried in every way to excite my feelings, in vain.
For him the occasion terminated in an ejaculation. He forbade me
to tell anyone, and I did not do so, but tried to find out all I
could on the subject, with little or no result. From that day I
hated the groom and I felt a sort of guilt, as if I had 'lost
something.' Not till I was 12 years did I understand.
"From my earliest childhood I had one ideal of a man. From that
ideal I have never swerved. At the age of 30 I found a friend
who, though quite heterosexual, has, without giving me any sexual
intercourse, given me the love I have always needed. He has been
for the last couple of years a second mother, father, sister,
brother, and lover. Through him I have regained my health, my
love of nature, and he has helped to deaden my hatred toward
human nature and my bitterness. A better friend I never wish to
find. It has made up for all the years of mental and physical
suffering. One strange thing is that the feeling is mutual. He
has had a tragic life, for his wife, whom he loved beyond
everything, died under very sad circumstances. He says I am the
best male friend he has ever had. While with him, much of the
lower nature in me was stamped out. I shall always look upon him
as the turning point in my life. I think he wrought some of his
finest influence through his music. He played Beethoven and
Wagner for me for a couple of hours every day for months, and
thus opened up a new world to me.... He is six years older than I
am.
"At 10 years of age we moved to Sweden, a country I hated from
first to last. About this time I began to notice that there was
something strange about myself. I felt myself an alien, and have
done so ever since. An event of importance in my life was, I feel
sure, when my father's sister tried to take away my mother's
character. It was done in jealousy and spite, and my aunt had to
beg my parents' pardon. Outwardly the affair was patched up; but
I feel sure my father never really forgave his sister. Jews never
forgive.
"This event awoke in me a great hatred toward women, and it was
many years before I could at all control it.
"At the age of 14 I was much with a good-looking, musical
American, a year older than myself. One day, while romping, very
much the same thing occurred as with the groom. I still had no
sexual feelings. We remained good friends. I often wished to kiss
him. After the first time he would not allow it. He was very much
liked among the officers and so-called high society men, and had
always much money. About ten years later I heard he used to
accept money after intimate intercourse with those society men.
"During my fifteenth year I had great longing for sexual
intercourse with men. At this time the first signs of hair were
to be seen on my abdomen.
"At the age of 16 a gardener, a married man with family,
initiated me into mutual self-abuse. He lived in the back house
of the apartment house we then inhabited. He was about 40 years
of age, an ugly but muscularly developed man. These practices
took place in the cellar, to which there were three entrances. I
never allowed him to kiss me and the sight of his children always
awoke in me a great feeling of nausea. That was the natural
reaction of a bad conscience. For the man himself I had the
utmost contempt. This man told me of several parks and _pissoirs_
where men met, and I went to these places now and again for
erotic adventure.
"I must here relate that at the age of 16 my mother warned me
against self-abuse. It had the opposite effect, made me curious,
so I began at once. I have continued ever since, at least once a
day. (I have never had an involuntary emission in my whole life.)
Between 17 and 22 it became necessary for me to do so several
times a day. Working at art, painting, and above all music and
beauty have a strong influence over me and set my erotic longings
in violent motion. I have never found this do me any harm.
Abstinence, on the other hand, has a very harmful effect on me,
upsetting the whole nervous and physical system. I often find
that there is a something very much wanting in self-abuse: the
commingling of two human bodies who are _mentally_ as well as
physically in sympathy gives an electrical satisfaction which
quiets the whole nervous system. That at least has been my
experience.
"The gardener left and moved to the country. I then sometimes
visited _pissoirs_ or, as they are often called, 'panoramas'
(because they are round and one sees much there). What I saw in
the parks during the long summer nights was quite a revelation.
During the summer, when the husbands had sent their families in
the country, many of them led a very indiscreet life. What I saw
the first summer killed all the respect I had for elderly people.
I had always connected marriage and gray hairs with virtue and
morals; then I learnt otherwise. I must say I became about this
time a _sensual pig_. I knew how dangerous these places were on
account of the police and blackmailers, but that gave the hunt a
double zest. At this time I led a double life and was always
watching and analyzing myself. I had to do with heaps of men of
all classes. I was often offered money, but that I would on no
condition accept. To pay or to be paid kills every sort of erotic
feeling in me and always has done so. I once wished to experiment
with myself. I was offered a small sum of money by a former
schoolmaster. I accepted this just to see how it would affect me.
The next moment I threw the money as far away as possible. Then I
saw I had none of the prostitute nature in me. I was simply
overwhelmed with sensuality. I considered I was a criminal and
wished to see in how many ways my nature had the criminal
instinct. I wanted to see if I could become a thief. I stole a
silver button in a shop where antiquities were sold, but I went
to the shop the same day again and returned the button, without
the people knowing. I found I could not become a thief. Then the
question came. Why had I felt a criminal since my seventh year?
Was it my fault? If not, whose fault was it? Not till I studied
Freud's psychoanalytical system did I get a clear insight into my
own character.
"When I was 20 years of age I met a gentleman one night in a
heavy snow-storm. We walked and talked and understood each other.
He belonged to one of Sweden's first aristocratic families. He
was extremely refined. He asked me to his rooms. We undressed and
lay down. He had a very beautiful head and a still more beautiful
body. I think that all my erotic feelings were numbed by looking
at his beautiful body. To me anything sensual would have been
sacrilege, I thought, and I can remember the feeling of awe which
came over me. He was them 20 years of age, but his hair was quite
white. First he did not understand, and then he was very gentle
to me. I kept perfectly chaste for three whole months after the
sight of his body. We saw each other often. Eight years later we
met for the last time. He suffered much from melancholia. At that
time I prevented him from committing suicide. This winter,
however, he shot himself.
"At the age of 22 my sister introduced me to a charming,
intelligent and refined, half-English, half-Swedish painter. We
'recognized' each other at once, though we had never seen each
other before, and even knew each other's characters to the
smallest traits. My parents liked him better than any friend I
had ever had. My sister and he were from the first like sister
and brother. The first evening in my home he and I kissed each
other. The women were mad about him. Later I found many men were
too. I was three weeks his senior. He had his own rooms. I have
never felt any such wonderful harmony as when our naked bodies
mingled. It was like floating in ether. With him it was the only
time I had been active in _fellatio_. We were much together,
though not much physically, for he had many love affairs with
women. What I loved was the way he would cut off all advances of
men, I was his 'little brother' and so he calls me to this day.
He is now married in America, and the father of a pretty little
daughter. We are the best of friends to this day.
"The two years in Copenhagen were some of the happiest I have
spent, though nearly the whole time I was in physical pain. In
Austria I found, among the Tyrolese peasants, that the
Englishmen, who come there in winter for sports and in the summer
for mountain climbing, have demoralized the young male peasants
with money. Homosexual intercourse is easy to get if you are
willing to pay the price,--larger in season, less out of season.
"In Italy it is merely a question of money or passion, but
everything in love there is quite transient.
"In Bavaria I found the love and peace 'which passeth all
understanding.' This love and friendship without anything of a
physically intimate nature brought me back from the 'deep black
gulf' to which I was swiftly floating. When I met my friend I was
nearly at the end of my tether. What his love and friendship has
done for me, together with Freud's psychoanalytical system,
nobody will ever know.
"Since being in Berlin, a town I like very much, a new life has
opened for me, a life where one lives as one likes if one does
not have to do with young boys. Here are homosexual baths,
pensions, restaurants, and hotels, where you can go with one of
your own sex at a certain fee per hour. Berlin is a revelation.
But since being here I find the physical erotic side of my nature
is little excited. I suppose it is the old story of 'forbidden
fruit.'
"My parents kept a very hospitable home. The last two years in
Sweden I was never at home. I hated society and knew much too
much about the private histories of those who came to my home.
They all belonged to the highest society. The highest society and
the lowest are very much alike. Of course my parents knew nothing
about these people. When I told my mother a great deal of private
history of people who came to our house, she was thunderstruck
and could at last understand my contempt for so-called good
society. I have visited in later years only in artistic and
theatrical circles; I consider that class of people more natural
than the other class and much more kind-hearted.
"My life has quite another side, the mystic side. But that would
be a much longer story than this. Suffice it to say, I am of a
highly sensitive nature, gifted with second sight." [A detailed
record of the subject's visions, premonitions of death of
acquaintances, etc., has been furnished by him.]
"I tried on four occasions to commit suicide, but I now see there
is nothing to be gained by doing so.
"Two years ago I told my parents about my sexual condition. It
was a frightful blow to them. My father had the circumstances
explained to him; he never understood the matter and never
discussed it with me. Had I told him earlier I feel quite certain
that, with his despotic nature, he would have put me in a
madhouse. My mother and sister have treated me very kindly
always. My brother has disowned me."
HISTORY XVI.--Irish, aged 36; knows of nothing unusual in his
ancestry. His tastes are masculine in every respect. He is
strong, healthy, and fond of exercises and sports. The sexual
instincts are abnormally developed; he confesses to an, enormous
appetite for almost everything,--food, drink, smoking, and all
the good things of life.
At about the age of 14 he practised masturbation with other boys
of the same age, and also had much pleasure in being in bed with
an uncle with whom the same thing was practised. Later on he
practised masturbation with every boy or man with whom he was on
terms of intimacy; to have been in bed with anyone without
anything of the sort taking place would have made sleep
impossible, and rendered him utterly wretched. His erotic dreams
at first were concerned with women, but more recently they are
usually of young men, and very rarely of women. He is mostly
indifferent to women, as also they have always been to him.
Although good-looking, strong, and masculine, he has never known
a woman to be in love with him. When about the age of 18 he
imagined he was in love with a girl; and he had often, between
the ages of 20 to 30, cohabited with prostitutes. He remembers on
one occasion, many years ago, having connection with a woman
seven or eight times in one night, and then having to masturbate
at noon the next day. He is unmarried, and thinks it is unlikely
that he ever will marry, but he adds that if a healthy, handsome,
and intelligent woman fell in love with him he might change his
mind, as it would be lonely to be old and alone, and he would
like to have children.
He is never attracted to men older than himself, and prefers
youths between the ages of 18 and 25. They may be of any class,
but he does not like common people, and is not attached to
uniforms or liveries. The requisite attractions are an
intelligent eye, a voluptuous mouth, and "intelligent teeth." "If
Alcibiades himself tried to woo me," he says, "and had bad teeth,
his labor would be in vain." He has sometimes been the active
participant in _pedicatio_, and has tried the passive rôle out of
curiosity, but prefers _fellatio_.
He does not consider that he is doing anything wrong, and regards
his acts as quite natural. His only regret is the absorbing
nature of his passions, which obtrude themselves in season and
out of season, seldom or never leaving him quiet, and sometimes
making his life a hell. Yet he doubts whether he would change
himself, even if he had the power.
HISTORY XVII.--Age 25; is employed in an ordinary workshop, and
lives in the back alley of a large town in which he was born and
bred. Fair, slight, and refined in appearance. The sexual organs
are normal and well developed, and the sexual passions strong.
His mother is a big masculine woman, and he is much attached to
her. Father is slight and weakly. He has seven brothers and one
sister. Homosexual desires began at an early age, though he does
not seem to have come under any perverse influences. He is not
inclined to masturbation. Erotic dreams are always of males. He
declares he never cared for any woman except his mother, and that
he could not endure to sleep with a woman.
He says he generally falls in love with a man at first sight--as
a rule, some one older than himself and of higher class--and
longs to sleep and be with him. In one case he fell in love with
a man twice his own age, and would not rest until he had won his
affection. He does not much care what form the sexual relation
takes. He is sensitive and feminine by nature, gentle, and
affectionate. He is neat and orderly in his habits, and fond of
housework; helps his mother in washing, etc. He appears to think
that male attachments are perfectly natural.
HISTORY XVIII.--Englishman, born in Paris; aged 26; an actor. He
belongs to an old English family; his father, so far as he is
aware, had no homosexual inclinations, nor had any of his
ancestors on the paternal side; but he believes that his
mother's family, and especially a maternal uncle who had a strong
feeling for beauty of form, were more akin to him in this
respect.
His earliest recollections show an attraction for males. At
children's parties he incurred his father's anger by kissing
other small boys, and his feelings grew in intensity with years.
He has never practised self-abuse, and seldom had erotic dreams;
when they do occur they are about males.
His physical feeling for women is one of absolute indifference.
He admires beautiful women in the same way as one admires
beautiful scenery. At the same time he likes to talk with clever
women, and has formed many friendships with frank, pure, and
cultivated English girls, for whom he has the utmost admiration
and respect. Marriage is impossible, because physical pleasure
with women is impossible; he has tried, but cannot obtain, the
slightest sexual feeling or excitement.
He especially admires youths (though they must not be immature)
from 16 or 17 to about 25. The type which physically appeals to
him most, and to which he appeals, is fair, smooth-skinned,
gentle, rather girlish and effeminate, with the effeminacy of the
_ingénue_, not the _cocotte_. His favorite to attract him must be
submissive and womanly; he likes to be the man and the master. On
this point he adds: "The great passion of my life is an
exception, and stands on an utterly different level. It realizes
an ideal of marriage in which neither is master, but both share a
joint empire, and in which tyranny would be equally painful to
both. But this friendship and love is for an equal, a year
younger than myself, and does not preclude other and less
creditable _liaisons, physical_ constancy being impossible to men
of our caliber."
_Pedicatio_ is the satisfaction he prefers, provided he takes the
active, never the passive, rôle. He is handsome, with broad
shoulders, good figure, and somewhat classic type of face, with
fine blue eyes. He likes boating and skating, though not cricket
or football, and is usually ready for fun, but has, at the same
time, a taste for reading.
He has no moral feelings on these matters; he regards them as
outside ethics, mere matters of temperament and social feeling.
If England were underpopulated he thinks he might possibly feel
some slight pangs of remorse; but, as things are, he feels that
in prostituting males rather than females he is doing a
meritorious action.
HISTORY XIX.--T.N. His history is given in his own words.
"From the time of my earliest imaginings I have always been
attached by strength in men and often thought about being carried
off by big warriors and living with them in caves and elsewhere.
When about 7 a young man used to show me his penis and handle
mine occasionally. At private boarding school masturbation was
fairly frequent and I suppose I was initiated about 12 or 13.
After leaving I occasionally indulged, but nothing happened until
I was about 20, except that I was often attracted by strong,
well-built young men of good character; a man who was not honest
and good-hearted had no attraction. At 20 I was much attached to
a young man of my own age. He was engaged. This did not prevent
him on one occasion endeavoring playfully and with his brother to
obtain access to my person. I successfully resisted, although if
_he_ only had been present I should not have done so, but
welcomed the attempt, and I have often regretted I did not let
him know this. But I had a dim idea that my penis was somewhat
undeveloped and this made me shy. Circumstances separated us.
About two years later I was crossing the Channel when I engaged
in conversation with a man about eight years older, who was one
of our travelling party. I think the attraction was a case of
love at sight, certainly on my side. A few nights later he had so
arranged that we shared a bedroom, and he very soon came over to
me and tenderly handled my person. I reciprocated and I look back
all these years to that night with pleasure and no feeling of
shame. On one occasion, about this time, I happened to be
sleeping with another young fellow (an office mate) on a holiday,
when I awoke and found him handling my penis caressingly. I
gently removed his hand and turned over. I thought none the less
of him, but my body seemed to belong only to myself and the
friend I loved. He was not an urning, I am sure, but we Were
often together and I much entered into his interests and felt
infinite satisfaction with life, made good progress and many
friends. Our physical intimacy was repeated, he taking the active
part in intercrural contact. Then he married very happily. Our
friendship remains, but circumstances prevent our often meeting,
and there is no longer desire on either part.
"For some years I was rather lonely in spite of friends. I was
somewhat attracted to another man, but his superior social
position was a defect to me. Then when about 28 I came in contact
with a young man of 24, of the artisan class, but superior in
ideals and intelligence to most men. I loved him at first glance
and to this day. At first it was just friendship, but soon his
form, voice, and thoughts entered into my very soul by day and
night. I longed always to be near him, to see him progress and
help him if I could. I would joyfully have given up home,
friends, and income, and followed him to the end of the world,
preferably an island where we two might at least be the only
white men. He seemed to embody all I longed for in the way of
knowledge of nature, of strength, of practical ability, and the
desire to imitate him in these things widened and strengthened my
character. The first time I slept with him I could only summon
courage to put my arm over his chest, but I could not sleep for
unsatisfied desire, and the unrelieved erection caused a dull
pain on the morrow. I had always disliked conversation that might
be regarded as bordering on the obscene, and consequently was
very ignorant on most matters; it pained me even to hear him
laugh at such remarks. I think if he had been intimate with me I
should have not conversed much on such topics, but now I felt
pleasure in such things with him as they expressed intimacy. I
dreamed about him and was never really happy in his absence; the
greatest joy would have been to have slept in his arms; the
hairiness of his legs and arms were also most fascinating.
Perhaps a year later, we were again at night together, and this
time I by degrees felt his private organs, but he was cold and I
felt a little unsatisfied. I wanted to be hugged. This happened
once more, and then on a later occasion,--not that it afforded me
much gratification, but because I wanted to stimulate him to
ardor,--I attempted masturbation. This aroused his disgust and I
was consequently dismayed. He told me I ought to marry and,
although I knew his love was all I wanted, I did not feel but
what I could make a woman happy. The constant unrelieved
erections which took place when I saw my friend adopt a graceful
attitude caused pain at the bottom of my back, and I consulted
two specialists, who also advised marriage. I did not tell them I
was an 'invert,' for I hardly knew it was a recognized thing, but
I did tell them something of what had taken place, and they made
next to no comment, but implied it was frequent. My friend now
felt repulsion toward me, but did not express himself, and as
other circumstances then caused a barrier between us to a certain
extent, I did not realize the true reason of his coldness. But I
felt utterly miserable. When I met a noble woman whom I had long
known I asked her to be my wife and she consented. Although I
told her very soon, and long before our marriage, of my
limitations as a husband and of my continued longing for my
friend, I feel now I did a great wrong, and I cannot understand
why I was not more conscious of this at the time; that I was to a
certain extent deceiving her relations was inevitable. I had
expected to devote my life in making her happy, but I soon found
that the true reason of my friend's apparent unfaithfulness was
my own action, combined with a feeling on his part that it was as
well that our affection should cease even at the cost of
misunderstanding. Since then, three years ago, I have not had a
happy day or night, and am therefore quite unable to promote
happiness in others. Without my friend, I can find no
satisfaction with wife, child, or home. Life has become almost
unbearable. Often I have seriously thought of committing suicide,
only to postpone it to a time which would be less cruelly
inopportune to others. I see my friend (now married) almost
daily, and suffer tortures at seeing others nearer to him than
myself. No explanation seems possible, as the whole idea of
inversion is so repugnant to him, and being an honorable man he
would feel marital ties preclude _any_ warmth of affection. But
all the longing of my life seems to be culminating in a driving
force which will carry me to the male prostitute or to death. I
can concentrate my mind on nothing else, and consequently have
become inefficient in work and have no heart for play. I know if
my longings could be occasionally satisfied I should immediately
recover, but my fear is that if I killed myself those who knew me
in happier days would only be confirmed in the impression of my
degeneracy and would feel my instincts had caused it, whereas it
is the denial and starvation of them which would have brought
about the result. I know now by experience of self and others
that my disposition is congenital and that I have been rendered
unhappy myself and a cause of unhappiness to others by the too
late knowledge of myself. The example of my former friend who
married misled me to think I too _could_ marry and make a happy
home; so that when the man I loved advised me I resolved to do
so, as I would have done almost anything else _he_ suggested. If
I could have withdrawn from the engagement without embarrassment
to the devoted woman who became my wife I would have done so, if
she gave me the opportunity. Nothing in my married state has
brought me pleasure and I often wish my wife would cease to love
me so that we might separate. But she would be heart-broken at
the suggestion and I feel driven to attempt to relieve my
feelings even in a way that has previously seemed repulsive to
me,--I mean by use of money.
"About my feelings toward my child there is not much to say, as
they are not very strong. I believe I carry him and help bathe
and attend to him as much as most fathers, and when he is a few
years older I hope I may find him very companionable. But he has
brought me no real joy, though I see other men look at him almost
with affection. But he has brought added happiness to his
mother."
The next case is interesting as showing the mental and emotional
development in a very radical case of sexual inversion.
HISTORY XX.--Englishman, of independent means, aged 49. His
father and his father's family were robust, healthy, and
prolific. On his mother's side, phthisis, insanity, and
eccentricity are traceable. He belongs to a large family, some of
whom died in early childhood and at birth, while others are
normal. He himself was a weakly and highly nervous child, subject
to night-terrors and somnambulism, excessive shyness and
religious disquietude.
Sexual consciousness awoke before the age of 8, when his
attention was directed to his own penis. His nurse, while out
walking with him one day, told him that when little boys grow'
up their penes fall off. The nursery-maid sniggered, and he felt
that there must be something peculiar about the penis. He
suffered from; irritability of the prepuce, and the nurse
powdered it before he went to sleep. There was no transition from
this to self-abuse.
About the same time he became subject to curious half-waking
dreams. In these he imagined himself the servant of several adult
naked sailors; he crouched between their thighs and called
himself their dirty pig, and by their orders he performed
services for their genitals and buttocks, which he contemplated
and handled with relish. At about the same period, when these
visions began to come to him, he casually heard that a man used
to come and expose his person before the window of a room where
the maids sat; this troubled him vaguely. Between the age of 8
and 11 he twice took the penis of a cousin into his mouth, after
they had slept together; the feeling of the penis pleased him.
When sleeping with another cousin, they used to lie with hands
outstretched to cover each other's penis or nates. He preferred
the nates, but his cousin the penis. Neither of these cousins was
homosexual, and there was no attempt at mutual masturbation. He
was in the habit of playing with five male cousins. One of these
boys was unpopular with the others, and they invented a method of
punishing him for supposed offenses. They sat around the room on
chairs, each with his penis exposed, and the boy to be punished
went around the room on his knees and took each penis into his
mouth in turn. This was supposed to humiliate him. It did not
lead to masturbation. On one occasion the child accidentally
observed a boy who sat next to him in school playing with his
penis and caressing it. This gave him a powerful, uneasy
sensation. With regard to all these points the subject observes
that none of the boys with whom he was connected at this period,
and who were exposed to precisely the same influences, became
homosexual.
He was himself, from the first, indifferent to the opposite sex.
In early childhood, and up to the age of 13, he had frequent
opportunities of closely inspecting the sexual organs of girls,
his playfellows. These roused no sexual excitement. On the
contrary, the smell of the female parts affected him
disagreeably. When he once saw a schoolfellow copulating with a
little girl, it gave him a sense of mystical horror. Nor did the
sight of the male organs arouse any particular sensations. He is,
however, of opinion that, living with his sisters in childhood,
he felt more curious about his own sex as being more remote from
him. He showed no effeminacy in his preferences for games or
work.
He went to a public school. Here he was provoked by boy friends
to masturbate, but, though he often saw the act in process, it
only inspired him with a sense of indecency. In his fifteenth
year puberty commenced with nocturnal emissions, and, at the
same time, he began to masturbate, and continued to do so about
once a week, or once a fortnight, during a period of eight
months; always with a feeling that that was a poor satisfaction
and repulsive. His thoughts were not directed either to males or
females while masturbating. He spoke to his father about these
signs of puberty, and by his father's advice he entirely
abandoned onanism; he only resumed the practice, to some extent,
after the age of 30, when he was without male comradeship.
The nocturnal emissions, after he had abandoned self-abuse,
became very frequent and exhausting. They were medically treated
by tonics such as quinine and strychnine. He thinks this
treatment exaggerated his neurosis.
All this time, no kind of sexual feeling for girls made itself
felt. He could not understand what his schoolfellows found in
women, or the stories they told about wantonness and delight of
coitus.
His old dreams about the sailors had disappeared. But now he
enjoyed visions of beautiful young men and exquisite statues; he
often shed tears when he thought of them. These dreams persisted
for years. But another kind gradually usurped their place to some
extent. These second visions took the form of the large, erect
organs of naked young grooms or peasants. These gross visions
offended his taste and hurt him, though, at the same time, they
evoked a strong, active desire for possession; he took a strange,
poetic pleasure in the ideal form. But the seminal losses which
accompanied both kinds of dreams were a perpetual source of
misery to him.
There is no doubt that at this time--that is, between the
fifteenth and seventeenth years--a homosexual diathesis had
become established. He never frequented loose women, though he
sometimes thought that would be the best way of combating his
growing inclination for males. And he thinks that he might have
brought himself to indulge freely in purely sexual pleasure with
women if he made their first acquaintance in a male costume, as
_débardeuses, Cherubino_, court-pages, young halberdiers, as it
is only when so clothed that women on the stage or in the
ball-room have excited him.
His ideal of morality and fear of venereal infection, more than
physical incapacity, kept him what is called chaste. He never
dreamed of women, never sought their society, never felt the
slightest sexual excitement in their presence, never idealized
them. Esthetically, he thought them far less beautiful than men.
Statues and pictures of naked women had no attraction for him,
while all objects of art which represented handsome males deeply
stirred him.
It was in his eighteenth year that an event occurred which he
regards as decisive in his development. He read Plato. A new
world opened, and he felt that his own nature had been revealed.
Next year he formed a passionate, but pure, friendship with a boy
of 15. Personal contact with the boy caused erection, extreme
agitation, and aching pleasure, but not ejaculation. Through four
years he never saw the boy naked or touched him pruriently. Only
twice he kissed him. He says that these two kisses were the most
perfect joys he ever felt.
His father now became seriously anxious both about his health and
his reputation. He warned him of the social and legal dangers
attending his temperament. But he did not encourage him to try
coitus with women. He himself thinks that his own sense of danger
might have made this method successful, or that, at all events,
the habit of intercourse with women might have lessened neurosis
and diverted his mind to some extent from homosexual thoughts.
A period of great pain and anxiety now opened for him. But his
neurasthenia increased; he suffered from insomnia, obscure
cerebral discomfort, stammering, chronic conjunctivitis,
inability to concentrate his attention, and dejection. Meanwhile
his homosexual emotions strengthened, and assumed a more sensual
character. He abstained from indulging them, as also from
onanism, but he was often forced, with shame and reluctance, to
frequent places--baths, urinaries, and so forth--where there were
opportunities of seeing naked men.
Having no passion for women, it was easy to avoid them. Yet they
inspired him with no exact horror. He used to dream of finding an
exit from his painful situation by cohabitation with some coarse,
boyish girl of the people; but his dread of syphilis stood in the
way. He felt, however, that he must conquer himself by efforts of
will, and by a persistent direction of his thoughts to
heterosexual images. He sought the society of distinguished
women. Once he coaxed up a romantic affection for a young girl of
15, which came to nothing, probably because the girl felt the
want of absolute passion in his wooing. She excited his
imagination, and he really loved her; but she did not, even in
the closest contact, stimulate his sexual appetite. Once, when he
kissed her just after she had risen from bed in the morning, a
curious physical repugnance came over him, attended with a sad
feeling of disappointment.
He was strongly advised to marry by physicians. At last he did
so. He found that he was potent, and begot several children, but
he also found, to his disappointment, that the tyranny of the
male genital organs on his fancy increased. Owing to this cause
his physical, mental, and moral discomfort became acute. His
health gave way.
At about the age of 30, unable to endure his position any longer,
he at last yielded to his sexual inclinations. As he began to do
this, he also began to regain calm and comparative health. He
formed a close alliance with a youth of 19. This _liaison_ was
largely sentimental, and marked by a kind of etherealized
sensuality. It involved no sexual acts beyond kissing, naked
contact, and rare involuntary emissions. About the age of 36 he
began freely to follow homosexual inclinations. After this he
rapidly recovered his health. The neurotic disturbances subsided.
He has always loved men younger than himself. At about the age of
27 he had begun to admire young soldiers. Since he yielded freely
to his inclinations the men he has sought are invariably persons
of a lower social rank than his own. He carried on one _liaison_
continuously for twelve years; it began without passion on the
friend's side, but gradually grew to nearly equal strength on
both sides. He is not attracted by uniforms, but seeks some
uncontaminated child of nature.
The methods of satisfaction have varied with the phases of his
passion. At first they were romantic and Platonic, when a
hand-touch, a rare kiss, or mere presence sufficed. In the second
period sleeping side by side, inspection of the naked body of the
loved man, embracements, and occasional emissions after prolonged
contact. In the third period the gratification became more
frankly sensual. It took every shape: mutual masturbation,
intercrural coitus, _fellatio, irrumatio_, and occasionally
active _pedicatio_; always according to the inclination or
concession of the beloved male.
He himself always plays the active, masculine part. He never
yields himself to the other, and he asserts that he never has the
joy of finding himself desired with ardor equal to his own. He
does not shrink from passive _pedicatio_; but it is never
demanded of him. Coitus with males, as above described, always
seems to him healthy and natural; it leaves a deep sense of
well-being, and has cemented durable friendships. He has always
sought to form permanent ties with the men whom he has adored so
excessively.
He is of medium height, not robust, but with great nervous
energy, with strong power of will and self-control, able to
resist fatigue and changes of external circumstances.
In boyhood he had no liking for female occupations, or for the
society of girls, preferring study and solitude. He avoided games
and the noisy occupations of boys, but was only non-masculine in
his indifference to sport, was never feminine in dress or habit.
He never succeeded in his attempts to whistle. He is a great
smoker, and has at times drunk much. He likes riding, skating,
and climbing, but is a poor horseman, and is clumsy with his
hands. He has no capacity for the fine arts and music, though
much interested in them, and is a prolific author.
He has suffered extremely throughout life, owing to his sense of
the difference between himself and normal human beings. No
pleasure he has enjoyed, he declares, can equal a thousandth
part of the pain caused by the internal consciousness of
pariahdom. The utmost he can plead in his own defense, he admits,
is irresponsibility, for he acknowledges that his impulse may be
morbid. But he feels absolutely certain that in early life his
health was ruined and his moral repose destroyed owing to the
perpetual conflict with his own inborn nature, and that relief
and strength came with indulgence. Although he always has before
him the terror of discovery, he is convinced that his sexual
dealings with men have been thoroughly wholesome to himself,
largely increasing his physical, moral, and intellectual energy,
and not injurious to others. He has no sense whatever of moral
wrong in his actions, and he regards the attitude of society
toward those in his position as utterly unjust and founded on
false principles.
The next case is, like the foregoing, that of a successful man of letters
who also passed through a long period of mental conflict before he became
reconciled to his homosexual instincts. He belongs to a family who are all
healthy and have shown marked ability in different intellectual
departments. He feels certain that one of his brothers is as absolute an
invert as himself and that another is attracted to both sexes. I am
indebted to him for the following detailed narrative, describing his
emotions and experiences in childhood, which I regard as of very great
interest, not only as a contribution to the psychology of inversion, but
to the embryology of the sexual emotions generally. We here see described,
in an unduly precocious and hyperesthetic form, ideas and feelings which,
in a slighter and more fragmentary shape, may be paralleled in the early
experiences of many normal men and women. But it must be rare to find so
many points in sexual psychology so definitely illustrated in a single
child. It may be added that the narrative is also not without interest as
a study in the evolution of a man of letters; a child whose imagination
was thus early exercised and developed was predestined for a literary
career.
HISTORY XXI.--"Almost the earliest recollection I have is of a
dream, which, from my vivid recollection of its details, must
have repeated itself, I think, more than once, unless my waking
thoughts unconsciously added definition. From this dream dated my
consciousness of the attraction to me of my own sex, which has
ever since dominated my life. The dream, suggested in part, I
think, by a picture in an illustrated newspaper of a mob
murdering a church dignitary, took this form: I dreamed that I
saw my own father murdered by a gang of ruffians, but I do not
remember that I felt any grief, though I was actually an
exceedingly affectionate child. The body was then stripped of its
clothing and eviscerated. I had at the time no notion of
anatomical details; but the particulars remain distinct to my
mind's eye, of entrails uniformly brown, the color of dung, and
there was no accompaniment of blood. When the abdomen had been
emptied, the incident in which I became an active participant
occurred. I was seized (and the fact that I was overpowered
contributed to the agony of delight it afforded me) and was laid
between the thighs of my murdered parent; and from there I had
presently crawled my way into the evacuated, abdomen. The act, so
far as I can decide of a dream at an age when emission was out of
the question, caused in me extreme organic excitement. At all
events, I used afterward definitely to recur to it in the waking
moments before sleep for the purpose of gaining a state of
erection. The dream had no outcome; it seemed to reach its goal
in the excitement it caused. I was at that time between 3 and 4
years old. (I have been told that erections occurred when I was
only 2 years old. It was between 3 and 4 that I used to induce,
at all events, the _sensation_ of an erection. But I was nearer 5
when, sitting on my bed and waiting to be dressed, I got an
involuntary erection and called my nurse's attention to it,
asking what it meant. The _appearance_ must, therefore, have been
usual to me at that date, but certainly the sensation was not.)
"At that time I was totally ignorant of the conditions, of
puberty, which afterward, when I discovered them, so powerfully
affected me. I could not even visualize the private organs of a
man; I made no deductions from myself. The only naked bodies I
had seen then--I judge from circumstances, not from any actual
memory of the facts--were those of my own sisters. In the waking
dreams which I began to construct, though I recurred often to the
one already narrated, the goal of my desire was generally to
nestle between the thighs or to have my face pressed against the
hinder parts of the object of my worship. But for a time my first
dream so engrossed me that I did not indulge in any promiscuity.
Gradually, however, my horizon enlarged, and took in, besides the
first mentioned, three others: a cousin very much my elder, an
uncle, and the curate of the parish.
"At this stage I began to invent circumstances for the indulgence
of my passion. One of the earliest was to imagine myself in a
tank with my three lovers floating in the water above me. From
this position I visited their limbs in turn; the attraction
rested in the thighs and buttocks only. I fancy this limitation
of the charm to the lower parts only lasted until actual
experience of a more complete embrace made me as much a lover of
the arms and breast; indeed, later I became more emotionally
enamored of these parts than of all the rest. At the beginning of
things I simply loved best what my mind could first get hold of.
"Quite early in my experience, when I was not more than 5, I
awoke earlier than usual, and saw my nurse standing in complete
nudity, commencing her toilet. She seemed to me a gross, coarse,
and meaningless object; the hair under her armpits displeased me,
and still more that on the lower part of her body. In the case of
men, directly I came to have cognizance of the same thing on
their bodies, the effect was exactly the opposite. It so happened
that about this time the gardener had received some injury to his
leg, and in showing the bruise to another exhibited before my
eyes a skin completely shagged over with dark hair. Though the
sight of the bruise repulsed me, my pleasure was intense, and the
vision of the gardener's legs was in my bed every night for a
week afterward. My point is that the sight of my nurse was liable
to rouse interest just as much as the far more prosaic display of
the gardener's wounded leg, but my nature made it impossible.
"It was about this time, if not before, that an enormous sense of
shyness with regard to all my private duties began to afflict me.
So great was it that I could endure from no hand except my
mother's or my nurse's the necessary assistance in the buttoning
and unbuttoning of my garments, always excepting those who were
about my own age, toward whom I felt no privacy whatever.
"When I was a little more than 5 I formed a friendship with a
young clerk, a youth of about 15, though he seemed to me a
grown-up person. One day, as he sat at his desk writing, I sat
down and began playing with his feet, investigating the height to
which his socks went under his trousers; in this way I obtained
six inches of bare leg. Conscious of my courage I fell to kissing
it. My friend laughed, but left me to my devotions in peace. This
was the first time in which a feeling of romance mixed itself in
my dreams; the physical excitement was less, but the pleasure was
greater. I cannot understand why I never repeated the experience.
He remained to me an object of very special and tender
consideration.
"In the next episode I have to relate the ideal was totally
absent, and the part I played was passive rather than active. I
was put to sleep with a boy considerably my senior. His
initiation led to a physical familiarity between us which was not
warm or kind, and I was allowed no scope for my own instinctive
desires for a warmer kind of contact; if I sought it under cover
of my companion's slumbers I found myself kicked away. Only on
one occasion did I find a few moments of supreme charm, while his
sleep remained sound, by discovering in the recesses of the sheet
an exposed surface of flesh against which I pressed my face in an
abandonment of joy. For the rest I was a passive participant, his
pleasure seeming to end in the mere handling of the fleshy
portions of my body. For this purpose I usually lay face downward
across his knees. So far as I can remember, this intimacy led to
a decrease in my pursuit of imaginative pleasures; for about a
year no further development took place.
"At about this date I was circumcised on account of the prepuce
being too long.
"Between the 6th and 7th years a change of environment brought me
into contact with a new set of faces. I had then a bed to myself,
and once more my imagination awoke to life. It was at this time
that I found myself constructing from men's faces suppositions as
to the rest of their bodies: a brown face led me to suppose a
uniformly brown body, a pale face a pale body. This idea of
variety began to charm me. I now made definite choice in my
reveries whether I would go to sleep between white thighs, or red
thighs, or brown thighs. Going to sleep definitely describes the
goal of the method to which I had addicted myself. As soon as I
entered my bed I abandoned myself to the construction of an amour
and retained it as long as I had consciousness. I may say that I
was not conscious of any emissions under these circumstances
(until some years later, when I brought it about by my own act),
but the pleasure was fairly acute.
"All this time there were secret meetings, with my bedfellow of
the year before. But they now took place by day, in various
hiding-places, with little unclothing or exposure, and my
companion was cold and fastidious and repelled any warmth on my
part; it became to me a dry sort of ritual. I had an idea at that
time that the whole thing was so much an original invention of
his and mine that there was no likelihood of it being practised
by anyone else in the world. But this consideration did not
restrain me in constructing love scenes with all those whose
appearance attracted me. At this period nearly every man with
whom I came in contact won at least my transient desire; only the
quite old and deformed lay outside the scope of my wishes. Many
of my amours developed in church; the men who sat near me were
the objects of my attention, and the clergyman, whose sermon I
did not listen to, supplied me with an occasion for reverie on
the charms his person would have for me under other
circumstances. It must have been at this time that I began to
elaborate ideas of a serried rank of congregated thighs across
which I lay and was dragged. I would arrange them in definite
order and then imagine myself drawn across from one to the other
somewhat forcibly. Admiration of strength was beginning at this
time to have a definite part in my conceptions, but anything of
the nature of cruelty had not then appealed to me. (I except the
original dream of my childhood, which seems to me still to stand
fantastically apart.) In the inventions to which I now gave
myself the sense of being passed across limbs of different
texture and color was subtle and pleasurable. I think the note of
constructive cruelty which now followed arose from an imagined
rivalry among my lovers for possession of me; the idea that I was
desired made me soon take a delight in imagining myself torn and
snatched about by the contending parties. Presently out of this I
began constructing definite scenes of violence. I was able in
imagination to lie in the thick and stress of conglomerated
deliciousness of thighs struggling to hold me; I was able to
imagine at least six bodies encircling me with passionate
contact. At the same time I had an ingrained feeling of my own
physical smallness in relation to the limbs whose contact threw
me into such paroxysms of delight. A new and sufficiently
ludicrous invention took possession of me; I imagined myself
strapped to the thigh (always, I think, the right one) of the man
on whom I chose, for the time, to concentrate my desires, and so
to be worn by him during his day's work, hidden beneath his
garments. I was not conscious of any difficulty due to my size.
The charm of bondage and compulsion was here, again, in the
ascendant. I fancy that it was in this connection that I first
anticipated whipping as the delightful climax to my emotions,
administered when my possessor, at the end of his day's work,
unclothed himself for rest.
"Up to this stage my attraction to the male organ of generation
had been slight and vague. Two things now contributed to bring
thought of it into prominence. On two or three occasions when I
accompanied farm laborers to their occupations I saw them pause
by the way to relieve nature. My extreme shyness as regards such
matters in my own person made this performance in my presence
like an outrage on my modesty; it had about it the suggestion of
an indecent solicitation to one whose inclination was to headlong
and delirious surrender. I stood rooted and flushing with
downcast eyes till the act was over and was conscious for a
considerable time of stammering speech and bewildered faculties.
When I afterward reviewed the circumstances they had the same
attraction for me that amorous cruelty was just then beginning to
exercise on my imagination. My mind secretly embraced the fearful
sweetness of the newly discovered sensation, surrounding the
performance of the function with all sorts of atrocious and
bizarre inventions. For a time my intellect hung back from
accepting this as the central and most fiery secret of the male
attraction; but shortly afterward, when out walking with my
father, I saw him perform the same act; I was overwhelmed with
emotion and could barely drag my feet from the spot or my eyes
from the damp herbage where he had deposited the waters of
secrecy. Even today, when my mind has been long accustomed to the
knowledge of generative facts, I cannot dissociate myself from
the shuddering charm that moment had for me. The attraction my
father's person had always had for me was now increased tenfold
by the performance I had witnessed (though I had not seen the
penis in any of these cases).
"For a considerable time only those lovers were dominant in my
imagination whom I had witnessed in the act that had so
poignantly affected me. My delight now took the form of imagining
myself strapped to the thighs of the person while this function
was in progress.
"By this time I must have been 8 years old. The cold and secret
relationship of which I have given an account had continued
without instructing me in any of the ardent possibilities it
might have suggested; no force or cruelty was used upon me, no
warmth was lavished. It made little difference that my companion
had now discovered the act of masturbation; it had no meaning to
me, since it led to no warmth of embrace. His method was to avert
himself from me; I had to fawn upon him from the rear and also to
invent indecent stories to stimulate his imagination. I felt
myself a despised instrument, the mere spectator of an act which,
if directed toward me with any warmth, would have aroused the
liveliest appetite. At this time, as I have since seen, my
companion was gaining knowledge from the ancient classics. For a
time some charm was imparted by his instructing me to adopt a
superincumbent face-to-face embrace. The beginning of his puberty
was enormously attractive to me; had he been less cold-blooded I
could have responded passionately to his endearments; but he
always insisted on rigorous passivity on my part, and he
explained nothing. One day, by a small gratuity, he induced me to
offer him my mouth, though I still had no comprehension of the
result I was helping to attain. Once the orgasm occurred, and the
effect was extremely nauseous; after that he was more careful. My
companion was approaching manhood, and his demands became more
frequent, his exactions more humiliating.
"At the same time my passion for male love was growing stronger.
I was able to construct from the unsatisfactory bondage in which
I was held images of bodily embrace which I had not before had
sufficient sense of human contact to form, though I seldom
imagined any of the acts that in actual experience repulsed me.
One day, however, I shirked a particularly repulsive humiliation
which my companion had forced upon me. He discovered the
deception, rose from the prone position in which he lay, and
throwing me across his knees thrashed me violently. I submitted
without a struggle, experiencing a curious sensation of pleasure
in the midst of my pain. When he repeated his order I found its
accomplishment no longer repulsive. One of the few pleasurable
memories this intimacy, extending over years, has left for me is
that moment of abject abasement to one who, with no warmth of
feeling, had yet once had sufficient energy to be brutal to me.
"It must have been from this incident that the calculated effect
of flagellation began to have weight with me when I indulged my
imagination. A wish to be repulsed, trampled, violated by the
object of my passion took hold of my instincts. Even then--and,
indeed, up to my 13th year--I had no idea of normal sexual
connection. I knew vaguely that children were born from women's
bodies; I did not know--and when told I did not believe--the true
facts of the marital relationship. All that I had
experienced--both in fact and imagination--was to me so highly
individual that I had no notion anything kindred to it could
exist outside of my own experience. I had no notion of sex as the
basis of life. Even when I came gradually to realize that men and
women were formed in a way that argued connection with each
other, I still believed it to be a dissolute sort of conduct, not
to be indulged in by those who had claims to respectability.
"I had, however, by this time arrived at a strong attraction
toward the organs of generation and all aspects of puberty, and
my imagination spent Itself in a fantastic worship of every sign
of masculinity. My enjoyment now was to imagine myself forced to
undergo physical humiliation and submission to the caprice of my
male captors, and the central fact became the discharge of urine
from my lover over my body and limbs, or, if I were very fond of
him, I let it be in my face. This was followed usually by a
half-caressing castigation, in which the hand only was
instrumental.
"The period of which I am now writing was that of my entry into
school life. My imaginary lovers immediately became numerous; all
the masters and all the boys above a certain age attracted me;
for two I had in addition a feeling of romantic as well as
physical attachment. Indeed, from this time onward I was never
without some heroes toward whom I indulged a perfectly separate
and tenderly ideal passion. The announcement that one was about
to leave surprised me into a passionate fit of weeping; yet my
reserve was so great and my sense of isolation so crushing that I
made no effort at intimacy, and to one for whom I felt
inexhaustible devotion I barely spoke for the first three years,
though meeting him daily. At this time the subjects of my
contemplation had distinctly individualized methods of approach.
Thus in one case I imagined we stood face to face in our
night-gear; suddenly mine was stripped from me; I was seized and
forcibly thrust under his and made to hang with my feet off the
ground by my full weight on the erect organ which inserted
itself between my thighs; so suspended--my body enveloped in the
folds of his linen and my face pressed upon his heart--I
underwent a castigation which continued until I was thrown down
to receive a discharge of urine over my prostrate body. Such
images seemed to come independently of my will.
"It was at this time that I found a large pleasure in imagining
contact with people whom I disliked; the prevailing note of these
intimacies was always cruelty, to which I submitted with acute
relish. I discovered, however, from the ordinary school
experiences of corporal punishment, that it had no charm to me
when administered for school offenses, even from the hands under
which at other times I imagined myself as delighting to receive
pain. The necessary link was lacking; had I perceived on the part
of my judge any liking for the operation, there would probably
have been a response on my side. On one occasion I was flogged
unjustly; conscious as I was of its cruel instead of judiciary
character, this was the only castigation I received which had in
it an element of gratification for my instincts. At the same time
I never forgave the hand that administered it; it is the only
instance I remember in myself of a grudge nourished for years.
"Meanwhile, amid this chaos of confused love and hatred, of
relish for cruelty and loathing for injustice, my first
thoroughly romantic and ideal attachment was developing itself. I
may say, of those to whom romance as well as physical attachment
bound me, that they have remained unchangeable parts of my
nature. Today, as it was twenty years ago, when I think of them
the blood gushes to my brain, my hands tingle and moisten with an
emotion I cannot subdue: I am at their feet worshipping them. Of
them my dreams were entirely tender; the idea of cruelty never
touched the conception I had of them. But I return to that one
who was the chief influence of my youth: older than myself by
only three years, he was of fine build and athletic, with
adolescence showing in his face; my tremulous beginnings of
worship were confirmed by a word of encouragement thrown to me
one day as I went to receive my first flogging; no doubt my
small, scared face excited his kind pity. I made it my concern
afterward to let him know that I had not cried under the ordeal,
and I believe he passed the word around that I had taken my
punishment pluckily. So little contact had I with him that beyond
constant worship on my part I remember nothing till, about three
years later, I received from him a kind, half-joking
solicitation, spoken in clean and simple language. So terrific
was my shyness and secrecy that I had even then no idea that
familiarity of the sort was common enough in schools. I was
absolutely unable to connect my own sensations with those of the
world at large or to believe that others felt as I did. On this
occasion I simply felt that some shrewd thrust had been made at
me for the detection of my secret. He had drawn me upon his knee;
I sat there silent, flushing and dumbfounded. He made no attempt
to press me; he had, as he thought, said enough if I chose to be
reciprocal; beyond that he would not tempt me. A few years ago I
heard of him married and prosperous.
"In following up my emotions in this direction I have far
outstripped the period up to which I have given a complete
exposition of my development. I must have been more than 12 years
old before school life persuaded me to face (as taught by
sniggering novices) the actual facts of sexual intercourse. At
the same time I learned that I had means of extracting enjoyment
from my own body in a definite direction which I had not till
then suspected. A growing resistance on my part to his cold
desires had led to a break with my former intimate; to the last
he had taught me nothing, except distaste for himself. I now
found ready teachers right and left of me. One of my
schoolfellows invited me to watch; him in the process of
masturbation; the spectacle left me quite unmoved; the result
appeared to me far less exciting than the discharge of urine
which, until then, I had associated with male virility. I was so
accustomed to my own lone amorous broodings that the effort and
action required for this process, when I attempted to imitate it,
disconcerted my thoughts and interfered with concentration on my
own inventions. I had never experienced the pleasure accompanying
the spasm of emission, and there seemed to be nothing worth
trying for along that road. I desisted and returned to my
reveries. I was now in a perfect maze of promiscuity; there must
have been at least fifty people who attracted me at that time. I
developed a liking for imagining myself between two lovers,
generally men who were physical contrasts. It was my habit to
analyze as minutely as possible those who attracted me. To gain
intimacy with what was below the surface I studied with attention
their hands, the wrists where they disappeared (showing the hair
of the forearm), and the neck; I estimated the comparative size
of the generative organs, the formation of the thighs and
buttocks, and thus constructed a presentment of the whole man.
The more vividly I could do this, the keener was the pleasure I
was able to obtain from their contemplated embraces.
"Till now I had been absolutely untouched by any moral scruples.
I had the usual acquiescence in the religious beliefs in which I
had been trained; it did not enter my head that there was any
divine law, one way or the other, concerning the allurements of
the imagination. From my thirteenth year slight hints of
uneasiness began to creep into my conscience. I began perhaps to
understand that the formulas of religion, to which I had listened
all my life with as little attention as possible, had some
meaning which now and then touched the circumstances of my own
life. I had not yet realized that my past foretold my future, and
that women would be to me a repulsion instead of an attraction
where things sexual were concerned. I had the full conviction
that one day I should be married; I had also some fear that as I
grew to manhood I might succumb to the temptations of loose
women. I had an incipient revulsion from such a fate, and this
seemed to me to indicate that moral stirrings were at work within
me. One night I was amorously attacked in my bedroom by two of
the domestics. I experienced an acute horror which I hid under
laughter; my resistance was so desperate that I escaped with a
tickling. I had been accustomed to sit on the servants' knees, a
habit I had innocently retained from childhood; I can now recall
in detail the approaches these women had been used to make me. At
the time I was utterly oblivious that anything was intended.
"I was equally oblivious to things that had a nearer relation to
my own feelings. In passing along a side-street one night I was
overtaken by a man who began conversation on the weather. He
asked me if I were not cold, began passing his hand up and down
my back; then came a question about caning at school, whether
certain parts of me were not sore, leading to an investigating
touch. I put his hand aside shyly, but did not resent the action.
Presently he was for exploring my trousers pockets and I began to
think him a pickpocket; repulsed in that direction, he returned,
to rubbing my back. The sensation was pleasant. I now took him
for a pimp who wished to take me to a prostitute, and as at that
time I had begun to realize that such pleasures were not to my
taste I was glad to find myself at my destination, and said
good-bye sharply, leaving him standing full of astonishment at
his failure with one who had taken his advances so pleasantly. I
could not bring myself to believe that others had the same
feelings as myself. Later I realized my escape, not without a
certain amount of regret, and constructed for my own pleasure a
different termination to the incident.
"I was now so possessed by masculine attraction that I became a
lover of all the heroes I read of in books. Some became as vivid
to me as those with whom I was living in daily contact. For a
time I became an ardent lover of Napoléon (the incident of his
anticipation of the nuptials with his second wife attracting me
by its impetuous brutality), of Edward I, and of Julius Cæsar.
Charles II I remember by a caressing cruelty with which my
imagination gifted him. Jugurtha was a great acquisition.
Bothwell, Judge Jefferies, and many villains of history and
fiction appealed to me by their cruelty.
"I had become an adept in the mental construction necessary for
the satisfaction of my desires. And yet up to that date I had
never seen the nude body of a full-grown adult. I had no
knowledge of the extent to which hair in certain instances
develops on the torso; indeed, my efforts at characterization
centered, for the most part, around the thighs and generative
organs. At this time one of my schoolfellows saw a common
workman, known to me by name, bathing in a stream with some
companions; all his body was, my informant told me, covered with
hair from throat to belly. In face the man was coarse and
repulsive, but I now began to regard him as a lovely monstrosity,
and for many nights embraced the vision of him passionately, with
face buried in the jungle growth of hair that covered his chest.
I was, for the first time, conscious of deliberately (and
successfully) willing not to see his face, which was distasteful
to me. At the same time another schoolfellow told me, concerning
a master who bathed with the boys, that hair showed above his
bathing-drawers as high as the navel. I now began definitely to
construct bodies in detail; the suggestion of extensive hairiness
maddened me with delight, but remained in my mind strongly
associated with cruelty; my hairy lovers never behaved to me with
tenderness; everything at this period, I think, tended to draw me
toward force and violence as an expression of amativeness. A
schoolfellow, a few years my senior, of a cruel, bullying
disposition, took a particular delight in inflicting pain on me:
he had particularly pointed shoes, and it was his custom to make
me stand with my back to him while he addressed me in petting and
caressing tones; just when his words were at their kindliest he
would inflict a sharp stroke with the toe of his boot so as to
reach the most tender part of my fundament; the pain was
exquisite; I was conscious that he experienced sexual pleasure (I
had seen definite signs of it beneath his clothing), and, though
loathing him, I would, after I had suffered from his kicks, throw
myself into his imaginary embraces and indulge in a perfect rage
of abject submission. Yet all the time I would gladly have killed
him.
"At the age of 14 I went, for a time, to a farm-house, where I
was allowed to mingle familiarly with the farm-laborers, a fine
set of muscular young men. I became a great favorite, and, having
childish, caressing manners a good deal behind my real age, I was
allowed to take many liberties with them. They all lived under
the farmer's roof in the old-fashioned way, and in the evening I
used to sit on their knees and caress and hug them to my heart's
content. They took it phlegmatically; it apparently gave them no
surprise. One of the men used to return my squeezes and caresses
and once allowed me to put my hand under his shirt, but there
were no further liberties.
"It was not until I was nearly 15 that the event happened which
made me, for the first time, restless in my enforced solitude. I
was verging on puberty, and perhaps in the hope that I should
find my own development met by a corresponding warmth I again
came into intimate relations with the companion whose frigid
performances had caused me weariness and disgust. He was now a
man, having reached majority. He put me into his bed while he
undressed himself and came toward me in perfect nudity. In a
moment we were in each other's arms and the deliciousness of that
moment intoxicated me. Suddenly, lying on the bed, I felt
attacked, as I thought, by an imperative need to make water. I
leaped up with a hurried excuse, but already the paroxysm had
subsided. No discharge came to my relief, yet the need seemed to
have passed. I returned to my companion, but the glamour of the
meeting was already over. My companion evidently found more
pleasure in my person than when I was a mere child; I felt moved
and flattered by the pleasure he took in pressing his face
against certain parts of my body. On a second occasion, one day,
I seemed involuntarily about to transgress decency, but again, as
before, separated myself, and remained ignorant of what it was on
which I had verged in my excitement. At another meeting, however,
I had been allowed to prolong my embrace and to act, indeed, upon
my full instincts. Once more I felt suddenly the coming of
something acutely impending; I took my courage in my hands and
went boldly forward. In another moment I had hold of the
mysterious secret of masculine energy, to which all my years of
dilirious imaginings had been but as a waiting at the threshold,
the knocking on a closed door.
"It was inevitable that from that day our intimacy should dwindle
into dissolution (though other causes anticipated this natural
decay), but I no longer found masturbation a dry and wearisome
formula. In my novitiate I was disheartened to find how long it
took me to dissociate myself from the contemplative and attach
myself to the active form of self-gratification. But I presently
found myself committed to the repetition of the act three times a
day. On almost the last occasion I met my intimate he showed an
exceptional ardor. At that meeting he proposed to attempt an act
I had not previously considered possible, far less had I heard
that it was considered the worst criminal connection that could
take place. I had a slight fear of pain, but was willing to
gratify him, and for the first time found in my submission a
union of the two amative instincts which had before disputed sway
in me: the instinct for tenderness and the instinct for cruelty.
_Pedicatio_ failed to take place, but I received an embrace which
for the first time gave me full satisfaction. My delight was
enormous; I was filled with emotions. I have no words to describe
the extraordinary charm of the warm, smooth flesh upon mine, and
the rougher contact of the hairy parts. Yet I was conscious, even
at the time, that this was but the physical side of pleasure, and
that he was not and never could be one whom I might truly be said
to love.
"I was now in my sixteenth year, and under the influence of these
and many other emotions then, for the first time, beginning to
seize me, a sense of literary power and a desire to express
myself through imaginative channels began to take hold of me. I
feared that my indulgence was having an enfeebling power on my
faculties (I had begun to experience physical languor and
depression), and certain religious scruples, the result of my
early training, took hold of me. For the first time I became
conscious that the ardors I felt toward my own sex were a
diversion of the sex-instinct itself, and to my astonishment and
consternation I found by chance the practices I had already
indulged in definitely denounced in the Bible as an abomination.
From that moment began a struggle which lasted for years. I made
a final breach with my former intimate, and thereupon a long
dispute took place between the conflicting influences that strove
for possession of my body. For a time I broke off the habit of
masturbation, but I could not so easily rid myself of the mental
indulgence, which was now almost an essential sedative for
inducing sleep. At this time a visit to the seaside, where, for
the first time, I was able to see men bathing in complete nudity,
frankly, in the full light of day, plunged me again for a time
headforemost into imaginative amours, and my scruples and
resolutions were flung to the winds. But, on the whole, I had now
entered a stage which, for want of a better term, I must describe
as the emotionally moral. To whatever depth of indulgence I
descended I carried a sense of obliquity with me; I believed that
I was a rebel from a law, natural and divine, of which yet no
instinct had been implanted in me. I still held unquestioned the
truth of the religion I had been brought up in, and my whole
life, every thought of my brain, every impulse of my body, were
in direct antagonism to the will of God. At times physical desire
broke down these barriers, but I practised considerable restraint
physically, though not mentally, and made great efforts to
conquer my aversion from women and extreme devotion for men,
without the slightest success. I was 30, however, before I found
a companion to love me in the way my nature required. I am quite
a healthy person, and capable of working at very high pressure.
Under sexual freedom I have become stronger."
HISTORY XXII.--T.J., aged 50; man of letters. Height 5 feet 7
inches; weight 10 stone, but formerly much less. Belongs to an
entirely normal family, all married and with children.
"Owing to the fact that my mother suffered from some malady the
whole period of gestation prior to my birth, I came into the
world so puny a child, so ill-nourished, that for some time the
doctors despaired of my life. Till the age of puberty, though
never ill, I suffered greatly from delicate health. I was
abnormally sensitive and all my affections and passions
extraordinarily developed. Owing to my brothers being much older
than myself I was thrown into the society of my sister. Till 8
years old she was my chief playmate. With her I played with dolls
and abandoned myself wholly to the delights of an imaginary land
which was much more real to me than the world around me. I never
remember learning to read, but at 5 the _Arabian Nights_ and
Kingsley's _Hereward the Wake_ were my favorite books. Living in
the country the society of other children was difficult to
obtain. My whole affections centered in my father, my mother
having died when I was a child. This affection for my father was
rather a morbid passion which absorbed my life. I dared not leave
his side for fear of a final separation from him. I would wake
him when asleep to see if he still lived. To this day, though he
died twenty-six years ago, his memory haunts me.
"My first abnormal desires were connected with him. I had seen
him occasionally micturating in the garden alleys or out in the
country. These occasions excited me terribly, and I would, if
possible, wait till he had gone, and touch the humid leaves,
drawing a terrible pleasure from the contact. Afterward, though
he never suspected it, desire for him became a consuming passion,
and I remember on one occasion, when on a holiday, I occupied the
same bed with him, the excitement of his propinquity brought on
such a formidable attack of heart palpitation that my father
called in the family physician on our return home. Needless to
say my heart was found quite sound. The desire still remains
after all these years, and nothing excites me more even now than
the memory of my father in his morning bath.
"The whole world for me in my early childhood was peopled with
imaginary beings. While still a young child I would invent
stories and relate them to any listener I could find, one such
story lasting three years. I was an omnivorous reader, but my
favorite reading was poetry. At 7 I could repeat the greater part
of Longfellow's poems; Scott followed; then Milton captivated me
when I was 14; then came Tennyson, Arnold, Swinburne, and Morris.
Later came the Greek and Latin poets. From 7 years on I wrote
verses to my father. Till 8 years I was excessively timid of the
dark and, indeed, of all loneliness. This passed, however, and
developed into an extreme sensitiveness of seeing or meeting
people. Even on a country road I would walk miles out of my way
to avoid meeting the ordinary yokel. At this period my day-dreams
were my favorite occupation. Even to the present day my visions
take up the greater part of my life. Though timid I was not
wanting in courage. At an early age I would fight boys even older
than myself. Later I have risked my life many times in various
parts of Europe. As regards sports, I can do a little of
everything: swimming, riding, fencing, shooting,--a little of
each. Cricket and football I also played passably, but sports
never interested me much. Literature became and is the passion
of my life and for some years has remained my sole occupation.
"At 8 years the sexual inversion began to manifest itself, though
till I had attained 10 years of age I was practically quite
innocent. At 8 years of age, my family removed to another country
and I made the acquaintance of a little boy who attracted me
sexually. We masturbated in company, without any reason except
the pleasure of seeing each other exposed. Then I had connection
with him _in anum_. This really at that time was an exception to
my ordinary tastes which speedily developed into an intense
desire of _fellatio_ and later on of intercrural pleasures. This
latter perhaps may be accounted for by the visit to our house of
a small boy with whom I slept for about a year. Every night
during this period, I had intercrural connection with him twice
and sometimes three times. Then came a consuming passion for all
young boys and very old men. Boys after 14 or 15 ceased to
attract me, more particularly when the hair of the pubes began to
develop. From 8 to 14, when first I had sexual emissions, I
masturbated at every opportunity. From 14 to 27, always once a
day, generally twice and sometimes three times a day. At 27 I
took rooms and formed acquaintance with the family occupying the
house. The boys, one by one, were allowed to sleep with me and I
conceived an extraordinary passion for one of them, an attachment
which lasted till I finally left England. The attachment was much
more that of a man for his wife and had nothing degrading in it.
I was wretched when away from him, and as he was very attached to
sport of all kinds I suffered 'divers kinds of death' each time
that I imagined his life to be endangered. I can honestly say
that in each of my attachments, and I have had many, the
prevailing sentiment was the delight of protecting a weaker being
than myself. Each person whom I have loved has been perfectly
normal and all are now fathers of families. Each still regards me
with affection and respect in spite of what has passed between
us. All my life I have been possessed with the passion for
paternity, I could almost say maternity. Willingly would I have
suffered the pains of hell could I have borne a son to the person
I loved. That I can honestly say has been the dominant instinct
of my life. In my passion I have never been brutal, nor save
under the influence of wine have I had connection with men over
the age of puberty. In Southern Europe my experiences have been
the same, a predominant passion for a boy exhibiting itself in
every species of protecting care, and though terminating so far
as sexual passion was concerned when the boy reached 15 or 16
years, yet still lasting and enduring in an honest and unselfish
affection. At the age of 51, I still masturbate once or twice a
week, though I long for some person whom I love to share the
pleasure with me. I tried vainly at the age of 27 to bring
myself into line with others. Prostitutes caused me horror,
whether male or female. I attempted the act of coitus four or
five times, twice with women of loose lives and at other times
with married women. Save in one case the attempts were either
abortive or caused me extreme disgust.
"Practically from the time of puberty I have attracted sexually
not only women but men. Women, oddly enough, though I care
nothing for them sexually, either hate me or adore me, and I have
had five offers of marriage. At the same time up till five years
ago, I was pursued by men and have had the oddest experiences
both in England and abroad. In the early period of this history I
suffered tremendously from the feeling that I was isolated and
unique in the world. I strove against the habit of masturbation
and my perverted tastes with all my might. Scourges, vigils,
burnings, all were of no avail. Deeper reading in the Classics
showed me how common was the taste of sex for the same sex. At 27
I began to have a settled philosophy. Then as now, I made endless
resolutions to avoid masturbation, though I can see nothing wrong
in the mutual act of two persons drawn together by love. I am and
always have been an extremely religious man, and if I am not
altogether an orthodox Catholic, do my duties and have a high
sense of the supernatural. I suffered much from melancholy from
my earliest years. At 18, though nothing definitely was wrong, a
vague but profound _malaise_ induced me to open the veins of my
arm. I fainted, however, and was promptly succored. At the age of
35, after a return from abroad, I took an enormous dose of
poison. This time again a singular coincidence saved me, and I
once more came back to life. After this I purposely went abroad
to obtain death and sought it in every possible way. Quite in
vain, as you see. One thing I have never had a fear of, but have
always longed for--Death. I am sure that if we only knew what
joys lay on the other side of death, the whole world would rush
madly to suicide. I have, apart from any perversion of taste, an
honest and genuine passion for children and animals, and I am
never happier than when in their society. Both adore me.
"My life has not dimmed nor deadened my faculties, for I am
occupied at the present time with very important work and I write
steadily. But my real life is passed in my visions, which take me
into another world quite as real as this sensuous one, and where
I always retreat on all occasions possible. And yet, a strange
paradox--I am a convinced Stoic and almost confine my reading to
Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius, and the 'Imitation.' I am extremely
emotional, fond of the society of women, though I loathe the
sexual side of them, and when I love, though passion is certainly
inextricably mixed, the prevailing sentiment is spiritual. I
shall probably end by being a Carthusian or a fakir."
HISTORY XXIII.--Englishman, aged 70, of German descent on
father's side. Was first child of his mother, who was 36 at his
birth; a younger brother normal; has no other relatives.
He was brought up in England, and went to school at the age of
13. At a very early age, between 6 and 8, was deeply impressed by
the handsome face of a young man, a royal trumpeter on horseback,
seen in a procession. This, and the sight of the naked body of
young men in a rowing-match on the river, caused great commotion,
but not of a definitely sexual character. This was increased by
the sight of a beautiful male model of a young Turk smoking, with
his dress open in front, showing much of the breast and below the
waist. He became familiar with pictures, admired the male figures
of Italian martyrs, and the full, rich forms of the Antinous, and
he read with avidity the _Arabian Nights_ and other Oriental
tales, translations from the classics, Suetonius, Petronius, etc.
He drew naked models in life schools, and delighted in male
ballet-dancers. As a child, he used to perform in private
theatricals; he excelled in female parts, and sang the songs of
Madame Vestris, encouraged in this by his father.
The sexual organs have never been fully developed, and the
testicles, though large, are of a flabby consistence. He cannot
whistle. He thinks he ought to have been a woman.
At school he was shy and reserved, and had no particular intimacy
with anyone, although he once desired it. He learned self-abuse
from his younger brother, who had learned it from an older boy.
He has never had erotic dreams. He never touched anyone but his
brother until later when travelling in Italy, and then only his
fellow-traveller. When travelling in Asia Minor he had many
opportunities, but always put them aside from fear, afterward
regretting his fearfulness. He yearned for intimacy with
particular friends, but never dared to express it. He went much
to theaters, and what he saw there incited him to masturbation.
When he was about 30 years of age his reserve, and his fear of
treachery and extortion, were at last overcome by an incident
which occurred late at night at the Royal Exchange, and again in
a dark recess in the gallery of the Olympic Theater when Gustavus
Brooke was performing. From that time the Adelphi Theater, the
Italian Opera, and the open parks at night became his fields of
adventure. He remarks that among people crowding to witness a
fire he found many opportunities. His especial intimates were a
railway clerk and an Italian model. In more recent years he has
chiefly found gratification among footmen and policemen.
He is exclusively passive; also likes mutual _fellatio_. He used
greatly to admire finely developed forms (conscious of his own
shortcomings), shapely limbs, and delicate brown hair, and always
admired strength and manly vigor. He never took any interest in
boys, and has always been indifferent to women.
HISTORY XXIV.--A medical man, English, aged 30. He believes that
his father, who was a magistrate, was very sympathetic toward
men; on several occasions he has sat with him on the bench when
cases of indecent assault were brought up; he discharged three
cases, although there could be little doubt as to their guilt,
and was very lenient to the others.
From the age of 9 he loved to sleep with his brother, ten years
older, who was in the navy; they slept in different beds, and the
child went to bed early, but he always kept awake to see his
brother undress, as he adored his naked body; and would then get
into his bed. He learned the habit of masturbation from his
brother at the age of 9; at that time there was no sexual orgasm,
but watching it in his brother was a perpetual source of wonder
and pleasure. During his brother's absence at sea the boy longed
for his return and would practice self-abuse with the thought of
his brother's naked body before him. This brother's death was a
source of great grief. At the age of 12 he went to
boarding-school and was constantly falling in love with
good-looking boys. He was always taken into one of the bigger
boys' beds. At this age he was thoroughly able to enjoy the
sexual orgasm with boys. His erotic dreams have always been of
men and especially of boys; he has never dreamed sexually of
women. From the age of 9 to the age of 21, when he left school,
he never gave women a thought sexually, though he always liked
their society. For two years after leaving school he had
connection with women, not because he thought there was sin in
loving his own sex, but because he regarded it as a thing that no
one did after leaving school. During these two years he still
really preferred men and used to admire the figures of soldiers
and sailors. He then paid a visit to London, which may be
described in his own words: "I went to see an old schoolfellow
who was living there. In his room was a young fellow, fair,
extremely good looking, with a good figure and charming manners.
From that moment all my past recollections came back. I could not
get him out of my mind; in fact, I was in love with him. I
pictured him naked before me as a lovely statue; my dreams were
frequent at night, always of him. For a fortnight afterward I
practised masturbation with the picture of his lovely face and
form always before me. We became fast friends, and from that day
women have never entered my thoughts."
Although up to the present he has no wish or intention to marry,
he believes that he will eventually do so, because it is thought
desirable in his profession; but he is quite sure that his love
and affection for men and boys will never lessen.
In earlier life he preferred men from 20 to 35; now he likes boys
from 16 upward; grooms, for instance, who must be good looking,
well developed, cleanly, and of a lovable, unchanging nature; but
he would prefer gentlemen. He does not care for mere mutual
embracing and reciprocal masturbation; when he really loves a man
he desires _pedicatio_ in which he is himself the passive
subject.
He has curly hair and moustache, and well-developed sexual
organs. His habits are masculine; he has always enjoyed field
sports, and can swim, ride, drive, and skate. At the same time,
he is devoted to music, can draw and paint, and is an ardent
admirer of male statuary. While fond of practical occupations of
every sort, he dislikes anything that is theoretical.
He adds: "As a medical man, I fail to see morally any
unhealthiness, or anything that nature should be ashamed of, in
connection with, and sympathy for, men."
HISTORY XXV.--A.S. Schoolmaster, aged 46.
"My father was, I should say, below the average in capacity for
friendship. He liked young girls, and was never interested in
boys. He was a man of strongly Puritanical morality, capable of
condemning with gloomy bitterness. He was also a man capable of
great sacrifice for principle, and mentally very well endowed. My
mother was a clever, practical woman, with wide sympathies. She
was capable of warm friendship, especially toward those younger
than herself. Her father (whom I never saw) was a teacher. He was
devoted to his wife, but also delighted in the company of young
men. He had always some young man on his arm, my mother would
tell me. My mother's family is of Welsh descent. I learned to
read at 5, and I can scarcely have been more than 6 when I used
to read again and again David's lament for Absalom. Even now I
can dimly recall the siren charm for me of that melancholy
refrain, 'O my son Absalom.... O Absalom, my son, my son!' Of
late, when I have thought of the amount of devotion I have shown
to lads, and the amount I have sometimes suffered for them, I
have felt as if there were something almost weirdly prophetic in
that early incident.
"I was always an impressionable creature. My mother was very
musical, and her singing 'got hold' of me wonderfully. The
dramatic and the poetic always strongly appealed to me.
"I felt I should like to act; but I never dared. In the same way
I felt that one day I should like to be a schoolmaster, but I
dared not say so. A shy, retiring creature was obviously unfitted
for such occupations. Well, the teaching came about, and the
strange part was that the boys were somehow or other attracted
by me, and the 'worst' customers were attracted most. And there
came a chance of acting too. Owing to some difficulties about the
cast in a play at school, I took a part. After that I _knew_ that
(within a certain range) I could act. I spent two holidays with a
dramatic company. I should undoubtedly have remained on the
stage, but for one thing. I don't wish to be sanctimonious, but
dirty and ugly jokes are odious to me. It was this sort of thing
that drove me away. I threw myself into the school work instead.
"It was partly the dramatic interest, partly a quite genuine
interest in human nature, that led me to do some preaching too.
When I had been badly hurt by one or two youngsters whom I loved,
I thought of going in for pastoral work, but this too was given
up--and very wisely. I should never be able to work comfortably
with any organization. For one thing I have a way of taking on
new ideas, and organizations do not like that. For another, all
social functions are anathema to me.
"Interest in 'art' as usually understood began to be marked only
after I was 30. It started with architecture and passed on to
painting and sculpture. The tendency to do rather a variety (too
great a variety) of things characterizes many uranians. We are
rather like the labile chemical compounds: our molecules readily
rearrange themselves.
"As a boy of 10 I had the ordinary sweethearting with a girl of
the same age. The incident is worth perhaps a little further
comment for the following reason: When I was 16 years old the
girl lived with us for a year. She was a nice, pleasant, bright
girl, and she thought a great deal of me. I was strongly
attracted by her. I remember especially one little incident. I
had been showing her how to do some algebra and she was kneeling
at the table by the side of my chair. Her hair was flowing over
her shoulders and she looked rather charming. She expressed warm
admiration of the way I had worked the problem out. I remember
that I deliberately squashed out the feeling of attraction that
came over me. I scarcely know why I did this; but I fancy there
was a vague sense that I did not want my work disturbed. There
was no sexual attraction or, at least, none that was manifest.
The girl, there is no doubt, grew to love me. I am sorry to say
that in two other cases, later, women loved me, and have both
permanently remained unmarried on my account. I sometimes feel
that in a wisely free society I should be able to give both of
these women children. That I believe I could do, and I think it
would be an immense satisfaction to them. A permanent union with
a woman would, however, be impossible to me. A permanent union
with a man would, I believe, be possible. At least I know that
attractions which have been at all homosexual in character have
in my case been very lasting.
"I was strongly attracted when not more than 13 to a lad slightly
older. It was a love story, there is no doubt, but I do not
recollect any outer sexual signs. There were other passing cases,
but in no case was there any warm response till I was 15. I then
made friends with a lad of entirely different type from myself. I
was a reader. I liked long walks and fresh air, but I was too shy
to go in for sports. Indeed I was frightfully shy. He was a great
sportsman and always at home in society. But he asked me to help
him with some work, and we took to working together. I grew
passionately fond of him. His caresses always caused some
erection. Personally, I believe it would have been wiser to have
obtained complete sexual expression. The absence of knowledge led
to two distinctly undesirable results. The first was marked
congestion and pain at times; the second was a tendency to a sort
of modified masochism. There is always, I suppose, some erotic
attraction about the buttocks, and of course also, to boys, they
afford an irresistibly attractive mark for a good smack. I found
that when this lad spanked me it produced some amount of sexual
excitement, and the desire for this form of stimulus grew upon
me. The result, in my case, was bad. It was sensualism, not love.
I can say this with confidence, because in a much later case of
deeply passionate love, I shrank from any such method, but the
mutual, naked embrace I found was for me an absolutely natural
and _pure_ expression of love. I never felt any touch of
grossness in it, and it destroyed the earlier and (for me at
least) less wholesome desire.
"The school friendship disappeared with the marriage of my
friend. I was furiously jealous, and the young man's mother was
opposed to me, but I still think of that early friendship with
tenderness. I know that my boy friend was the first who made me
capable of self-expression, the first who taught me how to make
friends at all. And if he still cared for me, I know that his
love would be dear to me still.
"My chief regret, as I look back, is that I did not know about
these things early. I cannot but think that all youngsters should
be spoken to about the love of comrades and encouraged to seek
help in any sort of trouble that this may bring. We homogenic
folk may be but a small percentage of mankind, but our numbers
are still great, and surely the making or marring of our lives
should count for something. At college I fell violently in love
with a friend with whom I did work in science. He loved me too,
though not with such heat. He also was largely uranian, but this
I only realized a year or two back. He remains unmarried, and is
still my friend. We did some research work together which is
pretty well known. I am quite sure that the love we had for each
other gave tremendous zest to our work and greatly increased our
powers.
"While I was working at college I was interested in a lad who was
working as errand boy for a city firm. I helped him to get better
training, and spent money on him. My father was making me some
allowance at the time and demurred. I said I would in future
support myself, and in this way came to take up schoolmastering.
I at once became quite absorbed in my work with the boys. Of
course I loved them. And here I feel I must touch upon what seems
to me a characteristic of most of us uranians. Our genital organs
are with us ordinarily and usually organs of _expression_. The
clean-minded heterogenic man is apt to look upon such a view of
the genital organs as monstrous; we, on the other hand, are
compelled (at least for ourselves) to regard it as the natural
and pure one. For my own part I had many Puritan
prejudices--prejudices that I retained for many a long and weary
day--but my affection for those of my own sex so often expressed
itself by some sexual stirring, and more or less erection, that I
was _obliged_ to look upon this as inevitable, and in general I
paid no attention to it whatever. It was the older boys' who
sometimes attracted me strongly. My love for them was I know a
genuinely spiritual thing, though inevitably having some physical
expression. I was capable of great devotion to them and sacrifice
for them, and I would certainly rather have died than have
injured them. The boys got on well with me. I was never weak with
them, and I was able to allow all kinds of familiarities without
any loss of respect. The older boys usually, out of class, called
me by my Christian name, and I remember one writing to ask me
whether he might do so, as it made him feel 'nearer' to me. A few
of the lads I of course loved with special devotion. They kissed
me and loved to have me embrace them. One of these was, I now
know, pure uranian, and there was in his case certainly some
sexual response, but though I often slept with him, when he was a
lad of 17 and 18, there was never any idea in our minds of any
sexual act. We are still warm friends, and always kiss when we
meet. Looking back upon those days, I feel that I was a little
inclined to pass on from one love to another, but each was a
genuine devotion, and involved real hard work on the lad's
behalf. And I know that where the lad stuck to me into manhood a
real tenderness and love remain still.
"While teaching I made the acquaintance of a non-conformist
minister, who, though happily married, had certainly some
homogenic tendencies. He was most devoted to boys and helped me
with regard to some difficult cases. It was the difficult cases
that always attracted me. I had to punish these lads and my
friend recommended spanking with the hand on the bare buttocks. I
mention that I adopted this method, because it might have been
thought specially dangerous to me. It certainly never produced in
me the remotest suggestion of any sexual act, though it did
sometimes produce a slight amount of sexual excitement. I
disregarded this, or put it out of my mind, as I found the method
most efficacious. It was capable of great variation of intensity,
and the boys were always ready to joke about it. I never came
across a case where any sexual excitement was produced by it. The
boys whom I had to be most 'down' on almost always, however, grew
fonder of me. There may be a slight and normal masochistic
tendency in most boys, and _perhaps_ the erogenic character of
the buttocks has something to do with the development of
affection. If so, I am inclined to regard it as normal and useful
rather than otherwise, for in my experience no undesirable result
was ever produced. But then, of course, there was no playing with
the business; that might, I am sure, in some cases be decidedly
injurious.
"One experience of my schoolmastering days is, I think, important
in its bearing upon general sexual psychology. I always noticed
that during the term I was specially free from 'wet dreams.' What
is noteworthy is this: During term there was never anything more
than a very partial sexual expression of any feeling of mine,
such expression indeed as was wholly inevitable. There was
therefore no actual loss of semen, and it seems clear that the
'wet dreams' were not due to mere physical pressure. The psychic
satisfaction of love in this case made the complete physical
expression less urgent. But it was a love of a distinctly tender
kind that was needed to keep the physical from obtruding. Of that
further experience has made me sure. I am, moreover, now
convinced that a _mutual_ uranian love will reach its best
results, both spiritual and physical, where there is complete
sexual expression.
"Of the character of the sexual dreams I have had, there is not
much to be said. During the period of masochistic tendency, they
were masochistic in character; otherwise they have been dreams
simply of the naked embrace. Usually there has been a
considerable element of ideal love in the dream. I have not more
than three times at most dreamed of intercourse with one of the
opposite sex. There was only in one case anything that I could
call actual emotion in such a dream. The other dreams have often
(not always) been dreams of real yearning, and not at all what I
should call merely sensual.
"In the course of time I wanted more freedom to do things in my
own way than could be obtained in a public school. I started a
school of my own. The work was for a good many years very happy.
I loved the boys, and they loved me. I was active, ardent, and
they made a chum of me. But people got into the way of sending me
awkward customers. I poured out my love on these, I used myself
up for them. Unfortunately (though I was never 'orthodox') my
Puritanical morality was still strong within me, my views of
human psychology were too limited, and I imposed them on the
boys. Some were very devoted; but, as years went by and the
proportion of _mauvais sujets_ increased, there tended to be a
split in the small camp and one or two boys whom I loved deceived
me terribly. To a man of my temperament this was heart-rending
and from then the work was doomed. Troubles at school went along
with troubles at home, and these things contributed to center my
affection upon a lad who was with me, and who had given me much
trouble. For some reason or other I went on believing that he
would get right. Deceit was his great difficulty. He was
certainly partly homosexual himself. Looking back I can see that
with a wider and more charitable knowledge I could have dealt
more wisely and helpfully with certain homosexual episodes of
his. I am convinced now that mere sweeping condemnation of the
physical is not the wholesome way of help. However, to cut the
story short, all seemed at last to go well, and the lad was
growing into a young man. Our love deepened, and we always slept
together, but quite ascetically. Later, when quite in his young
manhood he had left school, there was, unfortunately,
misunderstandings with his parents, who forbad him to sleep with
me. What followed is of some importance. Up till then, though
certainly his affection seemed ardent, I had observed no sexual
signs on his part. I had been quite frank with him as to mine. He
was then 19, and I thought old enough to have things explained to
him. Sleeping with him I had found peaceful and helpful, and more
than once he told me that it greatly helped him. But _after we
were forbidden to sleep together_, I found the passion in me more
difficult to control, and it suddenly leaped out in him. We were
still, however, rather ascetic, though we used to kiss each
other, and we used to embrace naked. This produced emission not
infrequently with me, but only once with him, though always
powerful erection. I would not allow any friction. Perhaps this
was a mistake. A more complete expression might have helped him.
"All my life I had been hungry for a complete response, and at
one time the lad thought he could give it. He was then nearing
20. 'I have never been so happy in my life,' he said. It was a
blow to me when I found he had mistaken his own feelings, but I
was quite ready to accept what love he could give. I also never
dreamed of any sort of insistence on sexual expression. With such
love as he could give I was quite ready to make myself content.
'The true measure of love,' wrote a uranian schoolmaster to me
once, 'is self-sacrifice'; not 'What will you give?' but 'What
will you give up?' Not 'What will you do for him?' but 'What will
you forego for his sake?' I quote this gladly, for the
conventional English moralists regard an invert as a kind of
deformed beast. I can only say that I tried to realize the ideal
which these words express. No 'moralist' would have helped me one
whit. The parents, also, separated us. They have done much harm
by their mistake. How difficult it is for parents to allow
freedom to their children! Their ideal is successful constraint,
not free self-discovery. But in spite of them, and in spite of
the separation, I know that my friend and I have helped each
other.
"There is one fear parents have which I believe is unwarranted.
As far as I have seen, I do not conclude that the early
expression of homosexual love prevents heterosexual love from
developing later. Where this love is a part of the individual's
inborn nature, it will show itself. I do, however, believe that a
noble homogenic love in early life will sometimes help a lad to
avoid a low standard of heterogenic attachment. The Greeks did
well, at their best time, in cultivating and ennobling the
homogenic love. Amongst us, as can be understood by all who know
the working of society taboos, it is the baser forms that are
unhindered, the noblest forms that are debased.
"We urnings are, I think, dependent upon individual love. Many of
us, I know, need to work for an individual to do our best. Is
this the outcome of the woman in the uranian temperament? And the
tragedy of our fate is that we whose souls vibrate only to the
touch of the hand of Eros are faced with the fiercest taboo of
all that can give our lives meaning. The other taboos have been
given up one by one. Will not this, the last of the taboos, soon
vanish? I have known lives darkened by it, weakened by it,
crushed out by it. How long are the western moralists to maim and
brand and persecute where they do not understand?"
The next case belongs to a totally different class from all the preceding
histories. These--all British or American--were obtained privately; they
are not the inmates of prisons or of asylums, and in most cases they have
never consulted a physician concerning their abnormal instincts. They pass
through life as ordinary, sometimes as honored, members of society. The
following case, which happens to be that of an American, is acquainted
with both the prison and the lunatic asylum. There are several points of
interest in his history, and he illustrates the way in which sexual
inversion can become a matter of medico-legal importance. I think,
however, that I am justified in believing that the proportion of sexually
inverted persons who reach the police-court or the lunatic asylum is not
much larger in proportion to the number of sexually inverted persons among
us than it is among my cases. For the documents on which I have founded
the history of Guy Olmstead I am indebted to the kindness of Dr. Talbot,
of Chicago, well known from his studies of abnormalities of the jaws and
face, so often associated with nervous and mental abnormality. He knew the
man who addressed to him the letters from which I here quote:--
HISTORY XXVI.--On the twenty-eighth of March, 1894, at noon, in
the open street in Chicago, Guy T. Olmstead fired a revolver at a
letter-carrier named William L. Clifford. He came up from behind,
and deliberately fired four shots, the first entering Clifford's
loins, the other three penetrating the back of his head, so that
the man fell and was supposed to be fatally wounded. Olmstead
made little attempt to escape, as a crowd rushed up with the
usual cry of "Lynch him!" but waved his revolver, exclaiming:
"I'll never be taken alive!" and when a police-officer disarmed
him: "Don't take my gun; let me finish what I have to do." This
was evidently an allusion, as will be seen later on, to an
intention to destroy himself. He eagerly entered the prison-van,
however, to escape the threatening mob.
Olmstead, who was 30 years of age, was born near Danville, Ill.,
in which city he lived for many years. Both parents were born in
Illinois. His father, some twenty years ago, shot and nearly
killed a wealthy coal operator, induced to commit the crime, it
is said, by a secret organization of a hundred prominent citizens
to whom the victim had made himself obnoxious by bringing suits
against them for trivial causes. The victim became insane, but
the criminal was never punished, and died a few years later at
the age of 44. This man had another son who was considered
peculiar.
Guy Olmstead began to show signs of sexual perversity at the age
of 12. He was seduced (we are led to believe) by a man who
occupied the same bedroom. Olmstead's early history is not clear
from the data to hand. It appears that he began his career as a
schoolteacher in Connecticut, and that he there married the
daughter of a prosperous farmer; but shortly after he "fell in
love" with her male cousin, whom he describes as a very handsome
young man. This led to a separation from his wife, and he went
West.
He was never considered perfectly sane, and from October, 1886,
to May, 1889 he was in the Kankakee Insane Asylum. His illness
was reported as of three years' duration, and caused by general
ill-health; heredity doubtful, habits good, occupation that of a
schoolteacher. His condition was diagnosed as paranoia. On
admission he was irritable, alternately excited and depressed. He
returned home in good condition.
At this period, and again when examined later, Olmstead's
physical condition is described as, on the whole, normal and
fairly good. Height, 5 feet 8 inches; weight, 159 pounds. Special
senses normal; genitals abnormally small, with rudimentary penis.
His head is asymmetrical, and is full at the occiput, slightly
sunken at the bregma, and the forehead is low. His cephalic index
is 78. The hair is sandy, and normal in amount over head, face,
and body. His eyes are gray, small, and deeply set; the zygomæ
are normal. The nose is large and very thin. There is arrested
development of upper jaw. The ears are excessively developed and
malformed. The face is very much lined, the nasolabial fissure is
deeply cut, and there are well-marked horizontal wrinkles on the
forehead, so that he looks at least ten years older than his
actual age. The upper jaw is of partial V-shape, the lower well
developed. The teeth and their tubercles and the alveolar process
are normal. The breasts are full. The body is generally well
developed; the hands and feet are large.
Olmstead's history is defective for some years after he left
Kankakee. In October, 1892, we hear of him as a letter-carrier in
Chicago. During the following summer he developed a passion for
William Clifford, a fellow letter-carrier about his own age, also
previously a schoolteacher, and regarded as one of the most
reliable and efficient men in the service. For a time Clifford
seems to have shared this passion, or to have submitted to it,
but he quickly ended the relationship and urged his friend to
undergo medical treatment, offering to pay the expenses himself.
Olmstead continued to write letters of the most passionate
description to Clifford, and followed him about constantly until
the latter's life was made miserable. In December, 1893, Clifford
placed the letters in the postmaster's hands, and Olmstead was
requested to resign at once. Olmstead complained to the Civil
Service Commission at Washington that he had been dismissed
without cause, and also applied for reinstatement, but without
success.
In the meanwhile, apparently on the advice of friends, he went
into hospital, and in the middle of February, 1894, his testicles
were removed. No report from the hospital is to hand. The effect
of removing the testicles was far from beneficial, and he began
to suffer from hysterical melancholia. A little later he went
into hospital again. On March 19th he wrote to Dr. Talbot from
the Mercy Hospital, Chicago: "I returned to Chicago last
Wednesday night, but felt so miserable I concluded to enter a
hospital again, and so came to Mercy, which is very good as
hospitals go. But I might as well go to Hades as far as any hope
of my getting well is concerned. I am utterly incorrigible,
utterly incurable, and utterly impossible. At home I thought for
a time that I was cured, but I was mistaken, and after seeing
Clifford last Thursday I have grown worse than ever so far as my
passion for him is concerned. Heaven, only knows how hard I have
tried to make a decent creature out of myself, but my vileness is
uncontrollable, and I might as well give up and die. I wonder if
the doctors knew that after emasculation it was possible for a
man to have erections, commit masturbation, and have the same
passion as before. I am ashamed of myself; I hate myself; but I
can't help it. I have friends among nice people, play the piano,
love music, books, and everything that is beautiful and
elevating; yet they can't elevate me, because this load of inborn
vileness drags me down and prevents my perfect enjoyment of
anything. Doctors are the only ones who understand and know my
helplessness before this monster. I think and work till my brain
whirls, and I can scarce refrain from crying out my troubles."
This letter was written a few days before the crime was
committed.
When conveyed to the police station Olmstead completely broke
down and wept bitterly, crying: "Oh! Will, Will, come to me! Why
don't you kill me and let me go to him!" (At this time he
supposed he had killed Clifford.) A letter was found on him, as
follows: "Mercy, March 27th. To Him Who Cares to Read: Fearing
that my motives in killing Clifford and myself may be
misunderstood, I write this to explain the cause of this homicide
and suicide. Last summer Clifford and I began a friendship which
developed into love." He then recited the details of the
friendship, and continued: "After playing a Liszt rhapsody for
Clifford over and over, he said that when our time to die came he
hoped we would die together, listening to such glorious music as
that. Our time has now come to die, but death will not be
accompanied by music. Clifford's love has, alas! turned to deadly
hatred. For some reason Clifford suddenly ended our relations and
friendship." In his cell he behaved in a wildly excited manner,
and made several attempts at suicide; so that he had to be
closely watched. A few weeks later he wrote to Dr. Talbot: "Cook
County Gaol, April 23. I feel as though I had neglected you in
not writing you in all this time, though you may not care to hear
from me, as I have never done anything but trespass on your
kindness. But please do me the justice of thinking that I never
expected all this trouble, as I thought Will and I would be in
our graves and at peace long before this. But my plans failed
miserably. Poor Will was not dead, and I was grabbed before I
could shoot myself. I think Will really shot himself, and I feel
certain others will think so, too, when the whole story comes out
in court. I can't understand the surprise and indignation my act
seemed to engender, as it was perfectly right and natural that
Will and I should die together, and nobody else's business. Do
you know I believe that poor boy will yet kill himself, for last
November when I in my grief and anger told his relations about
our marriage he was so frightened, hurt, and angry that he wanted
us both; to kill ourselves. I acquiesced gladly in this proposal
to commit suicide, but he backed out in a day or two. I am glad
now that Will is alive, and am glad that I am alive, even with
the prospect of years of imprisonment before me, but which I will
cheerfully endure for his sake. And yet for the last ten months
his influence has so completely controlled me, both body and
soul, that if I have done right he should have the credit for my
good deeds, and if I have done wrong he should be blamed for the
mischief, as I have not been myself at all, but a part of him,
and happy to merge my individuality into his."
Olmstead was tried privately in July. No new points were brought
out. He was sentenced to the Criminal Insane Asylum. Shortly
afterward, while still in the prison at Chicago, he wrote to Dr.
Talbot: "As you have been interested in my case from a scientific
point of view, there is a little something more I might tell you
about myself, but which I have withheld, because I was ashamed to
admit certain facts and features of my deplorable weakness. Among
the few sexual perverts I have known I have noticed that all are
in the habit of often closing the mouth with the lower lip
protruding beyond the upper. [Usually due to arrested development
of upper jaw.] I noticed the peculiarity in Mr. Clifford before
we became intimate, and I have often caught myself at the trick.
Before that operation my testicles would swell and become sore
and hurt me, and have seemed to do so since, just as a man will
sometimes complain that his amputated leg hurts him. Then, too,
my breasts would swell, and about the nipples would become hard
and sore and red. Since the operation there has never been a day
that I have been free from sharp, shooting pains down the abdomen
to the scrotum, being worse at the base of the penis. Now that my
fate is decided, I will say that really my passion for Mr.
Clifford is on the wane, but I don't know whether the improvement
is permanent or not. I have absolutely no passion for other men,
and have begun to hope now that I can yet outlive my desire for
Clifford, or at least control it. I have not yet told of this
improvement in my condition, because I wished people to still
think I was insane, so that I would be sure to escape being sent
to the penitentiary. I know I was insane at the time I tried to
kill both Clifford and myself, and feel that I don't deserve such
a dreadful punishment as being sent to a State prison. However, I
think it was that operation and my subsequent illness that caused
my insanity rather than passion for Clifford. I should very much
like to know if you really consider sexual perversion an
insanity."
When discharged from the Criminal Insane Asylum, Olmstead
returned to Chicago and demanded his testicles from the City
Postmaster, whom he accused of being in a systematized conspiracy
against him. He asserted that the postmaster was one of the chief
agents in a plot against him, dating from before the castration.
He was then sent to the Cook Insane Hospital. It seems probable
that a condition of paranoia is now firmly established.
The following cases are all bisexual, attraction being felt toward both
sexes, usually in predominant degree toward the male:--
HISTORY XXVII.--H.C., American, aged 28, of independent means,
unmarried, the elder of two children. His history may best be
given in his own words:--
"I am on both sides distantly of English ancestry, the first
colonists of my name having come to New England in 1630. Both my
mother's and my father's families have been prolific in soldiers
and statesmen; my mother's contributed one president to the
United States. So far as I am aware, none of my antecedents have
betrayed mental vagaries, except a maternal uncle, who, from
overstudy, became for a year insane.
"I am a graduate of two universities with degrees in arts and
medicine. After a year as physician in a hospital, I relinquished
medicine altogether, to follow literature, a predilection since
early boyhood.
"I awoke to sexual feeling at the age of 7, when, at a small
private school, glimpsing bare thighs above the stockings of girl
schoolmates, I dimly exulted. This fetishism, as it grew more
definite, centered at last upon the thighs and then the whole
person of one girl in particular. My first sexually tinged dream
was of her--that while she stood near I impinged my penis upon a
red-hot anvil and then, in beatific self-immolation, exhibited
the charred stump to her wondering, round eyes. This love,
however, abated at the coming of a new girl to the school, who,
not more beautiful, but more buxom, made stronger appeal to my
nascent sexuality. One afternoon, in the loft of her father's
stable, she induced me to disrobe, herself setting the example.
The erection our mutual handlings produced on me was without
conscious impulse; I felt only a childish curiosity on beholding
our genital difference. But the episode started extravagant
whimsies, one of which persistently obsessed me: with these
obviously compensatory differences, why might not the girl and I
effect some sort of copulation? This fantasy, drawn exclusively
from that unique experience, charmed with its grotesqueness only,
for at that time my sense of sex was but inchoate and my
knowledge of it was nothing. The bizarre conceit, submitted to
the equally ignorant girl and approved, was borne to the paternal
hay-loft and there, with much bungling, brought to surprising and
pleasurable consummation.
"In the four ensuing years I repeated the act not seldom with
this girl and with others.
"When I was 11 my sister and I were taken by our parents to
Europe, where we remained six years, attending school each winter
in a different city and, during the summer, travelling in various
countries.
"Abroad my lust was glutted to the full: the amenable
girl-playmate was ubiquitous, whom I plied with ardor at Swiss
hotels, German watering-places, French pensions,--where not?
Toward puberty I first repaired at times to prostitutes.
"Masturbation, excepting a few experiments, I never resorted to.
Few of my schoolmates avowedly practised it.
"Of homosexuality my sole hearing was through the classics,
where, with no long pondering, I opined it merely our modern
comradery, poetically aggrandized, masquerading in antique
habiliments and phraseology. It never came home to me; it attuned
to no tone in the scale of my sympathies; I possessed no
touchstone for transmitting the recitals of those ambiguous
amours into fiery messages. The relation to my own sex was,
intellectually, an occasional friendship devoid of strong
affection; physically, a mild antagonism, the naked body of a man
was slightly repellant. Statues of women evoked both carnal and
esthetic response; of men, no emotions whatever, save a deepening
of that native antipathy. Similarly in paintings, in literature,
the drama, the men served but as foils for the delicious maidens,
who visited my aërial seraglios and lapped me in roseate
dreamings.
"In my eighteenth year we returned to America, where I entered
the university.
"The course of my love of women was now a little erratic; normal
connection began to lose fascination. As long ago I had
formulated untutored the _rationale_ of coitus, so now
imagination, groping in the dark, conceived a fresh fillip for
the appetite--_cunnilinctus_. But this, though for a while quite
adequate, soon ceased to gratify. At this juncture, Christmas of
my first college year, I was appointed editor of a small
magazine, an early stricture of whose new conduct was paucity of
love stories. Such improvident neglect was in keeping with my
altering view of women, a view accorded to me by self-dissipation
of the glamour through which they had been wont to appear. I had
wandered somehow behind the scenes, and beheld, no footlights of
sex intervening, the once so radiant fairies resolved into a
raddled humanity, as likable as ever, but desirable no longer.
"Soon after this the Oscar Wilde case was bruiting about. The
newspaper accounts of it, while illuminating, flashed upon me no
light of self-revelation; they only amended some idle conjectures
as to certain mystic vices I had heard whispered of. Here and
there a newspaper allusion still too recondite was painstakingly
clarified by an effeminate fellow-student, who, I fancy now,
would have shown no reluctance had I begged him to adduce
practical illustration. I purchased, too, photographs of Oscar
Wilde, scrutinizing them under the unctuous auspices of this same
emasculate and blandiloquent mentor. If my interest in Oscar
Wilde arose from any other emotion than the rather morbid
curiosity then almost universal, I was not conscious of it.
"Erotic dreams, precluded hitherto by coition, came now to beset
me. The persons of these dreams were (and still are) invariably
women, with this one remembered exception: I dreamed that Oscar
Wilde, one of my photographs of him incarnate, approached me with
a buffoon languishment and perpetrated _fellatio_, an act
verbally expounded shortly before by my oracle. For a month or
more, recalling this dream disgusted me.
"The few subsequent endeavors, tentative and half-hearted, to
repristinate my venery were foredoomed, partly because I had
feared they were, to failure: erection was incomplete,
ejaculation without pleasure.
"There seemed a fallacy in this behavior. Why coitus without
sensual desire for it? No sense of duty impelled me, nor dread of
sexual aberration. The explanation is this: attraction to females
was not expunged, simply sublimed; my imagination, no longer
importing women from observation, created its own delectable
sirens, grown exacting and transcendental, petitioned reality in
vain. Substance had receded for good now, and soon even these
tormenting shadows of it became ever dimmer and dimmer, until
they too at length faded into nothingness.
"The antipodes of the sexual sphere turned more and more toward
the light of my tolerance. Inversion, till now stained with a
slight repugnance, became esthetically colorless at last, and
then delicately retinted, at first solely with pity for its
victims, but finally, the color deepening, with half-conscious
inclination to attach it to myself as a remote contingency. This
revolution, however, was not without external impetus. The
prejudiced tone of a book I was reading, Krafft-Ebing's
_Psychopathia Sexualis_, by prompting resentment, led me on to
sympathy. My championing, purely abstract though it was to begin
with, none the less involved my looking at things with eyes
hypothetically inverted,--an orientation for the sake of
argument. After a while, insensibly and at no one moment,
hypothesis merged into reality: I myself was inverted. That
occasional and fictitious inversion had never, I believe,
superposed this true inversion; rather a true inversion, those
many years dormant, had simply responded finally to a stimulus
strong and prolonged enough, as a man awakens when he is loudly
called.
"In presenting myself thus sexually transformed, I do not aver
having had at the outset any definitive inclination. The instinct
so freshly evolved remained for a while obscure. Its primary
expression was a feebly sensuous interest in the physical
character of boys--in their feminine resemblances especially. To
this interest I opposed no discountenance; for wantonness with
women under many and diverse conditions having long ago medicined
my sexual conscience to lethargy, no access of reasons came to me
now for its refreshment. On the other hand, intellectual delight
in the promises of the new world, as well as sensuality, conduced
to its deliberate exploration. Still, for a year, the yearning
settled with true lust upon no object more concrete than youths
whose only habitation was my fancy.
"A young surgeon, having read my copy of _Psychopathia Sexualis_,
fell one evening to discussing inverts with such relish that I
inquired ingenuously if he himself was one. He colored, whether
confirmatively or otherwise I could not guess, in spite of his
vehement no. Presently he very subtly recanted his denial. But to
his counter-question I maintained my own no, lest he propose some
sexual act, a point the esthetics of my developing inversion
would not yet concede, the boys of my imagination being still
predominant.
"One evening, soon after this, he convoyed me to several of the
café's where inverts are accustomed to foregather. These trysting
places were much alike: a long hall, with sparse orchestra at one
end, marble-topped tables lining the walls, leaving the floor
free for dancing. Round the tables sat boys and youths, Adonises
both by art and nature, ready for a drink or a chat with the
chance Samaritan, and shyly importunate for the pleasures for
which, upstairs, were small rooms to let. One of the boys,
supported by the orchestra, sang the 'Jewel Song' out of
'_Faust_.' His voice had the limpid, treble purity of a
clarinet, and his face the beauty of an angel. The song
concluded, we invited him to our table, where he sat sipping neat
brandy, as he mockingly encountered my book-begotten queries. The
boy-prostitutes gracing these halls, he apprised us, bore
fanciful names, some of well-known actresses, others of heroes in
fiction, his own being Dorian Gray. Rivals, he complained, had
assumed the same appellation, but he was the original Dorian; the
others were jealous impostors. His curly hair was golden; his
cheeks were pink; his lips, coral red, parted incessantly to
reveal the glistening pearliness of his teeth. Yet, though
deeming him the beautifulest youth in the world, I experienced no
sexual interest either in him or in the other boys, who indeed
were all beautiful--beauty was their chief asset. Dorian,
further, dilated on the splendor of his female attire, satin
corsets, low-cut evening gowns, etc., donned on gala nights to
display his gleaming shoulders and dimpled, plump, white arms.
Thus arrayed, he bantered, he would bewitch even me, now so
impassive, until I should throw myself, in tears of happiness,
into his loving embrace.
"My first venture upon _fellatio_ was a month later, with the
young surgeon. I confessed the whim to try it, and he acceded.
Though this nauseous and fatiguing act, very imperfectly
performed, was prompted mostly by curiosity, there arose soon a
passional hankering for repetition. In short, appetence for
_fellatio_ grew slowly from the night of that mawkish fiasco and
waxed eventually into a sovereign want.
"Perhaps miscarriage of that initiatory experiment was due to
precipitance, incubation of my perverse instinct being not yet
complete. A hiatus of a month now supervened, in which, while
further _fellatio_ was not attempted, my mind came always nearer
to a reconcilement with the grossness of the act, and began to
discover for its creatures some correlation in pretty boys beheld
in the flesh. One evening, in Broadway, I conceived suddenly a
full-fledged desire for a youth issuing from an hotel as I
passed. Our glances met and dwelled together. At a shop-window he
first accosted me. He was an invert. With him, in his room at the
hotel whence I had seen him emerge, I passed an apocalyptic
night. Thereafter commerce with boys only in the spirit ceased to
be an end; the images were carnalized, stepped from their
framework into the streets. That boy, that god out of the
machine, I see him clearly: his brown, curling hair; his eyes
blue as the sea; his chest both arched and so plump, his rounded
arms, his taper waist, the graceful swell of his hips and full,
snowy thighs; I recall as of yesterday the dimples in his knees,
the slenderness of his ankles, the softness of his little feet,
with insteps pink like the inside of a shell. How I gloated over
his ample roundness, his rich undulations!
"In the last eight years I have performed _fellatio_ (never
_pedicatio_) with more than three hundred men and boys. My
preference is for boys between 15 and 20, refined, pretty,
girlish, and themselves homosexual.
"Personally, barring this love for males, I am in all ways
masculine, given to outdoor sports, and to smoking and drinking
moderately. In appearance I am but a boy of 18. My face and
figure are generally considered beautiful: I am clean-shaved,
with black, curling hair, red cheeks and brown eyes; features
delicate and regular; body, of medium height, everywhere
practically hairless. By years of training I have attained alike
great strength and classic proportions, the muscular contours
smoothly rounded with adipose tissue. My hands and feet are
small. My penis, though perfectly shaped, is rather
enormous--erect, ten and a half inches in length, seven and a
quarter inches in circumference.
"Some abetment of my apostasy from orthodox methods was, no
doubt, this hypertrophy of the penis, which already in my
twentieth year had acquired its present redundance, rendering
coitus impracticable with most women I essayed and painful where
insertion was effected. Since falling heir to inversion, a unique
recurrence of normal desire, six years ago, persuaded me to
attempt coitus with eleven or twelve prostitutes, and, strangely
enough, with much of the old-time salacity and full erection,
but, as it chanced, always with too great disparity of parts for
success."
A certain preciosity in the manner of this communication may be
put down partly to the nature of the literary avocations with
which the writer is by preference occupied, and partly, no doubt
more fundamentally, to the special character of his predominantly
esthetic temperament and attraction to the exotic. An attraction
for exotic experiences will not, however, suffice to account for
the rather late development of homosexual tendencies, a late
development which may be held to place this case in the retarded
group of inverts. H.C. has himself pointed out to me that his
aversion to women, beginning to appear in the eighteenth year,
was already well pronounced before he had ever heard definitely
of specific homosexual acts, and fully a year before he
experienced the slightest sexual interest in men or boys.
Moreover, while it is true that the actual tendency to homosexual
attraction only appeared after he had read Krafft-Ebing and come
in contact with inverts, such influences would not suffice to
change the sexual nature of a normally constituted man.
It may be added that H.C. is not attracted to normal males. As
regards his moral attitude he remarks: "I have no scruples in the
indulgence of my passion. I perceive the moral objections
advanced, but how speculative they are, and constructive; while,
immediately, inversion is the source of so much good." He looks
upon the whole sexual question as largely a matter of taste.
I regard the foregoing case as of considerable interest. It presents what
is commonly supposed to be a very common type of inversion, Oscar Wilde
being the supreme exemplar, in which a heterosexual person apparently
becomes homosexual by the exercise of intellectual curiosity and esthetic
interest. In reality the type is far from common; indeed, an intellectual
curiosity and an esthetic interest, strong enough even apparently to
direct the sexual impulse in any new channel, are themselves far from
common. Moreover, a critical reading of this history suggests that the
apparent control over the sexual impulse by reason is merely a superficial
phenomenon. Here, as ever, reason is but a tool in the hands of the
passions. The apparent causes are really the results; we are witnessing
the gradual emergence of a retarded homosexual impulse.
HISTORY XXVIII.--English, aged 40, surgeon. Sexual experiences
began early, about the age of 10, when a companion induced him to
play at intercourse with their sisters. He experienced no
pleasure. A little later a servant-girl began to treat him
affectionately and at last called him into her bedroom when she
was partially undressed, fondled and kissed his member, and
taught him to masturbate her. On subsequent occasions she
attempted a simulation of intercourse, which gave her
satisfaction, but failed to induce emission in him. On returning
to school mutual masturbation was practised with schoolfellows,
and the first emission took place at the age of 14.
On leaving school he became a slave to the charms of women, and
had frequent coitus about the age of 17, but he preferred
masturbating girls and especially in persuading girls of good
position, to whom the experience was entirely novel, to allow him
to take liberties with them. At 25 he became engaged, and mutual
masturbation was practised to excess during the engagement; after
marriage connection generally took place twice every twenty-four
hours until pregnancy.
"At this time," he writes, "I stayed at the house of an old
school-fellow, due of my lovers of old days. There were so many
guests that I shared my friend's bedroom. The sight of his body
gave rise to lustful feelings, and when the light was out I stole
across to his bed. He made no objection, and we passed the night
in mutual masturbation. We passed the next fortnight together,
and I never took the same pleasure in coitus with my wife, though
I did my duty. She died five years later, and I devoted myself
heart and soul to my friend until his death by accident last
year. Since then I have lost all interest in life."
I am indebted for this case to a well-known English alienist, who
remarks that the patient is fairly healthy to look at, but with
neurasthenia and tendency to melancholia, and neurotic
temperament. The body is masculine and pubic hair abundant. One
testicle shows wasting.
HISTORIES XXIX AND XXX.--I give the following narrative in the
words of an intimate friend of one of the cases in question: "My
attention was first drawn to the study of inversion--though I
then regarded all forms of it as depraving and abominable--at a
public school, where in our dormitory a boy of 15 initiated his
select friends into the secrets of mutual masturbation, which he
had learned from his brother, a midshipman. I gave no heed to
this at the time, though I remembered it in after-years when
immersed in Plato, Lucretius, and the Epicurean writers. But my
attention was riveted to it at the age of 20, when I spent a
holiday with A., a companion with whom I was, and still am, on
terms of great friendship. We enjoyed many things in common,
studied together and discussed most unconventional matters, but
not this. Previously we had always occupied separate sleeping
apartments; on this occasion we were abroad in a country place,
and were compelled to put up with what we could get. We not only
had to share a room, but a bed. I was not surprised at his
throwing his arm over me, as I knew he was extraordinarily
attached to me, and I had always felt a brute for not returning
his affection so warmly. But I was surprised when later I awoke
to find him occupied in _fellatio_ and endeavoring to obtain my
response. Had it been anyone else I should have resented strongly
such a liberty, and our acquaintance would have ended, but I
cared for him too well, though never very demonstrative. This
episode led to discussion of the topic. He told me that his
sexual strength was great, that he had tested it in many ways,
and that it was essential to his well-being that he should have
satisfaction in some way. He loathed prostitution and considered
it degrading; he felt physically attracted to some women and
intellectually to others, but the two elements were never
combined, and though he had been intimate with a few he felt that
it was not right to them, as he could not marry them because he
held too high an ideal of marriage. He had always felt attracted
to his own sex, and had kept up a Platonic friendship with a
college chum, X (to whom I knew he was passionately attached),
for some years. Both considered it perfectly moral, and both,
felt better for it. Both abhor _pedicatio_. X., however, would
never discuss the subject, and seemed half-ashamed of it. A., on
the other hand, though showing a great self-respect in all things
else, feels no shame, though he says he would never discuss it
except with close friends or if asked for private advice.
"A. is the elder child of a military officer. His parents were 21
and 19, respectively, at the time of his birth. Both parents are
healthy, and the two children (both boys) have good
constitutions, though the elder has the better. He is of medium
height and slender limbs, proud carriage, handsome and
intellectual face (classic Greek type), excellent complexion,
charming manners, and good temper. The penis is large, the
foreskin very short. He is fond of philosophy, natural science,
history, and literature. He is reflective and patient rather than
smart, but strong-willed and very active when roused, never
resting till he has accomplished what he wants, even if this
takes years. He sings excellently, and is fond of cycling,
boating, swimming, and mountain-climbing. He enjoys excellent
health, and has never had a day's illness since he was 12 years
of age. He says the only time he cannot sleep has been when in
bed with some one who could not or would not satisfy him. He
requires satisfaction at least once a week, twice or thrice in
the hot season. He never smokes, nor drinks beer or spirits. He
is still single, but believes that marriage would meet all his
needs.
"X. is also an oldest child, of young and healthy parents
(between 21 and 24 at his birth) of different class; father a
builder. He is of pleasing, but not handsome, appearance; very
sensitive, very neat, and methodical in all things; not very
strong-willed, and very reserved to women. He is of very studious
disposition, especially fond of philosophy, politics, and natural
science; a good musician. Takes moderate exercise, but rather
easily fatigued. Is generally healthy, but not overstrong. He is
a vegetarian, and was brought up as a free-thinker. Until two
years ago he was never attracted toward a girl; indeed, he
disliked girls; but he is now engaged. For about eighteen months,
he has relinquished homosexuality, but has suffered from dreams,
bad digestion, and peevishness since. He thinks the only remedy
is marriage, which he is pushing on. He regards homosexuality as
quite natural and normal, though his desires are not strong, and
once a fortnight has always satisfied him. He was led to the
practice by the reasoning of A., and because he felt a certain
vague need, and this comforted him. He thinks it a matter of
temperament and not to be discussed, except by scientists. He
says he could never perform it except with his dearest friend,
whose request he could not resist. He has a long foreskin, flesh
like a woman's, and is well proportioned.
"Both men are ardent for social reform, the one actively, the
other passively engaged in it. Both also regard the law as to
homosexuality as absurd and demoralizing. They also think that
the law prohibiting polygamy is largely the cause of
prostitution, as many women are prevented from living honest
lives and being cared for by someone, and many men could marry
one woman for physical satisfaction and another for intellectual.
"They were devoted to each other when I first knew them; they are
still friends, but separated by distance. Both are exceedingly
honorable, and the latter is truthful to a fault."
According to later information X. had married and his homosexual
tendencies were almost completely in abeyance, partly, perhaps,
owing to the fact that he now lives quietly in the country. A.
has surprised his friends by his ardent attachment to a lady of
about his own age to whom he has become engaged. He declares that
he loves this woman better than any man, but nevertheless he
still feels strong passion for his men friends. It is evident
that the homosexual tendency in A. is distinctly more pronounced
than in his friend X. As is found more often in bisexual than in
homosexual persons, he is of predominantly masculine type,
possesses great vitality, and desires to exert all his faculties.
He has a sound nervous system and is very free from all
"nervousness." He has written a scientific treatise and can study
undisturbed amid violent noises. His voice is manly (in singing
deep base). He can whistle. He is not vain, though well formed,
and his hands are delicate. His favorite color is green. The
demonstrative warmth of his affection for his friends is the
chief feminine trait noted in him. He rarely dreams and has never
had an erotic dream; this he explains by saying (earlier than
Freud) that all dreams not caused by physical conditions are
wish-dreams, and as he always satisfies his sexual needs at once,
with a friend or by masturbation, his sexual needs have no
opportunity of affecting his subconscious life.
There may be some doubt as to the classification of the two foregoing
cases: they are not personally known to me. The following case, with which
I have been acquainted for many years, I regard as clearly a genuine
example of bisexuality:--
HISTORY XXXI.--Englishman, independent means, aged 52, married.
His ancestry is of a complicated character. Some of his mother's
forefathers in the last and earlier centuries are supposed to
have been inverted. He remembers liking the caresses of his
father's footmen when he was quite a little boy. He dreams
indifferently about men and women, and has strong sexual feeling
for women. Can copulate, but does not insist on this act; there
is a tendency to refined, voluptuous pleasure. He has been
married for many years, and there are several children by the
marriage.
He is not particular about the class or age of the men he loves.
He feels with regard to older men as a women does, and likes to
be caressed by them. He is immensely vain of his physical beauty;
he shuns _pedicatio_ and does not much care for the sexual act,
but likes long hours of voluptuous communion during which his
lover admires him. He feels the beauty of boyhood. At the same
time he is much attracted by young girls.
He is decidedly feminine in his dress, manner of walking, love of
scents, ornaments, and fine things. His body is excessively
smooth and white, the hips and buttocks rounded. Genital organs
normal. His temperament is feminine, especially in vanity,
irritability, and petty preoccupations. He is much preoccupied
with his personal appearance and fond of admiration; on one
occasion he was photographed naked as Bacchus. He is physically
and morally courageous. He has a genius for poetry and
speculation, with a tendency to mysticism.
He feels the discord between his love for men and society, also
between it and his love for his wife. He regards it as, in part,
at least, hereditary and inborn in him.
HISTORY XXXII.--C.R., physician; age 38. Nationality, Irish, with
a Portuguese strain. "My mother came of an old Quaker family. I
was quite unaware of sexual differences until I was about 14, as
I was carefully kept separate from my sisters and, although from
time to time strange longings which I did not understand
possessed me, I was a virgin in thought and deed until that
period of life.
"When I was 14 a cousin some years older than myself came to stay
with us and shared my bed. To my surprise he took hold of my
penis and rubbed it for a time, when a most pleasant feeling
seized me and increased until a discharge came out of my organ;
he then asked me to do the same to him. We frequently repeated
the process during the following month; I was quite unaware of
any harm resulting.
"The same year I went to school, but none of my schoolmates for
some time even suggested such actions until a friend staying with
us for the holidays one day in the bathroom repeated the process
and pressed his penis between my thighs, when a similar discharge
took place. I shortly found out that several of my school friends
and male cousins had the same desires, and an elder brother of my
first introducer into sexuality repeatedly spent the night with
me, when we would amuse ourselves in a similar way.
"A little later, my mother being away from home, I shared my
father's bed and he took my penis in his hand and pulled my
foreskin back. I in return took hold of his and found that he had
an erection. I proceeded to rub him when he stopped me and told
me that I should not do so, that when I was a little older I
should love a woman to do it and that if I did not rub myself and
allow other boys to do so, I would enjoy myself much more. I am
quite certain that my father was inverted, as he frequently, if
sleeping with me, used to press my naked body against his and he
always had a strong erection. On one occasion he rubbed me until
I had a discharge and then, turning over on his back, made me
take his penis in my hand and rub him for a few minutes. I used
to jest frequently with my father, as from my seventeenth year my
penis was larger than his. I will return to my father a little
later. When I was 17 a college friend shared my bed, and when
undressing he said that he envied me my penis being so much
larger than his; after getting into bed, he asked me to turn on
my side and I found that he was attempting _pedicatio_. I was
astonished at his doing so when he informed me that next to a
woman this process gave most pleasure. However, nothing resulted
and this is the only experience of _pedicatio_ that I have ever
had.
"When I was 18 one evening a college chum introduced me to a
woman and she was the first I ever had connection with. We went
behind some rocks and she took hold of my penis and pressed it
into her body, lying against me.
"My father evidently suspected me when I came home, and a few
days afterward told me that it was very dangerous to have
anything to do with women, that I should wait until I was older,
that when a boy became a man he ought to have a woman
occasionally, and that if I ever had a nasty disease I should
promptly tell him so that I could be properly cured.
"At college I found several chums who were fond of sharing my bed
and indulging in mutual masturbation, pressing our bodies
together face to face until there was mutual discharge, but never
again anyone who tried anal connection.
"A short time afterward I was in Brussels and I paid my first
visit to a brothel, a place close to the Cathedral. I picked a
girl of about 18 from eight naked beauties paraded for my choice.
She was avaricious and demanded 10 francs, I had paid 20 for my
room and had only 2 left. I wanted her to play with me, but she
only seized the penis and pulled me to her with such vigorous
action that I discharged very rapidly. I was so disgusted with
the result that I masturbated when I returned to my boarding
house.
"A year later I paid Portugal a visit and my friends there
frequently brought me to brothels and also introduced me to
ladies of easy virtue. I had connection with them; the Portuguese
prostitutes never suggested anything unnatural and in no instance
did a male approach me for sexual purposes.
"When I became a medical student, I used to visit a Turkish bath
frequently; on one occasion I playfully slapped a friend on the
buttocks, when my father, who was present, told me not to do so
as it was not proper conduct in public, that if I liked to do so
to him or one or two others it was no harm in private. Until I
was 21, in the bath my father always covered his penis from my
view, but after I attained my majority he always exposed himself
and repeatedly showed me pictures of naked women; he also taught
me the use of the condom.
"In my twenty-fourth year, a tall, handsome man who used to
frequent the baths one day sat down beside me and playfully
knocked my toes with his; he then pressed his naked thigh against
mine and a little later in the cooling room slipped his hand
under my sheet and grasped my penis; he then asked me to meet him
a few days later in the baths, saying I would be pleased with
what he would do.
"I kept the appointment and he took me into the hottest room,
where we lay on the floor; in a few minutes he turned on his side
and threw one of his legs across me; I got frightened and jumped
up; he had a powerful erection, but I refused to lie down again,
although he pulled his foreskin back to excite my desires; I was
afraid of being surprised by another bather. Twice on future
occasions I met this man and he made advances. I believe that I
would have yielded then if we had met at a private house.
"Shortly afterward I met an elderly gentleman at the baths who
also made advances to me, but from fear I resisted him. I also
disliked him as he had a foul breath and bad teeth; besides I was
now able to go to the Continent and enjoy female charms to my
heart's desire.
"After qualification I joined the army in South Africa and to my
astonishment found many of my comrades fond of male society; one
officer who had been wounded shared my bedroom at a military
hospital and when undressing frequently admired my penis; we used
to play with each other until we had powerful erections, but we
never masturbated or tried any unnatural vice.
"I used to have connection with women as frequently as I could,
and I frequently visited the Turkish baths and found that several
clients were abnormal, including one of the masseurs; the latter
enjoyed playing with my penis, kissing and tickling me.
"I married at 28. My married life has been normal and my wife and
I are still in love with one another; we have had several
children.
"My last sexual experiences have been in Australia; once in
Sydney at the baths a fellow-bather playfully began tickling me,
when I had an erection; he grasped my penis, I jumped up, and he
asked me to do anything that I liked with him. I refused. Once
on board a coasting steamer a fellow-passenger used to expose
himself, posing as a statue; we became very familiar and he
wanted me to spend a night with him. I also refused his offers.
"I am very healthy and strong, fond of riding, fishing, and
shooting. I lead a very active life. I am neither musician nor
artist, but fond of hearing music and I admire works of art.
"In person I am 6 feet high, inclined to fat; my body is very
strong; my penis is six inches long in repose and eight in
erection; I can without fatigue discharge twice in the night and
have connection at least twice a week. My scrotum is tense and
both testicles large. I am rather slow at discharging. I have
never had any desire to have connection with any other woman
since marriage, but several times I have met men who attracted
me. I have a friend (another doctor) who is very familiar with me
and if we spend a night together we will play with each other. I
have a great desire for him to circumcize me. We have never
indulged in anything beyond feeling or pressing our bodies
together like schoolboys.
"My favorite color is green.
"My erotic dreams, when I have any, are of my wife or of a male
lover.
"Sexual inversion is more widespread than is popularly supposed
and I have never had any twinge of conscience after any of my
affairs. I regard the homosexual instinct as quite natural, and,
except in regard to my wife, it is stronger in my case than the
heterosexual instinct. I have never initiated a youth into the
sexual life or had any desire to seduce a girl. Boys under 17, or
persons of lower social class, have no attraction for me."
HISTORY XXXIII.--M.O., 30 years of age, born in the United
States, of English father and of mother whose father was
Scotch,--the rest of his ancestry being English of long standing
in America, with a very little admixture of Dutch blood. He is 5
feet 8 inches in height, and has brown hair and eyes. No
hereditary troubles so far as known. In childhood, for some time
"threatened with chorea." Is subject to tonsillitis and a
stubborn though not severe form of indigestion, induced by
sedentary habits. He is of quick, nervous temperament. Has an
aversion from most outdoor sports, but a great esthetic
attraction to nature. Highly educated.
As far back as he can remember, he lived in a house from which
his parents removed when he was 4 years old. Before this removal,
he remembers two distinctly sexual experiences. A cousin five
years older was in the bathroom, seated, and M.O. was feeling his
sexual organs; his mother called him out. On another occasion he
was in a wagonhouse with a girl of his own age. They were lying
on a carriage-seat attempting intercourse. The girl's older
sister came in and found them. She said: "I am going to tell
mamma; you know she said for you not to do that any more." With
each of these clear memories comes the strong impression that it
was but one among many. Five years ago M.O. met a man of his own
age who had lived in that neighborhood at the same time.
Comparing notes, they found that nearly all the small children in
it had been given to such practices. The neighborhood was a
thoroughly "respectable" middle-class one.
From it, M.O. removed to another of just about the same
character, and lived there until he was 11 years old. Of this
period his memories are very fresh and abundant. With a single
exception, all the children between 5 and 14 years of age appear
to have indulged freely in promiscuous sexual play. In little
companies of from four to twelve they went where trees or long
grass hid them from observation, and exhibited their persons to
one another; sometimes, also, they handled one another, but not
in the way of masturbation. Of this last, M.O. was wholly
ignorant. Sometimes when but two or three were together,
intercourse was attempted. In M.O.'s case there was eager sexual
curiosity, and a more or less keen desire, but actual contact
brought no great satisfaction. On two or three occasions girls
practised _fellatio_, and he then reciprocated with
_cunnilinctus_, but without pleasure. In all these plays he is
sure that girls took the initiative as often as boys did.
During all this period, M.O. had now one girl sweetheart and now
another. This was conventional among the children, and was
fostered by the banter of older persons. M.O.'s sexual curiosity
was certainly greater in regard to the opposite sex. At this
time, however, his homosexual interests appeared. With a boy two
or more years older he frequently went to some hiding-place where
they looked at each other's organs and handled them. He and
another boy were once in an abandoned garden, and they took off
all their clothes, the better to examine each other. The other
boy then offered to kiss M.O.'s fundament, and did so. It caused
a surprisingly keen and distinctly sexual sensation, the first
sexual shock that he can remember experiencing. He refused to
reciprocate, however, when asked.
Toward the end of this period there was a new and increasing
development of another sort, not recognized then as at all sexual
in character. He began to feel toward certain boys in a way very
different and much keener than he had done thus far toward girls,
although at the time he made no comparisons. For instance there
was a boy whom he considered very pretty. They visited each other
often and spent long times playing together. In school they
looked and looked at each other until delicious, uncontrollable
giggling spells came on. Sexual matters were never discussed or
thought of. These experiences were, in their way, very
sentimental and ideal. M.O. is sure that with himself the main
consideration was always the other boy's beauty. He began to
recall with great fondness a certain much older and very handsome
youth who had lived near him in the first neighborhood, and had
at the time shown him, various little friendly attentions. He
seldom saw him now, and hardly sought to do so, yet was immensely
pleased by a casual word or look from him in the schoolyard, and
much interested when other people spoke of him.
A cousin about two years younger than M.O. often visited him and
slept with him. They were very fond of each other, and handled
each other's organs.
When M.O. was about 11 years of age the family removed to a
distant neighborhood, where there were almost no children of his
own age, and where any association with those in the one just
left was practically impossible. From this time until the changes
of puberty were well under way his sexual life contrasted
strongly, in its solitude, with the former promiscuity. He
remembers liking to wrestle with two or three schoolboys and to
get their heads between his legs. He thinks they were not aware
of his sexual impulses. He flirted, consciously flirted, with
certain school-girls, but never even suggested anything sexual to
them. He read a few family medical books.
One day, lying on an old uneven couch, innocently enough at
first, he induced a new and delicious sensation, altogether
different from any he had ever dreamed of--something far beyond
the satisfaction of mere curiosity. He repeated the thing and
before long produced emissions. Masturbation soon followed.
Certain days he would perform the act two or three times, but
again he would avoid it for days. He began at once to fight the
tendency, and felt very guilty and very ashamed for indulging it.
He prayed for help and at times wept over his failures to break
the habit so quickly formed. For a certain period, after two or
three years, he seemed to have succeeded, but he observed that he
had intense erotic dreams with copious emissions regularly every
eight days. Just then certain newspaper advertisements fell under
his eye, and these persuaded him that he had produced in himself
a diseased condition. He never resorted to the remedies
advertised, but he was discouraged in his efforts to overcome the
bad habit; and since the evil effects appeared to consist only in
the seminal losses, he concluded that he might as well have the
greater enjoyment of masturbation.
For a short time, he remembers that he had an intense but
revolting interest in the sexual organs of animals, especially
horses. The males were much more interesting.
Gradually he began to develop, entirely from within, the ideal of
a male comrade,--a beautiful, emotional boy between whom and
himself there might exist a powerful romantic passion. He lay for
hours dreaming of this, and inventing thrilling situations.
Suddenly, at church, he became acquainted with the very youth,
Edmund, who seemed to satisfy all his longings. M.O. was then 16½
and Edmund 15. A real wooing ensued, Edmund finally yielding to
the physical appeals of M.O. after several fits of misgiving. The
yielding was in the end complete, however. The two spent night
after night together, enjoying intercrural intercourse and
sometimes mutual masturbation. Their parents may have been
slightly uneasy at times, but the connection continued
uninterruptedly for a year and a half or more. In the meantime
M.O. occasionally had relations with other boys, but never
wavered in his real preference for Edmund. For girls he had no
sexual desire whatever, though he was much associated with them.
Then M.O. and Edmund went to college at different places, but
they met in vacations and wrote frequent and ardent love-letters.
Both had genuine attacks of love-sickness and of jealousy. As
M.O. looks back on this first love passion he can by no means
regret it. It doubtless had great formative influence.
After the first year at college, Edmund transferred to another
school farther away from M.O. and the opportunities for meeting
became rarer, but their affection was maintained and the
intercourse resumed whenever it was possible. Gradually, however,
Edmund became interested in women and finally married. M.O. also
formed relations repeatedly with college friends and occasionally
with others.
On the whole M.O. preferred boys a year or two younger than
himself, but as he grew older the age difference increased. At 30
he regarded himself as virtually "engaged" to a youth of 17, one
unusually mature, however, and much larger than himself.
M.O. is always unhappy unless his affections have fairly free
course. Life has been very disappointing to him in other
respects. His greatest joys have come to him in this way. If he
is able to consummate his present plan of union with the youth
just referred to, he will feel that his life has been crowned by
what is for him the best possible end; otherwise, he declares, he
would not care to live at all.
He admires male beauty passionately. Feminine beauty he perceives
objectively, as he would any design of flowing curves and
delicate coloring, but it has no sexual charm for him whatever.
Women have put themselves in his way repeatedly, but he finds
himself more and more irritated by their specifically feminine
foibles. With men generally he is much more patient and
sympathetic.
The first literature that appealed to him was Plato's dialogues,
first read at 20 years of age. Until then he had not known but
what he stood alone in his peculiarity. He read what he could of
classic literature. He enjoys Pater, appreciating his attitude
toward his own sex. Four or five years, later he came across
Raffalovich's book, and ever since has felt a real debt of
gratitude to its author.
M.O. has no wish to injure society at large. As an individual he
holds that he has the same right to be himself that anyone else
has. He thinks that while boys of from 13 to 15 might possibly be
rendered inverts, those who reach 16 without it cannot be bent
that way. They may be devoted to an invert enough in other ways
to yield him what he wishes sexually, but they will remain
essentially normal themselves. His observations are based on
about 30 homosexual relationships that have lasted various
lengths of time.
M.O. feels strongly the poetic and elevated character of his
principal homosexual relationships, but he shrinks from appearing
too sentimental.
With regard to the traces of feminism in inverts he writes:--
"Up to the age of 11 I associated much with a cousin five years
older (the one referred to above) and took great delight in a
game we often played, in which I was a girl,--a never-ending
romance, a non-sexual love story.
"Somewhat later and until puberty, I took great delight in
acting, but generally took female roles, wearing skirts, shawls,
beads, wigs, head-dresses. When I was about 13 my family began to
make fun of me for it. I played secretly for a while, and then
the desire for it left, never to return.
"There still lingers, however, a minor interest, which began
before puberty, in valentines. My feeling for them is much like
my feeling for flowers.
"Before I reached puberty I was sometimes called a 'sissy' by my
father. Such taunts humiliated me more than anything else has
ever done. After puberty my father no longer applied the term,
and gradually other persons ceased to tease me that way. The
sting of it lasted, though, and led me more than once to ask
intimate friends, both men and women, if they considered me at
all feminine. Every one of them has been very emphatically of the
opinion that my rational life is distinctively masculine, being
logical, impartial, skeptical. One or two have suggested that I
have a finer discrimination than most men, and that I take care
of my rooms somewhat as a woman might, though this does not
extend to the style of decorations. One man said that I lacked
sympathy with certain 'grosser manifestations of masculine
character, such as smoking.' Some women think me unusually
observing of women's dress. My own is by no means effeminate. In
a muscular way I have average strength, but am supple far beyond
what is usual. If trained for it early, I believe I would have
made a good contortionist.
"I have never had the least inclination to use tobacco, generally
take neither tea nor coffee, and seldom any liquor, never malt
liquors. The dessert is always the best part of the meal. These
tastes I attribute largely to my sedentary life. When out camping
I observed a marked change in the direction of heartier food and
mild stimulants.
"My physical courage has never been put to the test, but I
observe that others appear to count on it. I am very aggressive
in matters of religious, political, social opinion. In moral
courage I am either reckless or courageous, I do not know which.
"I am, perhaps, a better whistler than most men.
"When I was quite little my grandmother taught me to do certain
kinds of fancy-work, and I continued to do a little from time to
time until I was 24. Then I became irritated over a piece that
troubled me, put it in the fire, and have not wanted to touch any
since. As a pet economy I continue to do nearly all of my own
mending.
"I have a decided aversion for much jewelry. My estheticism is
very pronounced as compared with most of the men with whom I
associate, although I have never been able to give it much scope.
It makes for cleanliness, order, and general good taste. My dress
is economical and by no means fastidious; yet it seems to be
generally approved. I have been complimented often on my ability
to select appropriate presents, clothing, and to arrange a room."
M.O. states that he practises the love-bite at times, though very
gently. He often wants to pinch one who interests him sexually.
He considers very silly the statement somewhere made, that
inverts are always liars. Very few people, he says, are perfectly
honest, and the more dangerous society makes it for a man to be
so, the less likely he is to be. While he himself has been unable
in two or three instances to keep promises made to withhold from
sexual intercourse with certain attractive individuals, he has
never otherwise been guilty of untruth about his homosexual
relations.
The foregoing narrative was received eight years ago. During this
interval M.O.'s health has very greatly improved. There has been
a marked increase in outdoor activities and interests.
Two years since M.O. consulted a prominent specialist who
performed a thorough psychoanalysis. He informed M.O. that he
was less strongly homosexual than he himself supposed, and
recommended marriage with some young and pretty woman. He
attributed the homosexual bent to M.O.'s having had his "nose
broken" at the age of 6, by the birth of a younger brother, who
from that time on received all the attention and petting. M.O.
had continued up to that age very affectionate toward his mother
and dependent on her. He can remember friends and neighbors
commenting on it. At first M.O. was inclined to reject this
suggestion of the specialist, but on long reflection he inclines
to believe that it was indeed a very important factor, though not
the sole one. From his later observations of children and
comparisons of these with memories of his own childhood, M.O.
says he is sure he was affectionate and demonstrative much beyond
the average. His greatest craving was for affection, and his
greatest grief the fancied belief that no one cared for him. At
10 or 11 he attempted suicide for this reason.
Also as a result of the psychoanalysis, but trying to eliminate
the influence of suggestion, he recollects and emphasizes more
the attraction he felt toward girls before the age of 12. Had his
sexual experiences subsequently proved normal, he doubts if those
before 12 could be held to give evidence of homosexuality, but
only of precocious nervous and sexual irritability, greatly
heightened and directed by the secret practices of the children
with whom he associated. He does not see why these experiences
should have given him a homosexual bent any more than a
heterosexual one.
The psychoanalysis recalled to M.O. that during the period of
early flirtation he had often kissed and embraced various girls,
but likewise he recalled having observed at the same time, with
some surprise, that no definitely sexual desire arose, though the
way was probably open to gratify it. Such interest as did exist
ceased wholly or almost so as the relation with Edmund developed.
There was no aversion from the company of girls and women,
however; the intellectual friendships were mainly with them,
while the emotional ones were with boys.
Very recently M.O. spent several days with Edmund, who has been
married for several years. With absolutely no sexual interest in
each other, they nevertheless found a great bond of love still
subsisting. Neither regrets anything of the past, but feels that
the final outcome of their earlier relation has been good.
Edmund's beauty is still pronounced, and is remarked by others.
In spite of his precocious sexuality, M.O. had from the very
first an extreme disgust for obscene stories, and for any
association of sexual things with filthy words and anecdotes.
Owing in part to this and in part to his temperamental
skepticism, he disbelieved what associates told him regarding
sexual emissions, only becoming convinced when he actually
experienced them; and the facts of reproduction he denied
indignantly until he read them in a medical work. Until he was
well over 25 the physical aversion from any thought of
reproduction was intense. He knows other, normal, young men who
have felt the same way, but he believes it would be prevented or
overcome by sex-education such as is now being introduced in
American schools.
Again, as to traces of feminism: Perhaps two years ago, all
impulse to give the love-bite disappeared suddenly. There has
been lately a marked increase of dramatic interest, arising in
perfectly natural ways, and without any of the peculiarities
noted before. The childish pleasure in valentines has all gone;
M.O. believes that _circumstances_ have lately been more
favorable for the development of a more robust estheticism.
For some years he has heard no definite reproach for feminism,
though some persons tell his friends that he is "very peculiar."
He forms many intimate, enduring, non-sexual friendships with
both men and women, and he doubts if the peculiarity noted by
others is due so much to his homosexuality as it is to his
estheticism, skepticism, and the unconventional opinions which he
expresses quite indiscreetly at times. With the improvement in
general health, has come the changes that would be expected in
food and other matters of daily life.
Resuming his narrative at the point where the earlier
communication left it, M.O. says that about a year after that
time, the youth of 17 to whom he had considered himself virtually
engaged withdrew from the agreement so far as it bore on his own
future, but not from the sentimental relation as it existed.
Although separated most of the time by distance, the physical
relation was resumed whenever they met. Subsequently, however,
the young man fell in love with a young woman and became engaged
to her. His physical relation with M.O. then ceased, but the
friendship otherwise continues strong.
Shortly after the first break in this relation, M.O. became,
through the force of quite unusual circumstances, very friendly
and intimate with a young woman of considerable charm. He
confided to her his abnormality, and was not repulsed. To others
their relation probably appeared that of lovers, and a painful
situation was created by the slander of a jealous woman. M.O.
felt that in honor he must propose marriage to her. The young
woman was non-committal, but invited M.O. to spend several months
at her home. Shortly after his arrival a sad occurrence in his
own family compelled him to go away, and they did not meet again
for four years. They corresponded, but less and less often. His
relations with boys continued.
Before his final meeting with her he became acquainted with a
woman whom he has since married. The acquaintance began in a
wholly non-sentimental community of interests in certain
practical affairs, and very gradually widened into an
intellectual and sympathetic friendship. M.O. had no secrets from
this woman. After a full and prolonged consideration of all sides
of the matter they married. Since that event he has had no sexual
relations except with his wife. With her they are not passionate,
but they are animated by the strong desire for children. Of the
parental instinct he had become aware several years before this.
M.O. believes that no moral stigma should be attached to
homosexuality until it can be proved to result from the vicious
life of a free moral agent,--and of this he has no expectation.
He believes that much of its danger and unhappiness would be
prevented by a thorough yet discreet sex-education, such as
should be given to all children, whether normal or abnormal.
FOOTNOTES:
[124] Thus Godard described the little boys in Cairo as amusing themselves
indifferently either with boys or girls in sexual play. (_Egypte et
Palestine_, 1867, p. 105.) The same thing may be observed in England and
elsewhere.
[125] Thus, of the Duc d'Orleans, in the seventeenth century, as described
in Bouchard's _Confessions_, one of my correspondents writes: "This prince
was of the same mind as Campanella, who, in the _Città del Sole_, laid it
down that young men ought to be freely admitted to women for the avoidance
of sexual aberrations. Aretino and Berni enable us to comprehend the
sexual immorality of males congregated together in the courts of Roman
prelates." The homosexuality of youth was also well recognized among the
Romans, but they adopted the contrary course and provided means to gratify
it, as the existence of the _concubinus_, referred to by Catullus, clearly
shows.
[126] "Our Public Schools: their Methods and Morals." _New Review_, July,
1893.
[127] Max Dessoir, "Zür Psychologie der Vita Sexualis," _Allgemeine
Zeitschrift für Psychiatrie_, 1894, H. 5.
[128] F.H.A. Marshall, _The Physiology of Reproduction_, 1910, pp. 650-8.
[129] Iwan Bloch, in _The Sexual Life of Our Time_, makes this distinction
as between "homosexuality" (corresponding to inversion) and
"pseudo-homosexuality." According to the terminology I have accepted, the
term "pseudo-homosexuality" would be unnecessary and incorrect. More
recently (_Die Prostitution_, Bd. i, 1912, p. 103) Bloch has preferred, in
place of pseudo-homosexuality, the more satisfactory term, "secondary
homosexuality."
[130] See, for instance, Hirschfeld's reasonable discussion of the matter,
_Die Homosexualität_, ch. xvii.
[131] Alfred Fuchs, who edited Krafft-Ebing's _Psychopathia Sexualis_
after the latter's death, distinguishes between congenital homosexuality,
manifesting itself from the first without external stimulation, and
homosexuality on a basis of inborn disposition needing special external
influences to arouse it (_Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, Bd. iv,
1902, p. 181).
[132] Krafft-Ebing, "Ueber tardive Homosexualität," _Jahrbuch für sexuelle
Zwischenstufen_, Bd. iii, 1901, p. 7; Näcke, "Probleme auf den Gebiete der
Homosexualität," _Allgemeine Zeitschrift für Psychiatrie_, 1902, p. 805;
ib., "Ueber tardive Homosexualität," _Sexual-Probleme_, September, 1911.
Numa Praetorius (_Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, January, 1913, p.
228) considers that retarded cases should not be regarded as bisexual, but
as genuine inverts who had acquired a pseudoheterosexuality which at last
falls away; at the most, he believes such cases merely represent a
prolongation of the youthful undifferentiated period.
[133] Moll, _Untersuchungen über die Libido Sexualis_, 1897, pp, 458-8.
[134] Hirschfeld, _Die Homosexualität_, ch. viii.
[135] This was the term used in the earlier editions of the present
_Study_. I willingly reject it in favor of the simpler and fairly clear
term now more generally employed. It is true that by bisexuality it is
possible to understand not only the double direction of the sexual
instinct, but also the presence of both sexes in the same individual,
which in French is more accurately distinguished as "bisexuation."
[136] J. Van Biervliet, "L'Homme Droit et l'Homme Gauche," _Revue
Philosophique_, October, 1901. It is here shown that in the constitution
of their nervous system the ambidextrous are demonstrably left-sided
persons; their optic, acoustic, olfactory, and muscular sensitivity is
preponderant on the left side.
CHAPTER IV.
SEXUAL INVERSION IN WOMEN.
Prevalence of Sexual Inversion Among Women--Among Women of
Ability--Among the Lower Races--Temporary Homosexuality in Schools,
etc.--Histories--Physical and Psychic Characteristics of Inverted
Women--The Modern Development of Homosexuality Among Women.
Homosexuality is not less common in women than in men. In the seriocomic
theory of sex set forth by Aristophanes in Plato's _Symposium_, males and
females are placed on a footing of complete equality, and, however
fantastic, the theory suffices to indicate that to the Greek mind, so
familiar with homosexuality, its manifestations seemed just as likely to
occur in women as in men. That is undoubtedly the case. Like other
anomalies, indeed, in its more pronounced forms it may be less frequently
met with in women; in its less pronounced forms, almost certainly, it is
more frequently found. A Catholic confessor, a friend tells me, informed
him that for one man who acknowledges homosexual practices there are three
women. For the most part feminine homosexuality runs everywhere a parallel
course to masculine homosexuality and is found under the same conditions.
It is as common in girls as in boys; it has been found, under certain
conditions, to abound among women in colleges and convents and prisons, as
well as under the ordinary conditions of society. Perhaps the earliest
case of homosexuality recorded in detail occurred in a woman,[137] and it
was with the investigation of such a case in a woman that Westphal may be
said to have inaugurated the scientific study of inversion.
Moreover, inversion is as likely to be accompanied by high intellectual
ability in a woman as in a man. The importance of a clear conception of
inversion is indeed in some respects, under present social conditions,
really even greater in the case of women than of men. For if, as has
sometimes been said of our civilization, "this is a man's world," the
large proportion of able women inverts, whose masculine qualities render
it comparatively easy for them to adopt masculine avocations, becomes a
highly significant fact.[138]
It has been noted of distinguished women in all ages and in all fields of
activity that they have frequently displayed some masculine traits.[139]
Even "the first great woman in history," as she has been called by a
historian of Egypt, Queen Hatschepsu, was clearly of markedly virile
temperament, and always had herself represented on her monuments in
masculine costume, and even with a false beard.[140] Other famous queens
have on more or less satisfactory grounds been suspected of a homosexual
temperament, such as Catherine II of Russia, who appears to have been
bisexual, and Queen Christina of Sweden, whose very marked masculine
traits and high intelligence seem to have been combined with a definitely
homosexual or bisexual temperament.[141]
Great religious and moral leaders, like Madame Blavatsky and Louise
Michel, have been either homosexual or bisexual or, at least, of
pronounced masculine temperament.[142] Great actresses from the eighteenth
century onward have frequently been more or less correctly identified with
homosexuality, as also many women distinguished in other arts.[143] Above
all, Sappho, the greatest of women poets, the peer of the greatest poets
of the other sex in the supreme power of uniting art and passion, has left
a name which is permanently associated with homosexuality.
It can scarcely be said that opinion is unanimous in regard to
Sappho, and the reliable information about her, outside the
evidence of the fragments of her poems which have reached us, is
scanty. Her fame has always been great; in classic times her name
was coupled with Homer's. But even to antiquity she was somewhat
of an enigma, and many legends grew up around her name, such as
the familiar story that she threw herself into the sea for the
love of Phaon. What remains clear is that she was regarded with
great respect and admiration by her contemporaries, that she was
of aristocratic family, that she was probably married and had a
daughter, that at one time she had to take her part in political
exile, and that she addressed her girl friends in precisely
similar terms to those addressed by Alcaeus to youths. We know
that in antiquity feminine homosexuality was regarded as
especially common in Sparta, Lesbos, and Miletus. Horace, who was
able to read Sappho's complete poems, states that the objects of
her love-plaints were the young girls of Lesbos, while Ovid, who
played so considerable a part in weaving fantastic stories round
Sappho's name, never claimed that they had any basis of truth. It
was inevitable that the early Christians should eagerly attack so
ambiguous a figure, and Tatian (_Oratio ad Graecos_, cap. 52)
reproached the Greeks that they honored statues of the tribade
Sappho, a prostitute who had celebrated her own wantonness and
infatuation. The result is that in modern times there have been
some who placed Sappho's character in a very bad light and others
who have gone to the opposite extreme in an attempt at
"rehabilitation." Thus, W. Mure, in his _History of the Language
and Literature of Ancient Greece_ (1854, vol. iii, pp. 272-326,
496-8), dealing very fully with Sappho, is disposed to accept
many of the worst stories about her, though he has no pronounced
animus, and, as regards female homosexuality, which he considers
to be "far more venial" than male homosexuality, he remarks that
"in modern times it has numbered among its votaries females
distinguished for refinement of manners and elegant
accomplishments." Bascoul, on the other hand, will accept no
statements about Sappho which conflict with modern ideals of
complete respectability, and even seeks to rewrite her most
famous ode in accordance with the colorless literary sense which
he supposes that it originally bore (J.M.F. Bascoul, _La Chaste
Sappho et le Mouvement Feministe à Athènes_, 1911).
Wilamowitz-Moellendorff (_Sappho und Simonides_, 1913) also
represents the antiquated view, formerly championed by Welcker,
according to which the attribution of homosexuality is a charge
of "vice," to be repudiated with indignation. Most competent and
reliable authorities today, however, while rejecting the
accretions of legend around Sappho's name and not disputing her
claim to respect, are not disposed to question the personal and
homosexual character of her poems. "All ancient tradition and the
character of her extant fragments," says Prof. J.A. Platt
(_Encyclopedia Britannica_, 11th. ed., art. "Sappho"), "show that
her morality was what has ever since been known as 'Lesbian.'"
What exactly that "Lesbian morality" involved, we cannot indeed
exactly ascertain. "It is altogether idle," as A. Croiset remarks
of Sappho (_Histoire de la Littérature Grecque_, vol. ii, ch. v),
"to discuss the exact quality of this friendship or this love, or
to seek to determine with precision the frontiers, which language
itself often seems to seek to confuse, of a friendship more or
less esthetic and sensual, of a love more or less Platonic." (See
also J.M. Edmonds, _Sappho in the Added Light of the New
Fragments_, 1912). Iwan Bloch similarly concludes (_Ursprung der
Syphilis_, vol. ii, 1911, p. 507) that Sappho probably combined,
as modern investigation shows to be easily possible, lofty ideal
feelings with passionate sensuality, exactly as happens in normal
love.
It must also be said that in literature homosexuality in women has
furnished a much more frequent motive to the artist than homosexuality in
men. Among the Greeks, indeed, homosexuality in women seldom receives
literary consecration, and in the revival of the classical spirit at the
Renaissance it was still chiefly in male adolescents, as we see, for
instance, in Marino's _Adone_, that the homosexual ideal found expression.
After that date male inversion was for a long period rarely touched in
literature, save briefly and satirically, while inversion in women
becomes a subject which might be treated in detail and even with
complacence. Many poets and novelists, especially in France, might be
cited in evidence.
Ariosto, it has been pointed out, has described the homosexual
attractions of women. Diderot's famous novel, _La Religieuse_,
which, when first published, was thought to have been actually
written by a nun, deals with the torture to which a nun was put
by the perverse lubricity of her abbess, for whom, it is said,
Diderot found a model in the Abbess of Chelles, a daughter of the
Regent and thus a member of a family which for several
generations showed a marked tendency to inversion. Diderot's
narrative has been described as a faithful description of the
homosexual phenomena liable to occur in convents. Feminine
homosexuality, especially in convents, was often touched on less
seriously in the eighteenth century. Thus we find a homosexual
scene in _Les Plaisirs du Cloître_, a play written in 1773 (_Le
Théâtre d'Amour an XVIIIe Siècle_, 1910.) Balzac, who treated so
many psychological aspects of love in a more or less veiled
manner, has touched on this in _La Fille aux Yeux d'Or_, in a
vague and extravagantly romantic fashion. Gautier made the
adventures of a woman who was predisposed to homosexuality, and
slowly realizes the fact, the central motive of his wonderful
romance, _Mademoiselle de Maupin_ (1835). He approached the
subject purely as an artist and poet, but his handling of it
shows remarkable insight. Gautier based his romance to some
extent on the life of Madame Maupin or, as she preferred to call
herself, Mademoiselle Maupin, who was born in 1673 (her father's
name being d'Aubigny), dressed as a man, and became famous as a
teacher of fencing, afterward as an opera singer. She was
apparently of bisexual temperament, and her devotion to women led
her into various adventures. She ultimately entered a convent,
and died, at the age of 34, with a reputation for sanctity. (E.C.
Clayton, _Queens of Song_, vol. i, pp, 52-61; F. Karsch,
"Mademoiselle Maupin," _Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_,
vol. v, 1903, pp. 694-706.) A still greater writer, Flaubert, in
_Salammbô_ (1862) made his heroine homosexual. Zola has described
sexual inversion in _Nona_ and elsewhere. Some thirty years ago a
popular novelist, A. Belot, published a novel called
_Mademoiselle Giraud, ma Femme_, which was much read; the
novelist took the attitude of a moralist who is bound to treat
frankly, but with all decorous propriety, a subject of increasing
social gravity. The story is that of a man whose bride will not
allow his approach on account of her own _liaison_ with a female
friend continued after marriage. This book appears to have given
origin to a large number of novels, some of which touched the
question with considerable less affectation of propriety. Among
other novelists who have dealt with the matter may be mentioned
Guy de Maupassant (_La Femme de Paul_), Bourget (_Crime
d'Amour_), Catulle Mendès (_Méphistophéla_), and Willy in the
_Claudine_ series.
Among poets who have used the motive of homosexuality in women
with more or less boldness may be found Lamartine (_Regina_),
Swinburne (first series of _Poems and Ballads_), Verlaine
(_Parallèlement_), and Pierre Louys (_Chansons de Bilitis_). The
last-named book, a collection of homosexual prose-poems,
attracted considerable attention on publication, as it was an
attempt at mystification, being put forward as a translation of
the poems of a newly discovered Oriental Greek poetess; Bilitis
(more usually Beltis) is the Syrian name for Aphrodite. _Les
Chansons de Bilitis_ are not without charm, but have been
severely dealt with by Wilamowitz-Moellendorff (_Sappho und
Simonides_, 1913, p. 63 et seq.) as "a travesty of Hellenism,"
betraying inadequate knowledge of Greek antiquity.
More interesting, as the work of a woman who was not only highly
gifted, but herself of homosexual temperament, are the various
volumes of poems published by "Renée Vivien." This lady, whose
real name was Pauline Tarn, was born in 1877; her father was of
Scotch descent, and her mother an American lady from Honolulu. As
a child she was taken to Paris, and was brought up as a French
girl. She travelled much and at one time took a house at
Mitylene, the chief city of ancient Lesbos. She had a love of
solitude, hated publicity, and was devoted to her women friends,
especially to one whose early death about 1900 was the great
sorrow of Pauline Tarn's life. She is described as very
beautiful, very simple and sweet-natured, and highly accomplished
in many directions. She suffered, however, from nervous
overtension and incurable melancholy. Toward the close of her
life she was converted to Catholicism and died in 1909, at the
age of 32. She is buried in the cemetery at Passy. Her best verse
is by some considered among the finest in the French language.
(Charles Brun, "Pauline Tarn," _Notes and Queries_, 22 Aug.,
1914; the same writer, who knew her well, has also written a
pamphlet, _Renée Vivien_, Sansot, Paris, 1911.) Her chief volumes
of poems are _Etudes et Preludes_ (1901), _Cendres et Poussières_
(1902), _Evocations_ (1903). A novel, _Une Femme M'Apparut_
(1904), is said to be to some extent autobiographical. "Renée
Vivien" also wrote a volume on Sappho with translations, and a
further volume of poems, _Les Kitharèdes_, suggested by the
fragments which remain of the minor women poets of Greece,
followers of Sappho.
It is, moreover, noteworthy that a remarkably large proportion of the
cases in which homosexuality has led to crimes of violence, or otherwise
come under medico-legal observation, has been among women. It is well
know that the part taken by women generally in open criminality, and
especially in crimes of violence, is small as compared with men.[144] In
the homosexual field, as we might have anticipated, the conditions are to
some extent reversed. Inverted men, in whom a more or less feminine
temperament is so often found, are rarely impelled to acts of aggressive
violence, though they frequently commit suicide. Inverted women, who may
retain their feminine emotionality combined with some degree of infantile
impulsiveness and masculine energy, present a favorable soil for the seeds
of passional crime, under those conditions of jealousy and allied emotions
which must so often enter into the invert's life.
The first conspicuous example of this tendency in recent times is
the Memphis case (1892) in the United States. (Arthur Macdonald,
"Observation de Sexualité Pathologique Feminine," _Archives
d'Anthropologie Criminelle_, May, 1895; see also Krafft-Ebing,
_Psychopathia Sexualis_, Eng. trans, of 10th ed., p. 550.) In
this case a congenital sexual invert, Alice Mitchell, planned a
marriage with Freda Ward, taking a male-name and costume. This
scheme was frustrated by Freda's sister, and Alice Mitchell then
cut Freda's throat. There is no reason to suppose that she was
insane at the time of the murder. She was a typical invert of a
very pronounced kind. Her mother had been insane and had
homicidal impulses. She herself was considered unbalanced, and
was masculine in her habits from her earliest years. Her face was
obviously unsymmetrical and she had an appearance of youthfulness
below her age. She was not vicious, and had little knowledge of
sexual matters, but when she kissed Freda she was ashamed of
being seen, while Freda could see no reason for being ashamed.
She was adjudged insane.
There have been numerous cases in America more recently. One case
(for some details concerning which I am indebted to Dr. J.G.
Kiernan, of Chicago) is that of the "Tiller Sisters," two
quintroons, who for many years had acted together under that name
in cheap theaters. One, who was an invert, with a horror of men
dating from early girlhood, was sexually attached to the other,
who was without inborn inversion, and was eventually induced by a
man to leave the invert. The latter, overcome by jealousy, broke
into the apartment of the couple and shot the man dead. She was
tried, and sent to prison for life. A defense of insanity was
made, but for this there was no evidence. In another case, also
occurring in Chicago (reported in _Medicine_, June, 1899, and
_Alienist and Neurologist_, October, 1899), a trained nurse lived
for fourteen years with a young woman who left her on four
different occasions, but was each time induced to return;
finally, however, she left and married, whereupon the nurse shot
the husband, who was not, however, fatally wounded. The culprit
in this case had been twice married, but had not lived with
either of her husbands; it was stated that her mother had died in
an asylum, and that her brother had committed suicide. She was
charged with disorderly conduct, and subjected to a fine.
In another later case in Chicago a Russian girl of 22, named Anna
Rubinowitch, shot from motives of jealousy another Russian girl
to whom she had been devoted from childhood, and then fatally
shot herself. The relations between the two girls had been very
intimate. "Our love affair is one purely of the soul," Anna
Rubinowitch was accustomed to say; "we love each other on a
higher plane than that of earth." (I am informed that there were
in fact physical relationships; the sexual organs were normal.)
This continued, with great devotion on each side, until Anna's
"sweetheart" began to show herself susceptible to the advances of
a male wooer. This aroused uncontrollable jealousy in Anna, whose
father, it may be noted, had committed suicide by shooting some
years previously.
Homosexual relationships are also a cause of suicide among women.
Such a case was reported in Massachusetts early in 1901. A girl
of 21 had been tended during a period of nervous prostration,
apparently of hysterical nature, by a friend and neighbor,
fourteen years her senior, married and having children. An
intimate friendship grew up, equally ardent on both sides. The
mother of the younger woman and the husband of the other took
measures to put a stop to the intimacy, and the girl was sent
away to a distant city; stolen interviews, however, still
occurred. Finally, when the obstacles became insurmountable, the
younger woman bought a revolver and deliberately shot herself in
the temple, in presence of her mother, dying immediately. Though
sometimes thought to act rather strangely, she was a great
favorite with all, handsome, very athletic, fond of all outdoor
sports, an energetic religious worker, possessing a fine voice,
and was an active member of many clubs and societies. The older
woman belonged to an aristocratic family and was loved and
respected by all. In another case in New York in 1905 a retired
sailor, "Captain John Weed," who had commanded transatlantic
vessels for many years, was admitted to a Home for old sailors
and shortly after became ill and despondent, and cut his throat.
It was then found that "Captain Weed" was really a woman. I am
informed that the old sailor's despondency and suicide were due
to enforced separation from a female companion.
The infatuation of young girls for actresses and other prominent
women may occasionally lead to suicide. Thus in Philadelphia, a
few years ago, a girl of 19, belonging to a very wealthy family,
beautiful and highly educated, acquired an absorbing infatuation
for Miss Mary Garden, the _prima donna_, with whom she had no
personal acquaintance. The young girl would kneel in worship
before the singer's portrait, and studied hairdressing and
manicuring in the hope of becoming Miss Garden's maid. When she
realized that her dream was hopeless she shot herself with a
revolver. (Cases more or less resembling those here brought
forward occur from time to time in all parts of the civilized
world. Reports, mostly from current newspapers, of such cases, as
well as of simple transvestism, or Eonism, in both women and men,
will be found in the publications of the Berlin
Wissenschaftlich-humanitären Komitee: the _Monatsberichte_ up to
1909, then in the _Vierteljahrsberichte_, and from 1913 onward in
the _Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_.)
Yet, until recently, comparatively little has been known of sexual
inversion in women. Even so lately as 1901 (after the publication of the
first edition of the present Study), Krafft-Ebing wrote that scarcely
fifty cases had been recorded. The chief monographs devoted but little
space to women.
Krafft-Ebing himself, in the earlier editions of _Psychopathia
Sexualis_, gave little special attention to inversion in women,
although he published a few cases. Moll, however, included a
valuable chapter on the subject in his _Konträre
Sexualempfindung_, narrating numerous cases, and inversion in
women also received special attention in the present Study.
Hirschfeld, however, in his _Homosexualität_ (1914) is the first
authority who has been able to deal with feminine homosexuality
as completely co-ordinate with masculine homosexuality. The two
manifestations, masculine and feminine, are placed on the same
basis and treated together throughout the work.
It is, no doubt, not difficult to account for this retardation in the
investigation of sexual inversion in women. Notwithstanding the severity
with which homosexuality in women has been visited in a few cases, for the
most part men seem to have been indifferent toward it; when it has been
made a crime or a cause for divorce in men, it has usually been considered
as no offense at all in women.[145] Another reason is that it is less
easy to detect in women; we are accustomed to a much greater familiarity
and intimacy between women than between men, and we are less apt to
suspect the existence of any abnormal passion. And, allied with this
cause, we have also to bear in mind the extreme ignorance and the extreme
reticence of women regarding any abnormal or even normal manifestation of
their sexual life. A woman may feel a high degree of sexual attraction for
another woman without realizing that her affection is sexual, and when she
does realize this, she is nearly always very unwilling to reveal the
nature of her intimate experience, even with the adoption of precautions,
and although the fact may be present to her that, by helping to reveal the
nature of her abnormality, she may be helping to lighten the burden of it
on other women. Among the numerous confessions voluntarily sent to
Krafft-Ebing there is not one by a woman. There is, again, the further
reason that well-marked and fully developed cases of inversion are
probably rarer in women, though a slighter degree may be more common; in
harmony with the greater affectability of the feminine organism to slight
stimuli, and its lesser liability to serious variation.[146]
The same aberrations that are found among men are, however, everywhere
found among women. Feminine inversion has sometimes been regarded as a
vice of modern refined civilization. Yet it was familiar to the
Anglo-Saxons, and Theodore's Penitential in the seventh century assigned a
penance of three years (considerably less than that assigned to men, or
for bestiality) to "a woman fornicating with a woman." Among the women of
savages in all parts of the world homosexuality is found, though it is
less frequently recorded than among men.[147]
In New Zealand it is stated on the authority of Moerenhout (though I have
not been able to find the reference) that the women practised Lesbianism.
In South America, where inversion is common among men, we find similar
phenomena in women. Among Brazilian tribes Gandavo[148] wrote:--
"There are certain women among these Indians who determine to be
chaste and know no man. These leave every womanly occupation and
imitate the men. They wear their hair the same way as the men;
they go to war with them or hunting, bearing their bows; they
continue always in the company of men, and each has a woman who
serves her and with whom she lives."
This has some analogy with the phenomena seen among North American men.
Dr. Holder, who has carefully studied the _boté_, tells me that he has met
no corresponding phenomena in women.
There is no doubt, however, that homosexuality among women is well known
to the American Indians in various regions. Thus the Salish Indians of
British Columbia have a myth of an old woman who had intercourse with a
young woman by means of a horn used as a penis.[149] In the mythology of
the Assiniboine Indians (of Canada and Montana) and the Fox Indians (of
Iowa) there are also legends of feminine homosexuality, supposed to have
been derived from the Algonkin Cree Indians, who were closely connected
with both.[150]
According to the Assiniboine legend, a man's wife fell in love
with his sister and eloped with her, a boneless child being the
result of the union; the husband pursued the couple, and killed
his wife as well as the child; no one cared to avenge her death.
The Fox legend, entitled "Two Maidens who Played the Harlot with
Each Other," runs as follows: "It is said that once on a time
long ago there were two young women who were friends together. It
is told that there were also two youths who tried to woo the two
maidens, but they were not able even so much as to talk with
them. After awhile the youths began to suspect something wrong.
So once during the summer, when the two maidens started away to
peel off bark, the youths followed, staying just far enough
behind to keep them in sight. While the girls were peeling the
bark, the youths kept themselves hidden. After awhile they no
longer heard the sound of the maidens at work. Whereupon they
began to creep up to where they were. When they drew nigh,
behold, the maidens were in the act of taking off their clothes.
The first to disrobe flung herself down on the ground and lay
there. 'Pray, what are these girls going to do?' was the feeling
in the hearts of the youths. And to their amazement the girls
began to lie with each other. Thereupon the youths ran to where
the girls were. She who was lying on top instantly fell over
backward. Her clitoris was standing out and had a queer shape; it
was like a turtle's penis. Thereupon the maidens began to plead
with the youths: 'Oh, don't tell on us!' they said. 'Truly it is
not of our own free desire that we have done this thing We have
done it under the influence of some unknown being.' It is said
that afterward one of the maidens became big with child. In the
course of time, she gave birth, and the child was like a
soft-shell turtle."
In Bali, according to Jacobs (as quoted by Ploss and Bartels),
homosexuality is almost as common among women as among men, though it is
more secretly exercised; the methods of gratification adopted are either
digital or lingual, or else by bringing the parts together (tribadism).
Baumann, who noted inversion among the male negro population of Zanzibar,
finds that it is also not rare among women. Although Oriental manners
render it impossible for such women to wear men's clothes openly, they do
so in private, and are recognized by other women by their man-like
bearing, as also by the fact that women's garments do not suit them. They
show a preference for masculine occupations, and seek sexual satisfaction
among women who have the same inclinations, or else among normal women,
who are won over by presents or other means. In addition to tribadism or
cunnilinctus, they sometimes use an ebony or ivory phallus, with a kind of
glans at one end, or sometimes at both ends; in the latter case it can be
used by two women at once, and sometimes it has a hole bored through it by
which warm water can be injected; it is regarded as an Arab invention, and
is sometimes used by normal women shut up in harems, and practically
deprived of sexual satisfaction.[151]
Among the Arab women, according to Kocher, homosexual practices are rare,
though very common among Arab men. In Egypt, however, according to Godard,
Kocher, and others, it is almost fashionable, and every woman in the harem
has a "friend." In Turkey homosexuality is sometimes said to be rare among
women. But it would appear to be found in the harems and women's baths of
Turkey, as well as of Islam generally. Brantôme in the sixteenth century
referred to the Lesbianism of Turkish women at the baths, and Leo
Africanus in the same century mentioned the tribadism of Moorish women and
the formal organization of tribadic prostitution in Fez. There was an
Osmanli Sapphic poetess, Mihiri, whose grave is at Amasia, and Vambery and
Achestorides agree as to the prevalence of feminine homosexuality in
Turkey.[152] Among the negroes and mulattoes of French creole countries,
according to Corre, homosexuality is very common. "I know a lady of great
beauty," he remarks, "a stranger in Guadalupe and the mother of a family,
who is obliged to stay away from the markets and certain shops because of
the excessive admiration of mulatto women and negresses, and the impudent
invitations which they dare to address to her."[153] He refers to several
cases of more or less violent sexual attempts by women on young colored
girls of 12 or 14, and observes that such attempts by men on children of
their own sex are much rarer.
In China (according to Matignon) and in Cochin China (according to
Lorion) homosexuality does not appear to be common among women. In India,
however, it is probably as prevalent among women as it certainly is among
men.
In the first edition of this Study I quoted the opinion of Dr.
Buchanan, then Superintendant of the Central Gaol of Bengal at
Bhagalpur, who informed me that he had never come across a case
and that his head-gaoler had never heard of such a thing in
twenty-five years' experience. Another officer in the Indian
Medical Service assures me, however, that there cannot be the
least doubt as to the frequency of homosexuality among women in
India, either inside or outside gaols. I am indebted to him for
the following notes on this point:--
"That homosexual relationships are common enough among Indian
women is evidenced by the fact that the Hindustani language has
five words to denote the tribade: (1) _dúgáná_, (2) _zanàkhé_,
(3) _sa'tar_, (4) _chapathái_, and (5) _chapatbáz_. The _modus
operandi_ is generally what Martial calls _geminos committere
cunnos_, but sometimes a phallus, called _saburah_, is employed.
The act itself is called _chapat_ or _chapti_, and the Hindustani
poets, Nazir, Rangin, Ján S'áheb, treat of Lesbian love very
extensively and sometimes very crudely. Ján S'áheb, a woman poet,
sings to the effect that intercourse with a woman by means of a
phallus is to be preferred to the satisfaction offered by a male
lover. The common euphemism employed when speaking of two
tribades who live together is that they 'live apart.' So much for
the literary evidence as to the prevalence of what, _mirable
dictu_, Dr. Buchanan's gaoler was ignorant of.
"Now for facts. In the gaol of R. the superintendent discovered a
number of phalli in the females' inclosure; they were made of
clay and sun-dried and bore marks of use. In the gaol of S. was a
woman who (as is usual with tribades in India) wore male attire,
and was well known for her sexual proclivities. An examination
revealed the following: Face much lined, mammæ of masculine type,
but nipples elongated and readily erectile; gluteal and iliac
regions quite of masculine type, as also the thighs; clitoris,
with enlarged glands, readily erectile; nymphæ thickened and
enlarged; vulvar orifice patent, for she had in early youth been
a prostitute; the voice was almost contralto. Her partner was of
low type, but eminently feminine in configuration and manner. In
this case I heard that 'the man' went to a local ascetic and
begged his intercession with the deity, so that she might
impregnate her partner. ('The Hindoo medical works mention the
possibility of a woman uniting with another woman in sexual
embraces and begetting a boneless fetus.' _Short History of Aryan
Medical Science_, p. 44.)
"In the town of D. there 'lived apart' two women, one a Brahmin,
the other a grazier; their _modus operandi_ was tribadism, as an
eyewitness informed me. In S. I was called in to treat the widow
of a wealthy Mohammedan; I had occasion to examine the pudenda,
and found what Martineau would have called the indelible stigmata
of early masturbation and later sapphism. She admitted the
impeachment and confessed that she was on the best of terms with
her three remarkably well-formed and good-looking handmaidens.
This lady said that she began masturbation at an early age, 'just
like all other women,' and that sapphism came after the age of
puberty. Another Mohammedan woman whom I knew, and who had a very
large clitoris, told me that she had been initiated into Lesbian
love at 12 by a neighbor and had intermittently practised it ever
since. I might also instance two sisters of the gardener caste,
both widows, who 'lived apart' and indulged in simultaneous
sapphism.
"That sometimes the actors in tribadism are most vigorous is
shown by the fact that, in the central gaol of ----, swelling of
the vulva was admitted to have been caused by the embraces of two
female convicts. The subordinate who told me this mentioned it
quite incidentally while relating his experiences as hospital
assistant at this gaol. When I questioned him he stated that the
woman, whom he was called to treat, told him that she could never
'satisfy herself' with men, but only with women. He added that
tribadism was 'quite common in the gaol.'"
The foregoing sketch may serve to show that homosexual practices
certainly, and probably definite sexual inversion, are very widespread
among women in very many and various parts of the world, though it is
likely that, as among men, there are variations--geographical, racial,
national, or social--in the frequency or intensity of its obvious
manifestations. Thus, in the eighteenth century, Casanova remarked that
the women of Provence are specially inclined to Lesbianism.
In European prisons homosexual practices flourish among the women fully as
much, it may probably be said, as among the men. There is, indeed, some
reason for supposing that these phenomena are here sometimes even more
decisively marked than among men.[154] This prevalence of homosexuality
among women in prison is connected with the close relationship between
feminine criminality and prostitution.
The frequency of homosexual practices among prostitutes is a fact of some
interest, and calls for special explanation, for, at the first glance, it
seems in opposition to all that we know concerning the exciting causes of
homosexuality. Regarding the fact there can be no question.[155] It has
been noted by all who are acquainted with the lives of prostitutes, though
opinion may differ as to its frequency. In Berlin, Moll was told in
well-informed quarters, the proportion of prostitutes with Lesbian
tendencies is about 25 per cent. This was almost the proportion at Paris
many years ago, according to Parent-Duchâtelet; today, according to
Chevalier, it is larger; and Bourneville believes that 75 per cent, of the
inmates of the Parisian venereal hospitals have practised homosexuality.
Hammer in Germany has found among 66 prostitutes that 41 were
homosexual.[156] Hirschfeld thinks that inverted women are specially prone
to become prostitutes.[157] Eulenburg believes, on the other hand, that
the conditions of their life favor homosexuality among prostitutes; "a
homosexual union seems to them higher, purer, more innocent, and more
ideal."[158] There is, however, no fundamental contradiction between these
two views; they are probably both right.
In London, so far as my inquiries extend, homosexuality among prostitutes
is very much less prevalent, and in a well-marked form is confined to a
comparatively small section. I am indebted to a friend for the following
note: "From my experience of the Parisian prostitute, I gather that
Lesbianism in Paris is extremely prevalent; indeed, one might almost say
normal. In particular, most of the chahut-dancers of the Moulin-Rouge,
Casino de Paris, and the other public balls are notorious for going in
couples, and, for the most part, they prefer not to be separated, even in
their most professional moments with the other sex. In London the thing
is, naturally, much less obvious, and, I think, much less prevalent; but
it is certainly not infrequent. A certain number of well-known prostitutes
are known for their tendencies in this direction, which do not, however,
interfere in any marked way with the ordinary details of their profession.
I do not personally know of a single prostitute who is exclusively
Lesbian; I have heard vaguely that there are one or two such anomalies.
But I have heard a swell _cocotte_ at the Corinthian announce to the whole
room that she was going home with a girl; and no one doubted the
statement. Her name, indeed, was generally coupled with that of a
fifth-rate actress. Another woman of the same kind has a little clientele
of women who buy her photographs in Burlington Arcade. In the lower ranks
of the profession all this is much less common. One often finds women who
have simply never heard of such a thing; they know of it in regard to men,
but not in regard to women. And they are, for the most part, quite
horrified at the notion, which they consider part and parcel of 'French
beastliness.' Of course, almost every girl has her friend, and, when not
separately occupied, they often sleep together; but, while in separate,
rare cases, this undoubtedly means all that it can mean, for the most
part, so far as one can judge, it means no more than it would mean among
ordinary girls."
It is evident that there must be some radical causes for the frequency of
homosexuality among prostitutes. One such cause doubtless lies in the
character of the prostitute's relations with men; these relations are of a
professional character, and, as the business element becomes emphasized,
the possibility of sexual satisfaction diminishes; at the best, also;
there lacks the sense of social equality, the feeling of possession, and
scope for the exercise of feminine affection and devotion. These the
prostitute must usually be forced to find either in a "bully" or in
another woman.[159]
Apart from this fact it must be borne in mind that, in a very large number
of cases, prostitutes show in slight or more marked degree many of the
signs of neurotic heredity,[160] and it would not be surprising if they
present the germs of homosexuality in an unusually high degree. The life
of the prostitute may well develop such latent germs; and so we have an
undue tendency to homosexuality, just as we have it among criminals, and,
to a much less extent, among persons of genius and intellect.
Homosexuality is specially fostered by those employments which keep women
in constant association, not only by day, but often at night also, without
the company of men. This is, for instance, the case in convents, and
formerly, at all events,--however, it may be today,--homosexuality was
held to be very prevalent in convents. This was especially so in the
eighteenth century when very many young girls, without any religious
vocation, were put into convents.[161] The same again is today the case
with the female servants in large hotels, among whom homosexual practices
nave been found very common.[162] Laycock, many years ago, noted the
prevalence of manifestations of this kind, which he regarded as
hysterical, among seamstresses, lace-makers, etc., confined for hours in
close contact with one another in heated rooms. The circumstances under
which numbers of young women are employed during the day in large shops
and factories, and sleep in the establishment, two in a room or even two
in a bed, are favorable to the development of homosexual practices.
In England it is seldom that anyone cares to investigate these
phenomena, though, they certainly exist. They have been more
thoroughly studied elsewhere. Thus, in Rome, Niceforo, who
studied various aspects of the lives of the working classes,
succeeded in obtaining much precise information concerning the
manners and customs of the young girls in dressmaking and
tailoring work-rooms. He remarks that few of those who see the
"virtuous daughters of the people," often not more than 12 years
old, walking along the streets with the dressmaker's box under
their arm, modestly bent head and virginal air, realize the
intense sexual preoccupations often underlying these appearances.
In the work-rooms the conversation perpetually revolves around
sexual subjects in the absence of the mistress or forewoman, and
even in her presence the slang that prevails in the work-rooms
leads to dialogues with a double meaning. A state of sexual
excitement is thus aroused which sometimes relieves itself
mentally by psychic onanism, sometimes by some form of
masturbation; one girl admitted to Niceforo that by allowing her
thoughts to dwell on the subject while at work she sometimes
produced physical sexual excitement as often as four times a day.
(See also vol. i of these _Studies_, "Auto-erotism.") Sometimes,
however, a vague kind of homosexuality is produced, the girls,
excited by their own thoughts and their conversation, being still
further excited by contact with each other. "In summer, in one
work-room, some of the girls wear no drawers, and they unbutton
their bodices, and work with crossed legs, more or less
uncovered. In this position, the girls draw near and inspect one
another; some boast of their white legs, and, then the petticoats
are raised altogether for more careful comparison. Many enjoy
this inspection of nudity, and experience real sexual pleasure.
From midday till 2 P.M., during the hours of greatest heat, when
all are in this condition, and the mistress, in her chemise (and
sometimes, with no shame at the workers' presence, even without
it), falls asleep on the sofa, all the girls, _without one
exception_, masturbate themselves. The heat seems to sharpen
their desires and morbidly arouse all their senses. The
voluptuous emotions, restrained during the rest of the day, break
out with irresistible force; stimulated by the spectacle of each
other's nakedness, some place their legs together and thus
heighten the spasm by the illusion of contact with a man." In
this way they reach mutual masturbation. "It is noteworthy,
however," Niceforo points out, "that these couples for mutual
masturbation are never Lesbian couples. Tribadism is altogether
absent from the factories and work-rooms." He even believes that
it does not exist among girls of the working class. He further
describes how, in another work-room, during the hot hours of the
day in summer, when no work is done, some of the girls retire
into the fitting-room, and, having fastened their chemises round
their legs and thighs with pins, so as to imitate trousers, play
at being men and pretend to have intercourse with the others.
(Niceforo, _Il Gergo_, cap. vi, 1897, Turin.) I have reproduced
these details from Niceforo's careful study because, although
they may seem to be trivial at some points, they clearly bring
out the very important distinction between a merely temporary
homosexuality and true inversion. The amusements of these young
girls may not be considered eminently innocent or wholesome, but,
on the other hand, they are not radically morbid or vicious. They
are strictly, and even consciously, _play_; they are dominated by
the thought that the true sexual ideal is normal relationship
with a man, and they would certainly disappear in the presence of
a man.
It must be remembered that Niceforo's observations were made
among girls who were mostly young. In the large factories, where
many adult women are employed, the phenomena tend to be rarer,
but of much less trivial and playful character. At Wolverhampton,
some forty years ago, the case was reported of a woman in a
galvanizing "store" who, after dinner, indecently assaulted a
girl who was a new hand. Two young women held the victim down,
and this seems to show that homosexual vice was here common and
recognized. No doubt, this case is exceptional in its brutality.
It throws, however, a significant light on the conditions
prevailing in factories. In Spain, in the large factories where
many adult women are employed, especially in the great tobacco
factory at Seville, Lesbian relationships seem to be not
uncommon. Here the women work in an atmosphere which in summer is
so hot that they throw off the greater part of their clothing, to
such an extent that a bell is rung whenever a visitor is
introduced into a work-room, in order to warn the workers. Such
an environment predisposes to the formation of homosexual
relationships. When I was in Spain some years ago an incident
occurred at the Seville Fábrica de Tabacos which attracted much
attention in the newspapers, and, though it was regarded as
unusual, it throws light on the life of the workers. One morning
as the women were entering the work-room and amid the usual scene
of animation changing their Manila shawls for the light costume
worn during work, one drew out a small clasp-knife and, attacking
another, rapidly inflicted six or seven wounds on her face and
neck, threatening to kill anyone who approached. Both these
_cigarreras_ were superior workers, engaged in the most skilled
kind of work, and had been at the factory for many years. In
appearance they were described as presenting a striking contrast:
the aggressor, who was 48 years of age, was of masculine air,
tall and thin, with an expression of firm determination on her
wrinkled face; the victim, on the other hand, whose age was 30,
was plump and good-looking and of pleasing disposition. The
reason at first assigned for the attack on the younger woman was
that her mother had insulted the elder woman's son. It appeared,
however, that a close friendship had existed between the two
women, that latterly the younger woman had formed a friendship
with the forewoman of her work-room, and that the elder woman,
animated by jealousy, then resolved to murder both; this design
was frustrated by the accidental absence of the forewoman that
day.
In theaters the abnormal sexuality stimulated by such association in work
is complicated by the general tendency for homosexuality to be connected
with dramatic aptitude, a point to which I shall have to refer later on. I
am indebted to a friend for the following note: "Passionate friendships
among girls, from the most innocent to the most elaborate excursions in
the direction of Lesbos, are extremely common in theaters, both among
actresses and, even more, among chorus-and ballet-girls. Here the
pell-mell of the dressing-rooms, the wait of perhaps two hours between the
performances, during which all the girls are cooped up, in a state of
inaction and of excitement, in a few crowded dressing-rooms, afford every
opportunity for the growth of this particular kind of sentiment. In most
of the theaters there is a little circle of girls, somewhat avoided by the
others, or themselves careless of further acquaintanceship, who profess
the most unbounded devotion to one another. Most of these girls are
equally ready to flirt with the opposite sex, but I know certain ones
among them who will scarcely speak to a man, and who are never seen
without their particular 'pal' or 'chum,' who, if she gets moved to
another theater, will come around and wait for her friend at the
stage-door. But here, again, it is but seldom that the experience is
carried very far. The fact is that the English girl, especially of the
lower and middle classes, whether she has lost her virtue or not, is
extremely fettered by conventional notions. Ignorance and habit are two
restraining influences from the carrying out of this particular kind of
perversion to its logical conclusions. It is, therefore, among the upper
ranks, alike of society and of prostitution, that Lesbianism is most
definitely to be met with, for here we have much greater liberty of
action, and much greater freedom from prejudices."
With girls, as with boys, it is in the school, at the evolution of
puberty, that homosexuality usually first shows itself. It may originate
in a way mainly peripheral or mainly central. In the first case, two
children, perhaps when close to each other in bed, more or less
unintentionally generate in each other a certain amount of sexual
irritation, which they foster by mutual touching and kissing. This is a
spurious kind of homosexuality, the often precocious play of the normal
instinct. In the girl who is congenitally predisposed to homosexuality it
will continue and develop; in the majority it will be forgotten as quickly
as possible, not without shame, in the presence of the normal object of
sexual love.
I may quote as fairly typical the following observation supplied
by a lady who cannot be called inverted: "Like so many other
children and girls, I was first taught self-indulgence by a girl
at school, and I passed on my knowledge to one or two others,
with one of whom I remember once, when we were just 16, spending
the night sensually. We were horribly ashamed after, and that was
the only time. When I was only 8 there was a girl of 13 who liked
to play with my body, and taught me to play with hers, though I
rather disliked doing so. We slept together, and this went on at
intervals for six months. These things, for the sake of getting
enjoyment, and not with any passion, are not uncommon with
children, but less common, I think, than people sometimes
imagine. I believe I could recall without much difficulty, the
number of times such things happened with me. In the case I
mentioned when I did for one night feel--or try to excite in
myself and my girl-companion of 16--sensual passion, we had as
little children slept together a few times and done these things,
and meeting after an absence, just at that age, recalled our
childish memories, and were carried away by sexual impulse. But I
never felt any peculiar affection or passion for her even at the
time, nor she for me. We only felt that our sensual nature was
strong at the time, and had betrayed us into something we were
ashamed of, and, therefore, we avoided letting ourselves sleep
too close after that day. I think we disliked each other, and
were revolted whenever we thought of that night, feeling that
each had degraded the other and herself."
The cases in which the source is mainly central, rather than peripheral,
nevertheless merge into the foregoing, with no clear line of demarcation.
In such cases a girl forms an ardent attachment for another girl, probably
somewhat older than herself, often a schoolfellow, sometimes her
schoolmistress, upon whom she will lavish an astonishing amount of
affection and devotion. There may or not be any return; usually the return
consists of a gracious acceptance of the affectionate services. The girl
who expends this wealth of devotion is surcharged with emotion, but she is
often unconscious or ignorant of the sexual impulse, and she seeks for no
form of sexual satisfaction. Kissing and the privilege of sleeping with
the friend are, however, sought, and at such times it often happens that
even the comparatively unresponsive friend feels more or less definite
sexual emotion (pudendal turgescence, with secretion of mucus and
involuntary twitching of the neighboring muscles), though little or no
attention may be paid to this phenomenon, and in the common ignorance of
girls concerning sex matters it may not be understood. In some cases there
is an attempt, either instinctive or intentional, to develop the sexual
feeling by close embraces and kissing. This rudimentary kind of homosexual
relationship is, I believe, more common among girls than among boys, and
for this there are several reasons: (1) a boy more often has some
acquaintance with sexual phenomena, and would frequently regard such a
relationship as unmanly; (2) the girl has a stronger need of affection
and self-devotion to another person than a boy has; (3) she has not, under
our existing social conditions which compel young women to hold the
opposite sex at arm's length, the same opportunities of finding an outlet
for her sexual emotions; while (4) conventional propriety recognizes a
considerable degree of physical intimacy between girls, thus at once
encouraging and cloaking the manifestations of homosexuality.
The ardent attachments which girls in schools and colleges form to each
other and to their teachers constitute a subject which is of considerable
psychological interest and of no little practical importance.[163] These
girlish devotions, on the borderland between friendship and sexual
passion, are found in all countries where girls are segregated for
educational purposes, and their symptoms are, on the whole, singularly
uniform, though they vary in intensity and character to some extent, from
time to time and from place to place, sometimes assuming an epidemic form.
They have been most carefully studied in Italy, where Obici and
Marchesini--an alienist and a psychologist working in conjunction--have
analyzed the phenomena with remarkable insight and delicacy and much
wealth of illustrative material.[164] But exactly the same phenomena are
everywhere found in English girls' schools, even of the most modern type,
and in some of the large American women's colleges they have sometimes
become so acute as to cause much anxiety.[165] On the whole, however, it
is probable that such manifestations are regarded more indulgently in
girls' than in boys' schools, and in view of the fact that the
manifestations of affection are normally more pronounced between girls
than between boys, this seems reasonable. The head mistress of an English
training college writes:--
"My own assumption on such, matters has been that affection does naturally
belong to the body as well as the mind, and between two women is naturally
and innocently expressed by, caresses. I have never therefore felt that I
ought to warn any girl against the physical element in friendship, as
such. The test I should probably suggest to them would be the same as one
would use for any other relation--was the friendship helping life as a
whole, making them keener, kinder, more industrious, etc., or was it
hindering it?"
Passionate friendships, of a more or less unconsciously sexual character,
are common even outside and beyond school-life. It frequently happens that
a period during which a young woman falls in love at a distance with some
young man of her acquaintance alternates with periods of intimate
attachment to a friend of her own sex. No congenital inversion is usually
involved. It generally happens, in the end, either that relationship with
a man brings the normal impulse into permanent play, or the steadying of
the emotions in the stress of practical life leads to a knowledge of the
real nature of such feelings and a consequent distaste for them. In some
cases, on the other hand, such relationships, especially when formed after
school-life, are fairly permanent. An energetic emotional woman, not
usually beautiful, will perhaps be devoted to another who may have found
some rather specialized lifework, but who may be very unpractical, and who
has probably a very feeble sexual instinct; she is grateful for her
friends's devotion, but may not actively reciprocate it. The actual
specific sexual phenomena generated in such cases vary very greatly. The
emotion may be latent or unconscious; it may be all on one side; it is
often more or less recognized and shared. Such cases are on the borderland
of true sexual inversion, but they cannot be included within its region.
Sex in these relationships is scarcely the essential and fundamental
element; it is more or less subordinate and parasitic. There is often a
semblance of a sex-relationship from the marked divergence of the friends
in physical and psychic qualities, and the nervous development of one or
both the friends is sometimes slightly abnormal. We have to regard such
relationships as hypertrophied friendships, the hypertrophy being due to
unemployed sexual instinct.
The following narrative is written by a lady who holds a
responsible educational position: "A friend of mine, two or three
years older than myself (I am 31), and living in the same house
with me, has been passing through a very unhappy time. Long
nervous strain connected with this has made her sleep badly, and
apt to wake in terrible depression about 3 o'clock in the
morning. In the early days of our friendship, about eight months
ago, she occasionally at these times took refuge with me. After a
while I insisted on her consulting a doctor, who advised her,
amongst other things, not to sleep alone. Thenceforth for two or
three months I induced her to share my room. After a week or two
she generally shared my bed for a time at the beginning of the
night, as it seemed to help her to sleep.
"Before this, about the second or third time that she came to me
in the early morning, I had been surprised and a little
frightened to find how pleasant it was to me to have her, and how
reluctant I was that she should go away. When we began regularly
to sleep in the same room, the physical part of our affection
grew rapidly very strong. It is natural for me generally to
caress my friends, but I soon could not be alone in a room with
this one without wanting to have my arms round her. It would have
been intolerable to me to live with her without being able to
touch her. We did not discuss it, but it was evident that the
desire was even stronger in her than in me.
"For some time it satisfied us fully to be in bed together. One
night, however, when she had had a cruelly trying day and I
wanted to find all ways of comforting her, I bared by breast for
her to lie on. Afterward it was clear that neither of us could be
satisfied without this. She groped for it like a child, and it
excited me much more to feel that than to uncover my breast and
arms altogether at once.
"Much of this excitement was sexually localized, and I was
haunted in the daytime by images of holding this woman in my
arms. I noticed also that my inclination to caress my other women
friends was not diminished, but increased. All this disturbed me
a good deal. The homosexual practices of which I had read lately
struck me as merely nasty; I could not imagines myself tempted to
them;--at the same time the whole matter was new to me, for I had
never wanted anyone even to share my bed before; I had read that
sex instinct was mysterious and unexpected, and I felt that I did
not know what might come next.
"I knew only one elder person whom (for wide-mindedness,
gentleness, and saintliness) I could bear to consult; and to this
person, a middle-aged man, I wrote for advice. He replied by a
long letter of the most tender warning. I had better not weaken
my influence with my friend, he wrote, by going back suddenly or
without her consent, but I was to be very wary of going further;
there was fire about. I tried to put this into practice by
restraining myself constantly in our intercourse, by refraining
from caressing her, for instance, when I wanted to caress her and
knew that she wanted it. The only result seemed to be that the
desire was more tormenting and constant than ever.
"If at this point my friend had happened to die or go away, and
the incident had come to an end, I should probably have been left
nervous in these matters for years to come. I should have
faltered in the opinion I had always held, that bodily
expressions of love between women were as innocent as they were
natural; and I might have come nearer than I ever expected to the
doctrine of those convent teachers who forbid their girls to
embrace one another for fear an incalculable instinct should
carry them to the edge of an abyss.
"As it was, after a while I said a little on the subject to my
friend herself. I had been inclined to think that she might share
my anxiety, but she did not share it at all. She said to me that
she did not like these thoughts, that she cared for me more than
She had ever done for any person except one (now causing most of
her unhappiness), and wanted me in all possible ways, and that it
would make her sad to feel that I was trying not to want her in
one way because I thought it was wrong.
"On my part, I knew very well how much she did need and want me.
I knew that in relations with others she was spending the
greatest effort in following a course that I urged on her, and
was doing what I thought right in spite of the most painful
pressure on her to do wrong; and that she needed all the support
and comfort I could give her. It seemed to me, after our
conversation, that the right path for me lay not in giving way to
fears and scruples, but in giving my friend straightforwardly all
the love I could and all the kinds of love I could. I decided to
keep my eyes open for danger, but meanwhile to go on.
"We were living alone together at the time, and thenceforward we
did as we liked doing. As soon as we could, we moved to a bed
where we could sleep together all night. In the day when no one
was there we sat as close together as we wished, which was very
close. We kissed each other as often as we wanted to kiss each
other, which was very many times a day.
"The results of this, so far as I can see, have been wholly good.
We love each other warmly, but no temptation to nastiness has
ever come, and I cannot see now that it is at all likely to come.
With custom, the localized physical excitement has practically
disappeared, and I am no longer obsessed by imagined embraces.
The spiritual side of our affection seems to have grown steadily
stronger and more profitable since the physical side has, been
allowed to take its natural place."
A class in which homosexuality, while fairly distinct, is only slightly
marked, is formed by the women to whom the actively inverted woman is most
attracted. These women differ, in the first place, from the normal, or
average, woman in that they are not repelled or disgusted by lover-like
advances from persons of their own sex. They are not usually attractive to
the average man, though to this rule there are many exceptions. Their
faces may be plain or ill-made, but not seldom they possess good figures:
a point which is apt to carry more weight with the inverted woman than
beauty of face. Their sexual impulses are seldom well marked, but they are
of strongly affectionate nature. On the whole, they are women who are not
very robust and well developed, physically or nervously, and who are not
well adapted for child-bearing, but who still possess many excellent
qualities, and they are always womanly. One may, perhaps, say that they
are the pick of the women whom the average man would pass by. No doubt,
this is often the reason why they are open to homosexual advances, but I
do not think it is the sole reason. So far as they may be said to
constitute a class, they seem to possess a genuine, though not precisely
sexual, preference for women over men, and it is this coldness, rather
than lack of charm, which often renders men rather indifferent to them.
The actively inverted woman usually differs from the woman of the class
just mentioned in one fairly essential character: a more or less distinct
trace of masculinity. She may not be, and frequently is not, what would be
called a "mannish" woman, for the latter may imitate men on grounds of
taste and habit unconnected with sexual perversion, while in the inverted
woman the masculine traits are part of an organic instinct which she by no
means always wishes to accentuate. The inverted woman's masculine element
may, in the least degree, consist only in the fact that she makes advances
to the woman to whom she is attracted and treats all men in a cool,
direct manner, which may not exclude comradeship, but which excludes every
sexual relationship, whether of passion or merely of coquetry. Usually the
inverted woman feels absolute indifference toward men, and not seldom
repulsion. And this feeling, as a rule, is instinctively reciprocated by
men. At the same time bisexual women are at least as common as bisexual
men.
HISTORY XXXIV.--Miss S., aged 38, living in a city of the United
States, a business woman of fine intelligence, prominent in
professional and literary circles. Her general health is good,
but she belongs to a family in which there is a marked
neuropathic element. She is of rather phlegmatic temperament,
well poised, always perfectly calm and self-possessed, rather
retiring in disposition, with gentle, dignified bearing.
She says she cannot care for men, but that all her life has been
"glorified and made beautiful by friendship with women," whom she
loves as a man loves women. Her character is, however, well
disciplined, and her friends are not aware of the nature of her
affections. She tries not to give all her love to one person, and
endeavors (as she herself expresses it) to use this "gift of
loving" as a stepping-stone to high mental and spiritual
attainments. She is described by one who has known her for
several years as "having a high nature, and instincts unerringly
toward high things."
HISTORY XXXV.--Miss B., artist, of German ancestry on the
paternal side. Among her brothers and sisters, one is of neurotic
temperament and another is inverted. She is herself healthy. She
has no repugnance to men, and would even like to try marriage, if
the union were not permanent, but she has seldom felt any sexual
attraction to a man. In one exceptional instance, early in life,
realizing that she was not adapted for heterosexual
relationships, she broke off the engagement she had formed. Much
later in life, she formed a more permanent relationship with a
man of congenial tastes.
She is attracted to women of various kinds, though she recognizes
that there are some women to whom only men are attracted. Many
years since she had a friend to whom she was very strongly
attached, but the physical manifestations do not appear to have
become pronounced. After that her thoughts were much occupied by
several women to whom she made advances, which were not
encouraged to pass beyond ordinary friendship. In one case,
however, she formed an intimate relationship with a girl somewhat
younger than herself, and a very feminine personality, who
accepted Miss B.'s ardent love with pleasure, but in a passive
manner, and did not consider that the relationship would stand in
the way of her marrying, though she would on no account tell her
husband. The relationship for the first time aroused Miss B.'s
latent sexual emotions. She found sexual satisfaction in kissing
and embracing her friend's body, but there appeared to be no
orgasm. The relationship made a considerable change in her, and
rendered her radiant and happy.
In her behavior toward men Miss B. reveals no sexual shyness. Men
are not usually attracted to her. There is nothing striking in
her appearance; her person and manners, though careless, are not
conspicuously man-like. She is fond of exercise and smokes a good
deal.
HISTORY XXXVI.--Miss H., aged 30. Among her paternal relatives
there is a tendency to eccentricity and to nervous disease. Her
grandfather drank; her father was eccentric and hypochondriacal,
and suffered from obsessions. Her mother and mother's relatives
are entirely healthy, and normal in disposition.
At the age of 4 she liked to see the nates of a little girl who
lived near. When she was about 6, the nurse-maid, sitting in the
fields, used to play with her own parts, and told her to do
likewise, saying it would make a baby come; she occasionally
touched herself in consequence, but without producing any effect
of any kind. When she was about 8 she used to see various
nurse-maids uncover their children's sexual parts and show them
to each other. She used to think about this when alone, and also
about whipping. She never cared to play with dolls, and in her
games always took the part of a man. Her first rudimentary
sex-feelings appeared at the age of 8 or 9, and were associated
with dreams of whipping and being whipped, which were most vivid
between the ages of 11 and 14, when they died away on the
appearance of affection for girls. She menstruated at 12.
Her earliest affection, at the age of 13, was for a schoolfellow,
a graceful, coquettish girl with long golden hair and blue eyes.
Her affection displayed itself in performing all sorts of small
services for this girl, in constantly thinking about her, and in
feeling deliciously grateful for the smallest return. At the age
of 14 she had a similar passion for a girl cousin; she used to
look forward with ecstasy to her visits, and especially to the
rare occasions when the cousin slept with her; her excitement was
then so great that she could not sleep, but there was no
conscious sexual excitement. At the age of 15 or 16 she fell in
love with another cousin; her experiences with this girl were
full of delicious sensations; if the cousin only touched her
neck, a thrill went through her body which she now regards as
sexual. Again, at 17, she had an overwhelming, passionate
fascination for a schoolfellow, a pretty, commonplace girl, whom
she idealized and etherealized to an extravagant extent. This
passion was so violent that her health was, to some extent,
impaired; but it was purely unselfish, and there was nothing
sexual in it. On leaving school at the age of 19 she met a girl
of about the same age as herself, very womanly, but not much
attracted to men. This girl became very much attached to her, and
sought to gain her love. After some time Miss H. was attracted by
this love, partly from the sense of power it gave her, and an
intimate relation grew up. This relation became vaguely physical,
Miss H. taking the initiative, but her friend desiring such
relations and taking extreme pleasure in them; they used to touch
and kiss each other tenderly (especially on the _mons veneris_),
with equal ardor. They each experienced a strong pleasurable
feeling in doing this, and sexual erethism, but no orgasm, and it
does not appear that this ever occurred. Their general behavior
to each other was that of lovers, but they endeavored, as far as
possible, to hide this fact from the world. This relation lasted
for several years, and would have continued, had not Miss H.'s
friend, from religious and moral scruples, put an end to the
physical relationship. Miss H. had been very well and happy
during this relationship; the interference with it seems to have
exerted a disturbing influence, and also to have aroused her
sexual desires, though she was still scarcely conscious of their
real nature.
Soon afterward another girl of exceedingly voluptuous type made
love to Miss H., to which the latter yielded, giving way to her
feelings as well as to her love of domination. She was afterward
ashamed of this episode, though the physical element in it had
remained vague and indefinite. Her remorse was so great that when
her friend, repenting her scruples, implored her to let their
relationship be on the same footing as of old, Miss H., in her
return, resisted every effort to restore the physical relation.
She kept to this resolution for some years, and sought to divert
her thoughts into intellectual channels. When she again formed an
intimate relationship it was with a congenial friend, and lasted
for several years.
She has never masturbated. Occasionally, but very rarely, she has
had dreams of riding accompanied by pleasurable sexual emotions
(she cannot recall any actual experience to suggest this, though
fond of riding). She has never had any kind of sexual dreams
about a man; of late years she has occasionally had erotic dreams
about women.
Her feeling toward men is friendly, but she has never had sexual
attraction toward a man. She likes them as good comrades, as men
like each other. She enjoys the society of men on account of
their intellectual attraction. She is herself very active in
social and intellectual work. Her feeling toward marriage has
always been one of repugnance. She can, however, imagine a man
whom she could love or marry.
She is attracted to womanly women, sincere, reserved, pure, but
courageous in character. She is not attracted to intellectual
women, but at the same time cannot endure silly women. The
physical qualities that attract her most are not so much beauty
of face as a graceful, but not too slender, body with beautiful
curves. The women she is drawn to are usually somewhat younger
than herself. Women are much attracted to her, and without any
effort on her part. She likes to take the active part and
protecting rôle with them. She is herself energetic in character,
and with a somewhat neurotic temperament.
She finds sexual satisfaction in tenderly touching, caressing,
and kissing the loved one's body. (There is no _cunnilinctus_,
which she regards with abhorrence.) She feels more tenderness
than passion. There is a high degree of sexual erethism when
kissing, but orgasm is rare and is produced by lying on the
friend or by the friend lying on her, without any special
contact. She likes being herself kissed, but not so much as
taking the active part.
She believes that homosexual love is morally right when it is
really part of a person's nature, and provided that the nature of
homosexual love is always made plain to the object of such
affection. She does not approve of it as a mere makeshift, or
expression of sensuality, in normal women. She has sometimes
resisted the sexual expression of her feelings, once for years at
a time, but always in vain. The effect on her of loving women is
distinctly good, she asserts, both spiritually and physically,
while repression leads to morbidity and hysteria. She has
suffered much from neurasthenia at various periods, but under
appropriate treatment it has slowly diminished. The inverted
instinct is too deeply rooted to eradicate, but it is well under
control.
HISTORY XXXVII.--Miss M., the daughter of English parents (both
musicians), who were both of what is described as "intense"
temperament, and there is a neurotic element in the family,
though no history of insanity or alcoholism, and she is herself
free from nervous disease. At birth she was very small. In a
portrait taken at the age of 4 the nose, mouth, and ears are
abnormally large, and she wears a little boy's hat. As a child
she did not care for dolls or for pretty clothes, and often
wondered why other children found so much pleasure in them. "As
far back as my memory goes," she writes, "I cannot recall a time
when I was not different from other children. I felt bored when
other little girls came to play with me, though I was never rough
or boisterous in my sports." Sewing was distasteful to her. Still
she cared little more for the pastimes of boys, and found her
favorite amusement in reading, especially adventures and
fairy-tales. She was always quiet, timid, and self-conscious. The
instinct first made its appearance in the latter part of her
eighth or the first part of her ninth year. She was strongly
attracted by the face of a teacher who used to appear at a
side-window on the second floor of the school-building and ring a
bell to summon the children to their classes. The teacher's face
seemed very beautiful, but sad, and she thought about her
continually, though not coming in personal contact with, her. A
year later this teacher was married and left the school, and the
impression gradually faded away. "There was no consciousness of
sex at this time," she wrote; "no knowledge of sexual matters or
practices, and the feelings evoked were feelings of pity and
compassion and tenderness for a person who seemed to be very sad
and very much depressed. It is this quality or combination of
qualities which has always made the appeal in my own case. I may
go on for years in comparative peace, when something may happen,
in spite of my busy practical life, to call it all out." The next
feelings were experienced when, she was about 11 years of age. A
young lady came to visit a next-door neighbor, and made so
profound an impression on the child that she was ridiculed by her
playmates for preferring to sit in a dark corner on the
lawn--where she might watch this young lady--rather than to play
games. Being a sensitive child, after this experience she was
careful not to reveal her feelings to anyone. She felt
instinctively that in this she was different from others. Her
sense of beauty developed early, but there was always an
indefinable feeling of melancholy associated with it. The
twilight, a dark night when the stars shone brightly; these had a
very depressing effect upon her, but possessed a strong
attraction nevertheless, and pictures appealed to her. At the age
of 12 she fell in love with a schoolmate, two years older than
herself, who was absorbed in the boys and never suspected this
affection; she wept bitterly because they could not be confirmed
at the same time, but feared to appear undignified and
sentimental by revealing her feelings. The face of this friend
reminded her of one of Dolce's Madonnas which she loved. Later
on, at the age of 16, she loved another friend very dearly and
devoted herself to her care. There was a tinge of masculinity
among the women of this friend's family, but it is not clear if
she can be termed inverted. This was the happiest period of Miss
M.'s life. Upon the death of this friend, who had long been in
ill health, eight years afterward, she resolved never to let her
heart go out to anyone again.
Specific physical gratification plays no part in these
relationships. The physical sexual feelings began to assert
themselves at puberty, but not in association with her ideal
emotions. "In that connection," she writes, "I would have
considered such things a sacrilege. I fought them and in a
measure successfully. The practice of self-indulgence which might
have become a daily habit was only occasional. Her image evoked
at such times drove away such feelings, for which I felt a
repugnance, much preferring the romantic ideal feelings. In this
way, quite unconscious of the fact that I was at all different
from, any other person, I contrived to train myself to suppress
or at least to dominate my physical sensations when they arose.
That is the reason why friendship and love have always seemed
such holy and beautiful things to me. I have never connected the
two sets of feelings. I think I am as strongly sexed as anyone,
but I am able to hold a friend in my arms and experience deep
comfort and peace without having even a hint of physical sexual
feeling. Sexual expression may be quite necessary at certain
times and right under certain conditions, but I am convinced that
free expression of affection along sentimental channels will do
much to minimize the necessity for it along specifically sexual
channels. I have gone three months without the physical outlet.
The only time I was ever on the verge of nervous prostration was
after having suppressed the instinct for ten months. The other
feelings, which I do not consider as sexual feelings at all, so
fill my life in every department--love, literature, poetry,
music, professional and philanthropic activities--that I am able
to let the physical take care of itself. When the physical
sensations come, it is usually when I am not thinking of a loved
one at all. I could dissipate them by raising my thought to that
spiritual friendship. I do not know if this was right and wise. I
know it is what occurred. It seems a good thing to practise some
sort of inhibition of the centers and acquire this kind of
domination. One bad result, however, was that I suffered much at
times from the physical sensations, and felt horribly depressed
and wretched whenever they seemed to get the better of me."
"I have been able," she writes, "successfully to master the
desire for a more perfect and complete expression of my feelings,
and I have done so without serious detriment to my health." "I
love few people," she writes again, "but in these instances when
I have permitted my heart to go out to a friend I have always
experienced most exalted feelings, and have been made better by
them morally, mentally, and spiritually. Love is with me a
religion."
With regard to her attitude toward the other sex, she writes: "I
have never felt a dislike for men, but have good comrades among
them. During my childhood I associated with both girls and boys,
enjoying them all, but wondering why the girls cared to flirt
with boys. Later in life I have had other friendships with men,
some of whom cared for me, much to my regret, for, naturally, I
do not care to marry."
She is a musician, and herself attributes her nature in part to
artistic temperament. She is of good intelligence, and shows
remarkable talent for various branches of physical science. She
is about 5 feet 4 inches in height, and her features are rather
large. The pelvic measurements are normal, and the external
sexual organs are fairly normal in most respects, though somewhat
small. At a period ten years subsequent to the date of this
history, further examination, under anesthetics, by a
gynecologist, showed no traces of ovary on one side. The general
conformation of the body is feminine. But with arms, palms up,
extended in front of her with inner sides of hands touching, she
cannot bring the inner sides of forearms together, as nearly
every woman can, showing that the feminine angle of arm is lost.
She is left-handed and shows a better development throughout on
the left side. She is quiet and dignified, but has many boyish
tricks of manner and speech which seem to be instinctive; she
tries to watch herself continually, however, in order to avoid
them, affecting feminine ways and feminine interests, but always
being conscious of an effort in so doing.
Miss M. can see nothing wrong in her feelings; and, until, at the
age of 28, she came across the translation of Krafft-Ebing's
book, she had no idea "that feelings like mine were 'under the
ban of society' as he puts it, or were considered unnatural and
depraved." She would like to help to bring light on the subject
and to lift the shadow from other lives. "I emphatically
protest," she says, "against the uselessness and the inhumanity
of attempts to 'cure' inverts. I am quite sure they have perfect
right to live in freedom and happiness as long as they live
unselfish lives. One must bear in mind that it is the soul that
needs to be satisfied, and not merely the senses."
HISTORY XXXVIII.--Miss V., aged 35. Throughout early life up to
adult age she was a mystery to herself, and morbidly conscious of
some fundamental difference between herself and other people.
There was no one she could speak to about this peculiarity. In
the effort to conquer it, or to ignore it, she became a hard
student and has attained success in the profession she adopted. A
few years ago she came across a book on sexual inversion which
proved to be a complete revelation to her of her own nature, and,
by showing her that she was not an anomaly to be regarded with
repulsion, brought her comfort and peace. She is willing that her
experiences should be published for the sake of other women who
may be suffering as in the past she has suffered.
"I am a teacher in a college for women. I am 34 years old and of
medium size. Up to the age of 30 I looked much younger, and since
older, than my age. Until 21 I had a strikingly child-like
appearance. My physique has nothing masculine in it that I am
aware of; but I am conscious that my walk is mannish, and I have
very frequently been told that I do things--such as
sewing,--'just like a man.' My voice is quite low but not coarse.
I dislike household work, but am fond of sports, gardening, etc.
When so young that I cannot remember it, I learned to whistle, a
practice at which I am still expert. When a young girl, I learned
to smoke, and should still enjoy it.
"Several men have been good friends of mine, but very few
suitors. I scarcely ever feel at ease with a man; but women I
understand and can nearly always make my friends.
"I am of Scotch-Irish descent. My father's family were
respectable, prosperous, religious people; my mother's family
only semi-respectable, hard livers, shrewd, but not intelligent,
industrious and money-getting, but fond of drinking and
carousing. There were many illegitimates among them. Both
grandmothers, though of little education, were unusual women. Of
my four maternal uncles, three drank heavily.
"When 43, my mother gave birth to me, the youngest of 8 children.
Of those who grew to adult years, 2 seem quite normal sexually; 1
is exceedingly erratic, entirely unprincipled, has been a thief
and a forger, is a probable bigamist, and has betrayed several
respectable women. Aside from his having inordinate desire, I
know of no sexual abnormality. Another brother, married and a
father, as a boy was much given to infatuations for men. I fancy
this never went beyond infatuation and of late years has not been
noticeable. A third brother, single, though much courted by women
on account of his good looks and personal charm, is wholly
unresponsive, has no gallantry, nor was ever, to my knowledge, a
suitor. He is, however, fond of the society of women, especially
those older than he. He has a somewhat effeminate voice and walk.
Though he has begun of late years to smoke and drink a little,
these habits sit rather oddly upon him. When a child, one of his
favorite make-believe games was to pretend that he was a famous
woman singer. At school he was always found hanging around the
older girls.
"As a child I loved to stay in the fields, refused to wear a
sunbonnet, used to pretend I was a boy, climbed trees, and played
ball. I liked to play with dolls, but I did not fondle them, or
even make them dresses. When my hair was clipped, I was delighted
and made everyone call me 'John.' I used to like to wear a man's
broad-brimmed hat and make corn-cob pipes. I was very fond of my
father and tried to imitate him as much as possible. Where
animals were concerned, I was entirely fearless.
"I think I was not a sexually precocious child, though I seem to
have always known in a dim way that there were two sexes. Very
early I had a sense of shame at having my body exposed; I
remember on one occasion I could not be persuaded to undress
before a young girl visitor. At that time I must have been about
3. When I was 4 a neighbor who had often petted me took me on his
lap and clasped my hand around his penis. Though he was
interrupted in a moment, this made a lasting impression on me. I
had no physical sensation nor did I have any conception of the
significance of the act. Yet I had a slight feeling of repulsion,
and I must have dimly felt that it was wrong, for I did not tell
my mother. I was not accustomed to confide in her, for, though
truthful, I was secretive.
"At the age of 5 I commenced to attend a district school. I
remember that on my first day I was Greatly attracted by a little
girl who wore a bright-red dress.
"My first definite knowledge of sex came in this way: I was
attending Sabbath school and had become ambitious to read the
Bible through. I had gotten as far as the account of the birth of
Esau and Jacob, which aroused my curiosity. So I asked my mother
the meaning of some word in the passage. She seemed embarrassed
and evaded my question. This attitude stimulated my curiosity
further, and I re-read the chapter until I understood it pretty
well. Later I was further enlightened by girl playmates. I fancy
I enjoyed listening to their talk and repeating what I knew on
account of the mystery and secrecy with which sex subjects are
surrounded rather than any sensual delight.
"I cannot recall any act of mine growing directly from sexual
feeling until I was 10 years old. Several other little girls and
myself two or three times exposed private parts of our bodies to
each other. In one instance, at least, I was the instigator. This
act gave me some pleasure, though no distinct physical sensation.
One incident I recall that happened when I was about 10. A girl
cousin and myself had been playing 'house' together. I do not
recall what immediately led to it, but we began to address each
other as boys and tried to urinate through long tubes of some
sort. I also recall feeling a vague interest in this process in
animals, and observing them closely in the act.
"From this time until I was about 14 I grew ruder, more
boisterous and uncontrollable. Prior to this I had been a quite
tractable child. When 12 I became interested in a boy in my grade
at school, and tried to attract him, but failed. Once at a
children's party where we were playing kissing games I tried to
get him to kiss me, but he was unresponsive. I do not recall
bothering myself about him after that. A year later I had a boy
chum about whom my schoolmaster teased me. I thought this
ridiculous. At the age of 13 I menstruated, a fact that caused me
shame and anger. Gradually I grew to feel myself peculiar, why, I
cannot explain. I did not seem to myself to be like other girls
of my acquaintance. I adopted, as a defense, a brusque and
defiant air. I spent a good deal of time playing alone in our
backyard, where I made a pair of stilts, practised rope-walking,
and such things. At school I felt I was not liked by the nicer
girls and began to associate with girls whom I now believe were
immoral, but whom I then supposed did nothing worse than talk in
an obscene manner. I copied their conversation and grew more
reckless and uncontrollable. The principal of the high school I
was attending, I learned afterward, said I was the hardest pupil
to control she had ever had. About this time I read a book where
a girl was represented as saying she had a 'boy's soul in a
girl's body.' The applicability of this to myself struck me at
once, and I read the sentence to my mother who disgusted me by
appearing shocked.
"During this period I began to fall in love,--a practice which
clung to me until I was nearly 30 years old. I recall various
older women with whom I became much enamored, and one man. Of
these there was only one with whom I became acquainted well
enough to show any affection; another was a teacher, and another
was a young married woman at whom I used to gaze ardently during
an entire church service. Toward all my women teachers I had a
somewhat sentimental attitude. They stimulated me, while the men
gave me a wholly impersonal feeling. This abnormal sentimentality
may have been caused, or at least was increased, by the reading
of novels, some of a highly voluptuous nature. I began to read
novels at 7, and from 11 to 14 I absorbed a great many
undesirable ones. This lead to my picturing my future with a
lover, fancying myself in romantic scenes and being caressed and
embraced. I had always supposed I should marry. When about 5 I
decided that when I grew up I would marry a certain young man who
used to come to our house. Several years later he married, to my
real disappointment. I had no affection for him, but merely
thought he would make a desirable husband.
"During my unhappy adolescence I heard that a former playmate was
going to visit at my home. I began to look forward to the visit
with much eagerness and at her arrival was much excited. I wished
to stay alone with her and to caress her, and when we slept
together I pressed my body against her in a sensual manner, which
act she permitted, but without passion. I was greatly excited and
could scarcely sleep. This was the first time I had acted in such
a way, and after she left I felt shame and dislike for her. At
future meetings there was never the least sensuality; we never
referred to the first visit and are still friends, though not
intimate.
"A diary which I kept during my fourteenth and fifteenth years is
filled with romantic sentiments and endearing terms applied
successively to three girls of my own age. I had but a speaking
acquaintance with them, but I was strongly infatuated with all.
One boy was also the object of adoration.
"During my thirteenth year I became for a time very religious and
devoted to religious exercises. This passed and by my fourteenth
year I had become heretical, but was still keenly sensitive to
religious influences.
"When barely 16 I slept one night with a woman of low morals. She
acted toward me in a sensual manner and aroused my sexual
feelings. I felt at the time that this was a sin, but I was
carried away by passion. Afterward I hated this woman and
despised myself.
"I then went away to a co-educational boarding school. Here for
the first time I became happy. A girl of my own age, of fine
character and noticeable refinement, fell in love with me and
caused me to reciprocate. On retrospection I believe this to have
been a genuine and beautiful love on both sides. After a few
months, however, our relation, at my initiative and against my
friend's will, became a physical one. We expressed our affection
by mutual caresses, close embraces and lying on each other's
bodies. I sometimes touched her sexual organs sensually. All this
contact gave me exquisite thrills. After three years we had a
misunderstanding and separated. I was greatly grieved and
troubled for many years, and came to regret greatly the physical
relationship that had existed between us. My friend at length
fell in love and married. I had several other slighter
infatuations for women, was courted by several men to whom I
remained cold and bored except in one instance, where I was
somewhat touched, and finally found a lasting friendship with a
woman who had fallen deeply in love with me in her school days
and had never been able to care for any one else. She is a woman
of considerable literary talent and of good general ability and
high ideals. She is usually much liked by men. Her love for me is
the most real thing in the world for me, and seems the most
permanent. At first my feeling for her was almost purely
physical, although there were no sexual relations. I hated this
feeling and have succeeded in overcoming it pretty largely. At
times after long separations we have embraced with great passion,
at least on my part. This has always had a bad physical effect on
me. At present, however, it very rarely occurs. We both consider
sexual feelings degrading and deleterious to real love. Whether
at any time we have had complete physical satisfaction or
gratification, I hardly know. I have experienced very keen
physical pleasure, mingled with what I took to be great mental
exaltation and quickening of the emotions. This condition was
brought about by close contact with the body of my friend,
usually by lying upon it. But if by 'gratification' it is meant
that desire, having been completely satisfied, ceases
temporarily, I think I have never had that experience. If I did,
it was when I was about 18 when I lived with a girl friend in
intimate relations. Of late years, at any rate, it has never
happened to me, and an embrace, however close, always leaves me
with a desire for a closer union, both physical and spiritual. So
a few years since, I came to the conclusion that it was
impossible to obtain physical satisfaction through the woman I
loved. I came to this conclusion because of the bad physical
effects of contact. My sexual organs became highly sensitive and
inflamed and I suffered pain from the inflammation and resulting
leucorrhea. Should I allow myself to indulge in caresses this
condition would return. My friend, fortunately, though very
affectionate and demonstrative toward me, has very little sexual
passion. The idea that our relationship is based upon it is very
repugnant to her. I was at one time, a few years since, much
discouraged and almost hopeless of being able to overcome my
appetite, and I decided that we could not associate unless I
succeeded. At present, with help, I have very largely succeeded
in living with my friend on a basis of normal, though
affectionate and tender, companionship. I have been helped more,
and have learned more, through this companionship, than through
anything else. The keen pleasure that I have felt when in
responsive contact I never experienced in masturbation. So far as
I remember it never took place till I was well along in my 'teens
and was never an habitual practice, except the first summer I was
separated from a school friend whom I loved. Thoughts of her
aroused feelings which I attempted to satisfy in this way, but
the entire sensuality of the act soon led me to refrain and to
see that that was not what I wanted.
"A peculiar incident that might have some significance occurred
to me about five years ago. I was sitting in a small room where a
seminar was being conducted. The leader of the discussion was a
man about 50, whom I looked up to on account of his attainments
and respected as a man, though I knew him socially very slightly.
I had lost a night's sleep from toothache and was feeling
nervous. I was giving my entire attention to the subject in hand,
when suddenly I felt a very strong physical compulsion toward
that man. I did not know what I was going to do, but I felt on
the point of losing all control of myself. I was afraid to leave,
for fear the slightest movement would throw me into a panic. The
attraction was entirely physical and like nothing I had felt
before. And I had a strange feeling that its cause was in the man
himself; that he was willing it; I was like a spectator. It was
some moments before the assemblage broke up, when my 'possession'
completely disappeared and never recurred.
"Regarding dreams, I will say that not until the past year or two
have I been conscious of having clear-cut dreams with definite
happenings. They seemed usually to leave only vague impressions,
such as a feeling that I had been riding horseback, or trying to
perform some hard task. Sexual dreams I do not recall having had
for several years, except that occasionally I am awakened by a
feeling of uncomfortable sexual desire, which seems usually
caused by a need to urinate. Between the ages of 17 and 22,
approximately, I frequently, perhaps several times a month, would
have vague sexual dreams. These always, I think, occurred when I
happened to be sleeping with someone whom, in my dream, I would
mistake for my intimate friend, and would awaken myself by
embracing my bedfellow with sometimes a slight, sometimes
considerable degree of passion. I have finally arrived at some
understanding of my own temperament, and am no longer miserable
and melancholy. I regret that I am not a man, because I could
then have a home and children."
HISTORY XXXIX.--Miss D., actively engaged in the practice of her
profession, aged 40. Heredity good, nervous system sound, general
health on the whole satisfactory. Development feminine but manner
and movements somewhat boyish. Menstruation scanty and painless.
Hips normal, nates small, sexual organs showing some
approximation toward infantile type with large labia minora and
probably small vagina. Tendency to development of hair on body
and especially lower limbs. The narrative is given in her own
words:--
"Ever since I can remember anything at all I could never think of
myself as a girl and I was in perpetual trouble, with this as the
real reason. When I was 5 or 6 years old I began to say to myself
that, whatever anyone said, if I was not a boy at any rate I was
not a girl. This has been my unchanged conviction all through my
life.
"When I was little, nothing ever made me doubt it, in spite of
external appearance. I regarded the conformation of my body as a
mysterious accident. I could not see why it should have anything
to do with the matter. The things that really affected the
question were my own likes and dislikes, and the fact that I was
not allowed to follow them. I was to like the things which
belonged to me as a girl,--frocks and toys and games which I did
not like at all. I fancy I was more strongly 'boyish' than the
ordinary little boy. When I could only crawl my absorbing
interest was hammers and carpet-nails. Before I could walk I
begged to be put on horses' backs, so that I seem to have been
born with the love of tools and animals which has never left me.
"I did not play with dolls, though my little sister did. I was
often reproached for not playing her games. I always chose boys'
toys,--tops and guns and horses; I hated being kept indoors and
was always longing to go out. By the time I was 7 it seemed to me
that everything I liked was called wrong for a girl. I left off
telling my elders what I did like. They confused and wearied me
by their talk of boys and girls. I did not believe them and could
hardly imagine that they believed themselves. By the time I was 8
or 9 I used to wonder whether they were dupes, or liars, or
hypocrites, or all three. I never believed or trusted a grown
person in consequence. I led my younger brothers in everything. I
was not at all a happy little child and often cried and was made
irritable; I was so confused by the talk, about boys and girls. I
was held up as an evil example to other little girls who
virtuously despised me.
"When I was about 9 years old I went to a day school and began to
have a better time. From 9 to 13 I practically shaped my own
life. I learned very little at school, and openly hated it, but I
read a great deal at home and got plenty of ideas. I lived,
however, mainly out of doors whenever I could get out. I spent
all my pocket money on tools, rabbits, pigeons and many other
animals. I became an ardent pigeon-catcher, not to say thief,
though I did not knowingly steal.
"My brothers were as devoted to the animals as I was. The men
were supposed to look after them, but we alone did so. We
observed, mated, separated, and bred them with considerable
skill. We had no language to express ourselves, but one of our
own. We were absolutely innocent, and sweetly sympathetic with
every beast. I don't think we ever connected their affairs with
those of human beings, but as I do not remember the time when I
did not know all about the actual facts of sex and reproduction,
I presume I learned it all in that way, and life never had any
surprises for me in that direction. Though I saw many sights that
a child should not have seen, while running about wild, I never
gave them a thought; all animals great and small from rabbits to
men had the same customs, all natural and right. My initiation
here was, in my eyes, as nearly perfect as a child's should be. I
never asked grown people questions. I thought all those in charge
of me coarse and untruthful and I disliked all ugly things and
suggestions.
"Every half-holiday I went out with the boys from my brothers'
school. They always liked me to play with them, and, though not
pleasant-tongued boys, were always civil and polite to me. I
organized games and fortifications that they would never have
imagined for themselves, led storming parties, and instituted
some rather dangerous games of a fighting kind. I taught my
brothers; to throw stones. Sometimes I led adventures such as
breaking into empty houses. I liked being out after dark.
"In the winter I made and rigged boats and went sailing them, and
I went rafting and pole-leaping. I became a very good jumper and
climber, could go up a rope, bowl overhand, throw like a boy, and
whistle three different ways. I collected beetles and butterflies
and went shrimping and learned to fish. I had very little money
to spend, but I picked things up and I made all traps, nets,
cages, etc., myself. I learned from every working-man, I could
get hold of the use of all ordinary carpenters' tools, and how to
weld hot iron, pave, lay bricks and turf, and so on.
"When I was about 11 my parents got more mortified at my behavior
and perpetually threatened me with a boarding-school. I was told
for months how it would take the nonsense out of me--'shape me,'
'turn me into a young lady.' My going was finally announced to me
as a punishment to me for being what I was.
"Certainly, the horror of going to this school and the cruel and
unsympathetic way that I was sent there gave me a shock that I
never got over. The only thing that reconciled me to going was my
intense indignation with those who sent me. I appealed to be
allowed to learn Latin and boys' subjects, but was laughed at.
"I was so helpless that I knew I could not run away without being
caught, or I would have run away anywhere from home and school. I
never cried or fretted, but burnt with anger and went like a
trapped rabbit.
"In no words can I describe the severity of the nervous shock, or
the suffering of my first year at school. The school was noted
for its severity and I heard that at one period the elder girls
ran away so often that they wore a uniform dress. I knew two who
had run away. The teachers in my time were ignorant,
self-indulgent women who cared nothing for the girls or their
education and made much money out of them. There was a suspicious
reformatory atmosphere, and my money was taken from me and my
letters read.
"I was intensely shy. I hated the other girls. There were no
refinements anywhere; I had no privacy in my room, which was
always overcrowded; we had no hot water, no baths, improper food,
and no education. We were not allowed to wear enough clean linen,
and for five years I never felt clean.
"I never had one moment to myself, was not allowed to read
anything, had even not enough lesson books, was taught nothing to
speak of except a little inferior music and drawing. I never got
enough exercise, and was always tired and dull, and could not
keep my digestion in order. My pride and self-respect were
degraded in innumerable ways, I suffered agonies of disgust, and
the whole thing was a dreary penal servitude.
"I did not complain. I made friends with a few of the girls. Some
of the older girls were attracted to me. Some talked of men and
love affairs to me, but I was not greatly interested. No one ever
spoke of any other matters of sex to me or in my hearing, but
most of the girls were shy with me and I with them.
"In about two years' time the teachers got to like me and thought
me one of their nicest girls. I certainly influenced them and got
them to allow the girls more privileges.
"I lay great stress upon the physical privations and disgust that
I felt during these years. The mental starvation was not quite so
great because it was impossible for them to crush my mind as they
did my body. That it all materially aided to arrest the
development of my body I am certain.
"It is difficult to estimate sexual influences of which as a
child I was practically unaware. I certainly admired the
liveliest and cleverest girls and made friends with them and
disliked the common, lumpy, uneducated type that made two-thirds
of my companions. The lively girls liked me, and I made several
nice friends whom I have kept ever since. One girl of about 15
took a violent liking for me and figuratively speaking licked the
dust from my shoes. I would never take any notice of her. When I
was nearly 16 one of my teachers began to notice me and be very
kind to me. She was twenty years older than I was. She seemed to
pity my loneliness and took me out for walks and sketching, and
encouraged me to talk and think. It was the first time in my life
that anyone had ever sympathized with me or tried to understand
me and it was a most beautiful thing to me. I felt like an orphan
child who had suddenly acquired a mother, and through her I began
to feel less antagonistic to grown people and to feel the first
respect I had ever felt for what they said. She petted me into a
state of comparative docility and made the other teachers like
and trust me. My love for her was perfectly pure, and I thought
of her's as simply maternal. She never roused the least feeling
in me that I can think of as sexual. I liked her to touch me and
she sometimes held me in her arms or let me sit on her lap. At
bedtime she used to come and say good-night and kiss me upon the
mouth. I think now that what she did was injudicious to a degree,
and I wish I could believe it was as purely unselfish and kind as
it seemed to me then. After I had left school I wrote to her and
visited her during a few years. Once she wrote to me that if I
could give her employment she would come and live with me. Once
when she was ill with neurasthenia her friends asked me to go to
the seaside with her, which I did. Here she behaved in an
extraordinary way, becoming violently jealous over me with
another elderly friend of mine who was there. I could hardly
believe my senses and was so astonished and disgusted that I
never went near her again. She also accused me of not being
'loyal' to her; to this day I have no idea what she meant. She
then wrote and asked me what was wrong between us, and I replied
that after the words she had had with me my confidence in her was
at an end. It gave me no particular pang as I had by this time
outgrown the simple gratitude of my childish days and not
replaced it by any stronger feeling. All my life I have had the
profoundest repugnance to having any 'words' with other women.
"I was much less interested in sex matters than other children of
my age. I was altogether less precocious, though I knew more, I
imagine, than other girls. Nevertheless, by the time I was 15
social matters had begun to interest me greatly. It is difficult
to say how this happened, as I was forbidden all books and
newspapers (except in my holidays when I had generally a reading
orgy, though not the books I needed or wanted). I had abundant
opportunities for speculation, but no materials for any
profitable thinking.
"Dreaming was forced upon me. I dreamed fairy-tales by night and
social dreams by day. In the nightdreams, sometimes in the
day-dreams, I was always the prince or the pirate, rescuing
beauty in distress, or killing the unworthy. I had one dream
which I dreamed over and over again and enjoyed and still
sometimes dream. In this I was always hunting and fighting, often
in the dark; there was usually a woman or a princess, whom I
admired, somewhere in the background, but I have never really
seen her. Sometimes I was a stowaway on board ship or an Indian
hunter or a backwoodsman making a log-cabin for my wife or rather
some companion. My daythoughts were not about the women round
about me, or even about the one who was so kind to me; they were
almost impersonal. I went on, at any rate, from myself to what I
thought the really ideal and built up a very beautiful vision of
solid human friendship in which there was everything that was
strong and wholesome on either side, but very little of sex. To
imagine this in its fullness I had to imagine all social, family,
and educational conditions vastly different from anything I had
come across. From this my thoughts ran largely on social matters.
In whatever direction my thoughts ran I always surveyed them from
the point of view of a boy. I was trying to wait patiently till I
could escape from slavery and starvation, and trying to keep the
open mind I have spoken of, though I never opened a book of
poetry, or a novel, or a history, but I slipped naturally back
into my non-girl's attitude and read it through my own eyes. All
my surface-life was a sham, and only through books, which were
few, did I ever see the world naturally. A consideration of
social matters led me to feel very sorry for women, whom I
regarded as made by a deliberate process of manufacture into the
fools I thought they were, and by the same process that I myself
was being made one. I felt more and more that men were to be
envied and women pitied. I lay stress on this for it started in
me a deliberate interest in women as women. I began to feel
protective and kindly toward women and children and to excuse
women from their responsibility for calamities such as my
school-career. I never imagined that men required, or would have
thanked me for, any sort of sympathy. But it came about in these
ways, and without the least help that I can trace, that by the
time I was 19 years of age I was keenly interested in all kinds
of questions: pity for downtrodden women, suffrage questions,
marriage laws, questions of liberty, freedom of thought, care of
the poor, views of Nature and Man and God. All these things
filled my mind to the exclusion of individual men and women. As
soon as I left school I made a headlong plunge into books where
these things were treated; I had the answers to everything to
find after a long period of enforced starvation. I had to work
for my knowledge. No books or ideas came near me but what I went
in search of. Another thing that helped me to take an expansive
view of life at this time was my intense love of Nature. All
birds and animals affected me by their beauty and grace, and I
have always kept a profound sympathy with them as well as some
subtle understanding which enables me to tame them, at times
remarkably. I not only loved all other creatures, but I believed
that men and women were the most beautiful things in the universe
and I would rather look at them (unclothed) than on any other
thing, as my greatest pleasure. I was prepared to like them
because they were beautiful. When the time came for me to leave
school I rather dreaded it, chiefly because I dreaded my life at
home. I had a great longing at this time to run away and try my
fortune anywhere; possibly if I had been stronger I might have
done so. But I was in very poor health through the physical
crushing I had had, and in very poor spirits through this and my
mental repression. I still knew myself a prisoner and I was
bitterly disappointed and ashamed at having no education. I
afterward had myself taught arithmetic and other things.
"The next period of my life which covered about six years was not
less important to my development, and was a time of extreme
misery to me. It found me, on leaving school, almost a child.
This time between 18 and 24 should, I think, count as my proper
period of puberty, which probably in most children occupies the
end years of their school-life.
"It was at this time that I began to make a good many friends of
my own and to become aware of psychical and sexual attractions. I
had never come across any theories on the subject, but I decided
that I must belong to a third sex of some kind. I used to wonder
if I was like the neuter bees! I knew physical and psychical sex
feeling and yet I seemed to know it quite otherwise from other
men and women. I asked myself if I could endure living a woman's
life, bearing children and doing my duty by them. I asked myself
what hiatus there could be between my bodily structure and my
feelings, and also what was the meaning of the strong physical
feelings which had me in their grip without choice of my own.
[Experience of physical sex sensations first began about 16 in
sleep; masturbation was accidentally discovered at the age of 19,
abandoned at 28, and then at 34 deliberately resumed as a method
of purely physical relief.] These three things simply would not
be reconciled and I said to myself that I must find a way of
living in which there was as little sex of any kind as possible.
There was something that I simply lacked; that I never doubted.
Curiously enough, I thought that the ultimate explanation might
be that there were men's minds in women's bodies, but I was more
concerned in finding a way of life than in asking riddles without
answers.
"I thought that one day when I had money and opportunity I would
dress in men's clothes and go to another country, in order that I
might be unhampered by sex considerations and conventions. I
determined to live an honorable, upright, but simple life.
"I had no idea at first that homosexual attractions in women
existed; afterward observations on the lower animals put the idea
into my head. I made no preparation in my mind for any sexual
life, though I thought it would be a dreary business repressing
my body all my days.
"My relations with other women were entirely pure. My attitude
toward my sexual physical feelings was one of reserve and
repression, and I think the growing conviction of my radical
deficiency somewhere, would have made intimate affection for
anyone, with any demonstration in it, a kind of impropriety for
which I had no taste.
"However, between 21 and 24 other things happened to me.
"During these few years I saw plenty of men and plenty of women.
As regards the men I liked them very well, but I never thought
the man would turn up with whom I should care to live. Several
men were very friendly with me and three in particular used to
write me letters and give me much of their confidence. I invited
two of them to visit at my house. All these men talked to me with
freedom and even told me about their sexual ideas and doings. One
asked me to believe that he was leading a good life; the other
two owned that they were not. One discussed the question of
homosexuality with me; he has never married. I liked one of them
a good deal, being attracted by his softness and gentleness and
almost feminine voice. It was hoped that I would take to him and
he very cautiously made love to me. I allowed him to kiss me a
few times and wrote him a few responsive letters, wondering what
I liked in him. Someone then commented on the acquaintance and
said 'marriage,' and I woke up to the fact that I did not really
want him at all. I think he found the friendship too insipid and
was glad to be out of it. All these men were a trifle feminine in
characteristics, and two played no games. I thought it odd that
they should all express admiration for the very boyish qualities
in me that other people disliked. A fourth man, something of the
same type, told another friend that he always felt surprised at
how freely he was able to talk to me, but that he never could
feel that I was a woman. Two of these were brilliantly clever
men; two were artists.
"At the same period, or earlier, I made a number of women
friends, and of course saw more of them. I chose out some and
some chose me; I think I attracted them as much as, or even more
than, they attracted me. I do not quite remember if this was so,
though I can say for certain that it was so at school. There were
three or four bright, clever, young women whom I got to know then
with whom I was great friends. We were interested in books,
social theories, politics, art. Sometimes I visited them or we
went on exploring expeditions to many country places or towns.
They all in the end either had love affairs or married. I know
that in spite of all our free conversations they never talked to
me as they did to each other; we were always a little shy with
each other. But I got very fond of at least four of them. I
admired them and when I was tired and worried I often thought how
easily, if I had been a man, I could have married and settled
down with one or the other. I used to think it would be
delightful to have a woman to work for and take care of. My
attraction to these women was very strong, but I don't think they
knew it. I seldom even kissed them, but I should often have
cheerfully given them a good hugging and kissing if I had thought
it a right or proper thing to do. I never wanted them to kiss me
half so much as I wanted to kiss them. In these years I felt this
with every woman I admired.
"Occasionally, I experienced slight erections when close to other
women. I am sure that no deliberate thought of mine caused them,
and as I had them at other times too, when I was not expecting
them, I think it may have been accidental. What I felt with my
mind and what I felt with my body always at this time seemed
apart. I cannot accurately describe the interest and attraction
that women then were to me. I only know I never felt anything
like it for men. All my feelings of desire to do kindnesses, to
give presents, to be liked and respected and all such natural
small matters, referred to women, not to men, and at this time,
both openly and to myself, I said unhesitatingly that I liked
women best. It must be remembered that at this time a dislike for
men was being fostered in me by those who wanted me to marry, and
this must have counted for more than I now remember.
"As regards my physical sexual feelings, which were well
established during these few years, I don't think I often
indulged in any erotic imaginations worth estimating, but so far
as I did at all, I always imagined myself as a man loving a
woman. I cannot recall ever imagining the opposite, but I seldom
imagined anything at all, and I suppose ultimate sex sensations
know no sex.
"But as time went on and my physical and psychical feelings met,
at any rate in my own mind, I became fully aware of the meaning
of love and even, of homosexual possibilities.
"I should probably have thought more of this side of things
except that during this time I was so worried by the difficulty
of living in my home under the perpetual friction of comparison
with other people. My life was a sham; I was an actor never off
the boards. I had to play at being a something I was not front
morning till night, and I had no cessation of the long fatigue I
had had at school; in addition I had sex to deal with actively
and consciously.
"Looking back on these twenty-four years of my life I only look
back on a round of misery. The nervous strain was enormous and so
was the moral strain. Instead of a child I felt myself, whenever
I desired to please anyone else, a performing monkey. My
pleasures were stolen or I was snubbed for taking them. I was not
taught and was called a fool. My hand was against everybody's.
How it was that with my high spirits and vivid imagination I did
not grow up a moral imbecile full of perverted instincts I do not
know. I describe myself as a docile child, but I was full of
temptations to be otherwise. There were times when I was silent
before people, but if I had had a knife in my hand I could have
stuck it into them. If it had been desired to make me a
thoroughly perverted being I can imagine no better way than the
attempt to mould me by force into a particular pattern of girl.
"Looking at my instincts in my first childhood and my mental
confusion over myself, I do not believe the most sympathetic and
scientific treatment would have turned me into an average girl,
but I see no reason why proper physical conditions should not
have induced a better physical development and that in its turn
have led to tastes more approximate to those of the normal woman.
That I do not even now desire to be a normal woman is not to the
point.
"Instead of any such help, I suffered during the time that should
have been puberty from a profound mental and physical shock which
was extended over several years, and in addition I suffered from
the outrage of every fine and wholesome feeling I had. These
things by checking my physical development gave, I am perfectly
convinced, a traumatic impetus to my general abnormality, and
this was further kept up by demanding of me (at the dawn of my
real sexual activity, and when still practically a child) an
interest in men and marriage which I was no more capable of
feeling than any ordinary boy or girl of 15. If you had taken a
boy of 13 and given him all my conditions, bound him hand and
foot, when you became afraid of him petted him into docility, and
then placed him in the world and, while urging normal sexuality
upon him on the one hand, made him disgusted with it on the
other, what would have been the probable result?
"Looking back, I can only say I think, the results in my own case
were marvellously good, and that I was saved from worse by my own
innocence and by the physical backwardness which nature, probably
in mercy, bestowed upon me.
"I find it difficult to sum up the way in which I affect other
women and they me. I can only record my conviction that I do
affect a large number, whether abnormally or not I don't know,
but I attract them and it would be easy for some of them to
become very fond of me if I gave them a chance. They are also, I
am certain, more shy with me than they are with other women.
"I find it difficult also to sum up their effect on me. I only
know that some women attract me and some tempt me physically, and
have done ever since I was about 22 or 23. I know that
psychically I have always been more interested in women than in
men, but have not considered them the best companions or
confidants. I feel protective towards them, never feel jealous of
them, and hate having differences with them. And I feel always
that I am not one of them. If there had been any period in my
life when health, and temptation and money and opportunity had
made homosexual relations easy I cannot say how I should have
resisted. I think that I have never had any such relations simply
because I have in a way been safeguarded from them. For a long
time I thought I must do without all actual sexual relations and
acted up to that. If I had thought any relations right and
possible I think I should have striven for heterosexual
experiences because of the respect that I had cultivated, indeed
I think always had, for the normal and natural. If I had thought
it right to indulge any sort of gratification which was within my
reach I think I might probably have chosen the homosexual as
being perhaps more satisfying and more convenient. I always
wanted love and friendship first; later I should have been glad
of something to satisfy my sex hunger too, but by that time I
could have done without it, or I thought so."
At a period rather later than that dealt with in this narrative,
the subject of it became strongly attracted to a man who was of
somewhat feminine and abnormal disposition. But on consideration
she decided that it would not be wise to marry him.
The commonest characteristic of the sexually inverted woman is a certain
degree of masculinity or boyishness. As I have already pointed out,
transvestism in either women or men by no means necessarily involves
inversion. In the volume of _Women Adventurers_, edited by Mrs. Norman for
the Adventure Series, there is no trace of inversion; in most of these
cases, indeed, love for a man was precisely the motive for adopting male
garments and manners. Again, Colley Cibber's daughter, Charlotte Charke, a
boyish and vivacious woman, who spent much of her life in men's clothes,
and ultimately wrote a lively volume of memoirs, appears never to have
been attracted to women, though women were often attracted to her,
believing her to be a man; it is, indeed, noteworthy that women seem, with
special frequency, to fall in love with disguised persons of their own
sex.[166] There is, however, a very pronounced tendency among sexually
inverted women to adopt male attire when practicable. In such cases male
garments are not usually regarded as desirable chiefly on account of
practical convenience, nor even in order to make an impression on other
women, but because the wearer feels more at home in them. Thus, Moll
mentions the case of a young governess of 16 who, while still unconscious
of her sexual perversion, used to find pleasure, when everyone was out of
the house, in putting on the clothes of a youth belonging to the family.
Cases have been recorded of inverted women who spent the greater
part of their lives in men's clothing and been generally regarded
as men. I may cite the case of Lucy Ann Slater, _alias_ the Rev.
Joseph Lobdell, recorded by Wise (_Alienist and Neurologist_,
1883). She was masculine in character, features, and attire. In
early life she married and had a child, but had no affection for
her husband, who eventually left her. As usual in such cases, her
masculine habits appeared in early childhood. She was expert with
the rifle, lived the life of a trapper and hunter among the
Indians, and was known as the "Female Hunter of Long Eddy." She
published a book regarding those experiences. I have not been
able to see it, but it is said to be quaint and well written. She
regarded herself as practically a man, and became attached to a
young woman of good education, who had also been deserted by her
husband. The affection was strong and emotional, and, of course,
without deception. It was interrupted by her recognition and
imprisonment as a vagabond, but on the petition of her "wife" she
was released. "I may be a woman in one sense," she said, "but I
have peculiar organs which make me more a man than a woman." She
alluded to an enlarged clitoris which she could erect, she said,
as a turtle protrudes its head, but there was no question of its
use in coitus. She was ultimately brought to the asylum with
paroxysmal attacks of exaltation and erotomania (without
self-abuse apparently) and corresponding periods of depression,
and she died with progressive dementia. I may also mention the
case (briefly recorded in the _Lancet_, February 22, 1884) of a
person called John Coulter, who was employed for twelve years as
a laborer by the Belfast Harbor Commissioners. When death
resulted from injuries caused in falling down stairs, it was
found that this person was a woman. She was fifty years of age,
and had apparently spent the greater part of her life as a man.
When employed in early life as a manservant on a farm, she had
married her mistress's daughter. The pair were married for
twenty-nine years, but during the last six years lived apart,
owing to the "husband's" dissipated habits. No one ever suspected
her sex. She was of masculine appearance and good muscular
development. The "wife" took charge of the body and buried it.
A more recent case of the same kind is that of "Murray Hall," who
died in New York in 1901. Her real name was Mary Anderson, and
she was born at Govan, in Scotland. Early left an orphan, on the
death of her only brother she put on his clothes and went to
Edinburgh, working as a man. Her secret was discovered during an
illness, and she finally went to America, where she lived as a
man for thirty years, making money, and becoming somewhat
notorious as a Tammany politician, a rather riotous "man about
town." The secret was not discovered till her death, when it was
a complete revelation, even to her adopted daughter. She married
twice; the first marriage ended in separation, but the second
marriage seemed to have been happy, for it lasted twenty years,
when the "wife" died. She associated much with pretty girls, and
was very jealous of them. She seems to have been slight and not
very masculine in general build, with a squeaky voice, but her
ways, attitude, and habits were all essentially masculine. She
associated with politicians, drank somewhat to excess, though not
heavily, swore a great deal, smoked and chewed tobacco, sang
ribald songs; could run, dance, and fight like a man, and had
divested herself of every trace of feminine daintiness. She wore
clothes that were always rather too large in order to hide her
form, baggy trousers, and an overcoat even in summer. She is said
to have died of cancer of the breast. (I quote from an account,
which appears to be reliable, contained in the _Weekly
Scotsman_, February 9, 1901.)
Another case, described in the London papers, is that of
Catharine Coome, who for forty years successfully personated a
man and adopted masculine habits generally. She married a lady's
maid, with whom she lived for fourteen years. Having latterly
adopted a life of fraud, her case gained publicity as that of the
"man-woman."
In 1901 the death on board ship was recorded of Miss Caroline
Hall, of Boston, a water-color painter who had long resided in
Milan. Three years previously she discarded female dress and
lived as "husband" to a young Italian lady, also an artist, whom
she had already known for seven years. She called herself "Mr.
Hall" and appeared to be a thoroughly normal young man, able to
shoot with a rifle and fond of manly sports. The officers of the
ship stated that she smoked and drank heartily, joked with the
other male passengers, and was hail-fellow-well-met with
everyone. Death was due to advanced tuberculosis of the lungs,
hastened by excessive drinking and smoking.
Ellen Glenn, _alias_ Ellis Glenn, a notorious swindler, who came
prominently before the public in Chicago during 1905, was another
"man-woman," of large and masculine type. She preferred to dress
as a man and had many love escapades with women. "She can fiddle
as well as anyone in the State," said a man who knew her, "can
box like a pugilist, and can dance and play cards."
In Seville, a few years ago, an elderly policeman, who had been
in attendance on successive governors of that city for thirty
years, was badly injured in a street accident. He was taken to
the hospital and the doctor there discovered that the "policeman"
was a woman. She went by the name of Fernando Mackenzie and
during the whole of her long service no suspicion whatever was
aroused as to her sex. She was French by birth, born in Paris in
1836, but her father was English and her mother Spanish. She
assumed her male disguise when she was a girl and served her
time in the French army, then emigrated to Spain, at the age of
35, and contrived to enter the Madrid police force disguised as a
man. She married there and pretended that her wife's child was
her own son. She removed to Seville, still serving as a
policeman, and was engaged there as cook and orderly at the
governor's palace. She served seven successive governors. In
consequence of the discovery of her sex she has been discharged
from the police without the pension due to her; her wife had died
two years previously, and "Fernando" spent all she possessed on
the woman's funeral. Mackenzie had a soft voice, a refined face
with delicate features, and was neatly dressed in male attire.
When asked how she escaped detection so long, she replied that
she always lived quietly in her own house with her wife and did
her duty by her employers so that no one meddled with her.
In Chicago in 1906 much attention was attracted to the case of
"Nicholai de Raylan," confidential secretary to the Russian
Consul, who at death (of tuberculosis) at the age of 33 was found
to be a woman. She was born in Russia and was in many respects
very feminine, small and slight in build, but was regarded as a
man, and even as very "manly," by both men and women who knew her
intimately. She was always very neat in dress, fastidious in
regard to shirts and ties, and wore a long-waisted coat to
disguise the lines of her figure. She was married twice in
America, being divorced by the first wife, after a union lasting
ten years, on the ground of cruelty and misconduct with chorus
girls. The second wife, a chorus girl who had been previously
married and had a child, was devoted to her "husband." Both wives
were firmly convinced that their husband was a man and ridiculed
the idea that "he" could be a woman. I am informed that De Raylan
wore a very elaborately constructed artificial penis. In her will
she made careful arrangements to prevent detection of sex after
death, but these were frustrated, as she died in a hospital.
In St. Louis, in 1909, the case was brought forward of a young
woman of 22, who had posed as a man for nine years. Her masculine
career began at the age of 13 after the Galveston flood which
swept away all her family. She was saved and left Texas dressed
as a boy. She worked in livery stables, in a plough factory, and
as a bill-poster. At one time she was the adopted son of the
family in which she lived and had no difficulty in deceiving her
sisters by adoption as to her sex. On coming to St. Louis in 1902
she made chairs and baskets at the American Rattan Works,
associating with fellow-workmen on a footing of masculine
equality. One day a workman noticed the extreme smallness and
dexterity of her hands. "Gee, Bill, you should have been a girl."
"How do you know I'm not?" she retorted. In such ways her ready
wit and good humor always, disarmed suspicion as to her sex. She
shunned no difficulties in her work or in her sports, we are
told, and never avoided the severest tests. "She drank, she
swore, she courted girls, she worked as hard as her fellows, she
fished and camped; she told stories with the best of them, and
she did not flinch when the talk grew strong. She even chewed
tobacco." Girls began to fall in love with the good-looking boy
at an early period, and she frequently boasted of her feminine
conquests; with one girl who worshipped her there was a question
of marriage. On account of lack of education she was restricted
to manual labor, and she often chose hard work. At one time she
became a boiler-maker's apprentice, wielding a hammer and driving
in hot rivets. Here she was very popular and became local
secretary of the International Brotherhood of Boiler-makers. In
physical development she was now somewhat of an athlete. "She
could outrun any of her friends on a sprint; she could kick
higher, play baseball, and throw the ball overhand like a man,
and she was fond of football. As a wrestler she could throw most
of the club members." The physician who examined her for an
insurance policy remarked: "You are a fine specimen of physical
manhood, young fellow. Take good care of yourself." Finally, in a
moment of weakness, she admitted her sex and returned to the
garments of womanhood.
In London, in 1912, a servant-girl of 23 was charged in the Acton
Police Court with being "disorderly and masquerading," having
assumed man's clothes and living with another girl, taller and
more handsome than herself, as husband and wife. She had had
slight brain trouble as a child, and was very intelligent, with a
too active brain; in her spare time she had written stories for
magazines. The two girls became attached through doing Christian
social work together in their spare time, and resolved to live as
husband and wife to prevent any young man from coming forward.
The "husband" became a plumber's mate, and displayed some skill
at fisticuffs when at length discovered by the "wife's" brother.
Hence her appearance in the Police Court. Both girls were sent
back to their friends, and situations found for them as
day-servants. But as they remained devoted to each other
arrangements were made for them to live together.
Another case that may be mentioned is that of Cora Anderson, "the
man-woman of Milwaukee," who posed for thirteen years as a man,
and during that period lived with two women as her wives without
her disguise being penetrated. (Her "Confessions" were published
in the _Day Book_ of Chicago during May, 1914.)
It would be easy to bring forward other cases. A few instances of
marriage between women will be found in the _Alienist and
Neurologist_, Nov., 1902, p. 497. In all such cases more or less
fraud has been exercised. I know of one case, probably unique, in
which the ceremony was gone through without any deception on any
side: a congenitally inverted Englishwoman of distinguished
intellectual ability, now dead, was attached to the wife of a
clergyman, who, in full cognizance of all the facts of the case,
privately married the two ladies in his own church.
When they still retain female garments, these usually show some traits of
masculine simplicity, and there is nearly always a disdain for the petty
feminine artifices of the toilet. Even when this is not obvious, there are
all sorts of instinctive gestures and habits which may suggest to female
acquaintances the remark that such a person "ought to have been a man."
The brusque, energetic movements, the attitude of the arms, the direct
speech, the inflexions of the voice, the masculine straightforwardness and
sense of honor, and especially the attitude toward men, free from any
suggestion either of shyness or audacity, will often suggest the
underlying psychic abnormality to a keen observer.
In the habits not only is there frequently a pronounced taste for smoking
cigarettes, often found in quite feminine women, but also a decided taste
and toleration for cigars. There is also a dislike and sometimes
incapacity for needlework and other domestic occupations, while there is
often some capacity for athletics.
As regards the general bearing of the inverted woman, in its most
marked and undisguised form, I may quote an admirable description
by Prof. Zuccarelli, of Naples, of an unmarried middle-class
woman of 35: "While retaining feminine garments, her bearing is
as nearly as possible a man's. She wears her thin hair thrown
carelessly back _alla Umberto_, and fastened in a simple knot at
the back of her head. The breasts are little developed, and
compressed beneath a high corset; her gown is narrow without the
expansion demanded by fashion. Her straw hat with broad plaits is
perhaps adorned by a feather, or she wears a small hat like a
boy's. She does not carry an umbrella or sunshade, and walks out
alone, refusing the company of men; or she is accompanied by a
woman, as she prefers, offering her arm and carrying the other
hand at her waist, with the air of a fine gentleman. In a
carriage her bearing is peculiar and unlike that habitual with
women. Seated in the middle of the double seat, her knees being
crossed or else the legs well separated, with a virile air and
careless easy movements she turns her head in every direction,
finding an acquaintance here and there with her eye, saluting men
and women with a large gesture of the hand as a business man
would. In conversation her pose is similar; she gesticulates
much, is vivacious in speech, with much power of mimicry, and
while talking she arches the inner angles of her eyebrow, making
vertical wrinkles at the center of her forehead. Her laugh is
open and explosive and uncovers her white rows of teeth. With men
she is on terms of careless equality." ("Inversione congenita
dell'istinto sessuale in una donna," _L'Anomalo_, February,
1889.)
"The inverted woman," Hirschfeld truly remarks (_Die
Homosexualität_, p. 158), "is more full of life, of enterprise,
of practical energy, more aggressive, more heroic, more apt for
adventure, than either the heterosexual woman or the homosexual
man." Sometimes, he adds, her mannishness may approach reckless
brutality, and her courage becomes rashness. This author
observes, however, in another place (p. 272) that, in addition to
this group of inverted women with masculine traits there is
another group, "not less large," of equally inverted women who
are outwardly as thoroughly feminine as are normal women. This is
not an observation which I am able to confirm. It appears to me
that the great majority of inverted women possess some masculine
or boyish traits, even though only as slight as those which may
occasionally be revealed by normal women. Extreme femininity, in
my observation, is much more likely to be found in bisexual than
in homosexual women, just as extreme masculinity is much more
likely to be found in bisexual than in homosexual men.
While inverted women frequently, though not always, convey an impression
of mannishness or boyishness, there are no invariable anatomical
characteristics associated with this impression. There is, for instance,
no uniform tendency to a masculine distribution of hair. Nor must it be
supposed that the presence of a beard in a woman indicates a homosexual
tendency. "Bearded women," as Hirschfeld remarks, are scarcely ever
inverted, and it would seem that the strongest reversals of secondary
sexual characters less often accompany homosexuality than slighter
modifications of these characters.[167] A faint moustache and other slight
manifestations of hypertrichosis also by no means necessarily indicate
homosexuality. To some extent it is a matter of race; thus in the Pera
district of Constantinople, Weissenberg, among nearly seven hundred women
between about 18 and 50 years of age, noted that 10 per cent, showed hair
on the upper lip; they were most often Armenians, the Greeks coming
next.[168]
There has been some dispute as to whether, apart from
homosexuality, hypertrichosis in a woman can be regarded as an
indication of a general masculinity. This is denied by Max
Bartels (in his elaborate study, "Ueber abnorme Behaarung beim
Menschen," _Zeitschrift für Ethnologie_, 1876, p. 127; 1881, p.
219) and, as regards insanity, by L. Harris-Liston ("Cases of
Bearded Women," _British Medical Journal_, June 2, 1894). On the
other hand, J.H. Claiborne ("Hypertrichosis in Women," _New York
Medical Journal_, June 13, 1914) believes that hair on the face
and body in a woman is a sign of masculinity; "women with
hypertrichosis possess masculine traits."
There seems to be very little doubt that fully developed "bearded
women" are in most, possibly not all, cases decidedly feminine in
all other respects. A typical instance is furnished by Annie
Jones, the "Esau Lady" of Virginia. She belonged to a large and
entirely normal family, but herself possessed a full beard with
thick whiskers and moustache of an entirely masculine type; she
also showed short, dark hair on arms and hands resembling a man.
Apart from this heterogeny, she was entirely normal and feminine.
At the age of 26, when examined in Berlin, the hair of the head
was very long, the expression of the face entirely feminine, the
voice also feminine, the figure elegant, the hands and feet
entirely of feminine type, the external and internal genitalia
altogether feminine. Annie Jones was married. Max Bartels, who
studied Annie Jones and published her portrait (_Zeitschrift für
Ethnologie_, 1891, Heft 3, p. 243), remarks that in these
respects Annie Jones resembles other "bearded women"; they marry,
have children, and are able to suckle them. A beard in women
seems, as Dupré and Duflos believe (_Revue Neurologique_, Aug.
30, 1901), to be more closely correlated with neuropathy than
with masculinity; comparing a thousand sane women with a thousand
insane women in Paris, they found unusual degree of hair or down
on the face in 23 per cent. of the former and 50 per cent. of the
latter; but even the sane bearded women frequently belonged to
neuropathic families.
A tendency to slight widely diffused hypertrichosis of the body
generally, not localized or highly developed on the face, seems
much more likely than a beard to be associated with masculinity,
even when it occurs in little girls. Thus Virchow once presented
to the Berlin Anthropological Society a little girl of 5 of this
type who also possessed a deep and rough voice (_Zeitschrift für
Ethnologie_, 1891, Heft 4, p. 469). A typical example of slight
hypertrichosis in a woman associated with general masculine
traits is furnished by a description and figure of the body of a
woman of 56 in an anatomical institute, furnished by C. Strauch
(_Zeitschrift für Ethnologie_, 1901, Heft 6, p. 534). In this
case there was a growth of hair around both nipples and a line of
hair extended from the pubes to the navel; both these two
dispositions of hair are very rare in women. (In Vienna among
nearly 700 women Coe only found a tendency to hair distribution
toward the navel in about 1 per cent.). While the hair in this
subject was otherwise fairly normal, there were many
approximations to the masculine type in other respects: the
muscles were strongly developed, the bones massive, the limbs
long, the joints powerful, the hands and feet large, the thorax
well developed, the lower jaw massive; there was an absence of
feminine curves on the body and the breasts were scarcely
perceptible. At the same time the genital organs were normal and
there had been childbirth. It was further notable that this woman
had committed suicide by self-strangulation, a rare method which
requires great resolution and strength of will, as at any moment
of the process the pressure can be removed.
There seems little doubt that inverted women frequently tend to show minor
anomalies of the piliferous system, and especially slight hypertrichosis
and a masculine distribution of hair. Thus in a very typical case of
inversion in an Italian girl of 19 who dressed as a man and ran away from
home, the down on the arms and legs was marked to an unusual extent, and
there was very abundant hair in the armpits and on the pubes, with a
tendency to the masculine distribution.[169] Of the three cases described
in this chapter which I am best acquainted with, one possesses an
unusually small amount of hair on the pubes and in the axillæ
(oligotrichosis terminalis), approximating to the infantile type, while
another presents a complex and very rare piliferous heterogeny. There is
marked dark down on the upper lip; the pubic hair is thick, and there is
hair on toes and feet and legs to umbilicus; there are also a few hairs
around the nipples. A woman physician in the United States who knows many
female inverts similarly tells me that she has observed the tendency to
growth of hair on the legs. If, as is not improbable, inversion is
associated with some abnormal balance in the internal secretions, it is
not difficult to understand this tendency to piliferous anomalies; and we
know that the thyroid secretion, for instance, and much more the
testicular and ovarian secretions, have a powerful influence on the hair.
Ballantyne, some years ago, in discussing congenital
hypertrichosis (_Manual of Antenatal Pathology_, 1902, pp. 321-6)
concluded that the theory of arrested development is best
supported by the facts; persistence of lanugo is such an arrest,
and hypertrichosis may largely be considered a persistence of
lanugo. Such a conclusion is still tenable,--though it encounters
some difficulties and inconsistencies,--and it largely agrees
with what we know of the condition as associated with inversion
in women. But we are now beginning to see that this arrested
development may be definitely associated with anomalies in the
internal secretions, and even with special chemical defects in
these secretions. Virile strength has always been associated with
hair, as the story of Samson bears witness. Ammon found among
Baden conscripts (_L'Anthropologie_, 1896, p. 285) that when the
men were divided into classes according to the amount of hair on
body, the first class, with least hair, have the smallest
circumference of testicle, the fewest number of men with glans
penis uncovered, the largest number of infantile voices, the
largest proportion of blue eyes and fair hair, the smallest
average height, weight, and chest circumference, while in all
these respects the men with hairy bodies were at the other
extreme. It has been known from antiquity that in men early
castration affects the growth of hair. It is now known that in
women the presence or absence of the ovary and, other glands
affects the hair, as well as sexual development. Thus Hegar
(_Beiträge zur Geburtshülfe und Gynäkologie_, vol. i, p. 111,
1898) described a girl with pelvis of infantile type and uterine
malformation who had been unusually hairy on face and body from
infancy, with masculine arrangement of hair on pubes and abdomen;
menstruation was scanty, breasts atrophic; the hair was of lanugo
type; we see here how in women infantile and masculine
characteristics are associated with, and both probably dependent
on, defects in the sexual glands. Plant (_Centralblatt für
Gynäkologie_, No. 9, 1896) described another girl with very small
ovaries, rudimentary uterus, small vagina, and prominent nymphæ,
in whom menstruation was absent, hair on head long and strong,
but hair absent in armpits and scanty on mons veneris. These two
cases seem inconsistent as regards hair, and we should now wish
to know the condition of the other internal glands. The thyroid,
for instance, it is now known, controls the hair, as well as do
the sexual glands; and the thyroid, as Gautier has shown
(Académie de Médecine, July 24, 1900) elaborates arsenic and
iodine, which nourish the skin and hair; he found that the
administration of sodium cacodylate to young women produced
abundant growth of hair on head. Again, the kidneys, and
especially the adrenal glands, influence the hair. It has long
been known that in girls with congenital renal tumors there is an
abnormally early growth of axillary and pubic hair; Goldschwend
(_Präger medizinische Wochenschrift_, Nos. 37 and 38, 1910) has
described the case of a woman of 39, with small ovaries and
adrenal tumor, in whom hair began to grow on chin and cheeks.
(See also C.T. Ewart, _Lancet_, May 19, 1915.) Once more, the
glans hypophysis also affects hair growth and it has been found
by Lévi (quoted in _Archives d'Anthropologie Criminelle_,
August-September, 1912, p. 711) that the administration of
hypophysis extract to an infantile, hairless woman of 27, without
sexual feeling, produced a general tendency to growth of hair.
Such facts not only help to explain the anomalies of hair
development, but also indicate the direction in which we may find
an explanation of the anomalies of the sexual impulse.
Apart from the complicated problem presented by the hair, there are
genuine approximations to the masculine type. The muscles tend to be
everywhere firm, with a comparative absence of soft connective tissue; so
that an inverted woman may give an unfeminine impression to the sense of
touch. A certain tonicity of the muscles has indeed often been observed in
homosexual women. Hirschfeld found that two-thirds of inverted women are
more muscular than normal women, while, on the other hand, he found that
among inverted men the musculature was often weak.
Not only is the tone of the voice often different, but there is reason to
suppose that this rests on a basis, of anatomical modification. At Moll's
suggestion, Flatau examined the larynx in a large number of inverted
women, and found in several a very decidedly masculine type of larynx, or
an approach to it, especially in cases of distinctly congenital origin.
Hirschfeld has confirmed Flatau's observations on this point. It may be
added that inverted women are very often good whistlers; Hirschfeld even
knows two who are public performers in whistling. It is scarcely necessary
to remark that while the old proverb associates whistling in a woman with
crowing in a hen, whistling in a woman is no evidence of any general
physical or psychic inversion.
As regards the sexual organs it seems possible, so far as my observations
go, to speak more definitely of inverted women than of inverted men. In
all three of the cases concerning whom I have precise information, among
those whose histories are recorded in the present chapter, there is more
or less arrested development and infantilism. In one a somewhat small
vagina and prominent nymphæ, with local sensitiveness, are associated with
oligotrichosis. In another the sexual parts are in some respects rather
small, while there is no trace of ovary on one side. In the third case,
together with hypertrichosis, the nates are small, the nymphæ large, the
clitoris deeply hooded, the hymen thick, and the vagina probably small.
These observations, though few, are significant, and they accord with
those of other observers.[170] Krafft-Ebing well described a case which I
should be inclined to regard as typical of many: sexual organs feminine in
character, but remaining at the infantile stage of a girl of 10; small
clitoris, prominent cockscomb-like nymphæ, small vagina scarcely
permitting normal intercourse and very sensitive. Hirschfeld agrees in
finding common an approach to the type described by Krafft-Ebing; atrophic
anomalies he regards as more common than hypertrophic, and he refers to
thickness of hymen and a tendency to notably small uterus and ovaries. The
clitoris is more usually small than large; women with a large clitoris (as
Parent-Duchâtelet long since remarked) seem rarely to be of masculine
type.
Notwithstanding these tendencies, however, sexual inversion in a woman is,
as a rule, not more obvious than in a man. At the same time, the inverted
woman is not usually attractive to men. She herself generally feels the
greatest indifference to men, and often, cannot understand why a woman
should love a man, though she easily understands why a man should love a
woman. She shows, therefore, nothing of that sexual shyness and engaging
air of weakness and dependence which are an invitation to men. The man who
is passionately attracted to an inverted woman is usually of rather a
feminine type. For instance, in one case present to my mind he was of
somewhat neurotic heredity, of slight physical development, not sexually
attractive to women, and very domesticated in his manner of living; in
short, a man who might easily have been passionately attracted to his own
sex.
While the inverted woman is cold, or, at most, comradely in her bearing
toward men, she may become shy and confused in the presence of attractive
persons of her own sex, even unable to undress in their presence, and full
of tender ardor for the woman whom she loves.[171]
Homosexual passion in women finds more or less complete expression in
kissing, sleeping together, and close embraces, as in what is sometimes
called "lying spoons," when one woman lies on her side with her back
turned to her friend and embraces her from behind, fitting her thighs into
the bend of her companion's legs, so that her mons veneris is in dose
contact with the other's buttocks, and slight movement then produces mild
erethism. One may also lie on the other's body, or there may be mutual
masturbation. Mutual contact and friction of the sexual parts seem to be
comparatively rare, but it seems to have been common in antiquity, for we
owe to it the term "tribadism" which is sometimes used as a synonym of
feminine homosexuality, and this method is said to be practised today by
the southern Slav women of the Balkans.[172] The extreme gratification is
_cunnilinctus_, or oral stimulation of the feminine sexual organs, not
usually mutual, but practised by the more active and masculine partner;
this act is sometimes termed, by no means satisfactorily, "Sapphism," and
"Lesbianism."[173]
An enlarged clitoris is but rarely found in inversion and plays a very
small part in the gratification of feminine homosexuality. Kiernan refers;
to a case, occurring in America, in which an inverted woman, married and a
mother, possessed a clitoris which measured 2½ inches when erect. Casanova
described an inverted Swiss, woman, otherwise feminine in development,
whose clitoris in excitement was longer than his little finger, and
capable of penetration.[174] The older literature contains many similar
cases. In most such cases, however, we are probably concerned with some
form of pseudohermaphroditism, and the "clitoris" may more properly be
regarded as a penis; there is thus no inversion involved.[175]
While the use of the clitoris is rare in homosexuality, the use of an
artificial penis is by no means uncommon and very widespread. In several
of the modern cases in which inverted women have married women (such as
those of Sarolta Vay and De Raylan) the belief of the wife in the
masculinity of the "husband" has been due to an appliance of this kind
used in intercourse. The artificial penis (the olisbos, or baubon) was
well known to the Greeks and is described by Herondas. Its invention was
ascribed by Suidas to the Milesian women, and Miletus, according to
Aristophanes in the _Lysistrata_, was the chief place of its
manufacture.[176] It was still known in medieval times, and in the twelfth
century Bishop Burchard, of Worms, speaks of its use as a thing "which
some women are accustomed to do." In the early eighteenth century,
Margaretha Lincken, again in Germany, married another woman with the aid
of an artificial male organ.[177] The artificial penis is also used by
homosexual women in various parts of the world. Thus we find it mentioned
in legends of the North American Indians and it is employed in Zanzibar
and Madagascar.[178]
The various phenomena of sadism, masochism, and fetichism which
are liable to arise, spontaneously or by suggestion, in the
relationships of normal lovers, as well as of male inverts, may
also arise in the same way among inverted women, though,
probably, not often in a very pronounced form. Moll, however,
narrates a case (_Konträre Sexualempfindung_, 1899, pp. 565-70)
in which various minor but very definite perversions were
combined with inversion. A young lady of 26, of good heredity,
from the age of 6 had only been attracted to her own sex, and
even in childhood had practised mutual _cunnilinctus_. She was
extremely intelligent, and of generous and good-natured
disposition, with various masculine tastes, but, on the whole, of
feminine build and with completely feminine larynx. During seven
years she lived exclusively with one woman. She found complete
satisfaction in active _cunnilinctus_. During the course of this
relationship various other methods of excitement and
gratification arose--it seems, for the most part, spontaneously.
She found much pleasure in urolagnic and coprolagnic practices.
In addition to these and similar perversions, the subject liked
being bitten, especially in the lobule of the ear, and she was
highly excited when whipped by her friend, who should, if
possible, be naked at the time; only the nates must be whipped
and only a birch rod be used, or the effect would not be
obtained. These practices would not be possible to her in the
absence of extreme intimacy and mutual understanding, and they
only took place with the one friend. In this case the perverse
phenomena were masochistic rather than sadistic. Many homosexual
women, however, display sadistic tendencies in a more or less
degree. Thus Dr. Kiernan tells me of an American case, with which
he was professionally concerned with Dr. Moyer (see also paper by
Kiernan and Moyer in _Alienist and Neurologist_, May, 1907), of a
sadistic inverted woman in a small Illinois city, married and
with two young children. She was of undoubted neuropathic stock
and there was a history of pre-marital masturbation and
bestiality with a dog. She was a prominent club woman in her city
and a leader in religious and social matters; as is often the
case with sadists she was pruriently prudish, and there was
strong testimony to her chaste and modest character by clergymen,
club women, and local magnates. The victim of her sadistic
passion was a girl she had adopted from a Home, but whom she half
starved. On this girl she inflicted over three hundred wounds.
Many of these wounds were stabs with forks and scissors which
merely penetrated the skin. This was especially the case with
those inflicted on the breasts, labia, and clitoris. During the
infliction of these she experienced intense excitement, but this
excitement was under control, and when she heard anyone
approaching she instantly desisted. She was found sane and
responsible at the time of these actions, but the jury also found
that she had since become insane and she was sent to an Insane
Hospital, after recovery to serve a sentence of two years in
prison. The alleged insanity, Dr. Kiernan adds, was of the
dubious manic and depressive variety, and perhaps chiefly due to
wounded pride.
The inverted woman is an enthusiastic admirer of feminine beauty,
especially of the statuesque beauty of the body, unlike, in this, the
normal woman, whose sexual emotion is but faintly tinged by esthetic
feeling. In her sexual habits we perhaps less often find the degree of
promiscuity which is not uncommon among inverted men, and we may perhaps
agree with Moll that homosexual women are more often apt to love
faithfully and lastingly than homosexual men. Hirschfeld remarks that
inverted women are not usually attracted in girlhood by the autoerotic and
homosexual vices of school-life,[179] and nearly all the women whose
histories I have recorded in this chapter felt a pronounced repugnance to
such manifestations and cherished lofty ideals of love.
Inverted women are not rarely married. Moll, from various confidences
which he has received, believes that inverted women have not the same
horror of normal coitus as inverted, men; this is probably due to the fact
that the woman under such circumstances can retain a certain passivity. In
other cases there is some degree of bisexuality, although, as among
inverted men, the homosexual instinct seems usually to give the greater
relief and gratification.
It has been stated by many observers--in America, in France, in Germany,
and in England--that homosexuality is increasing among women.[180] There
are many influences in our civilization today which encourage such
manifestations.[181] The modern movement of emancipation--the movement to
obtain the same rights and duties as men, the same freedom and
responsibility, the same education and the same work--must be regarded as,
on the whole, a wholesome and inevitable movement. But it carries with it
certain disadvantages.[182] Women are, very justly, coming to look upon
knowledge and experience generally as their right as much as their
brothers' right. But when this doctrine is applied to the sexual sphere it
finds certain limitations. Intimacies of any kind between young men and
young women are as much discouraged socially now as ever they were; as
regards higher education, the mere association of the sexes in the
lecture-room or the laboratory or the hospital is discouraged in England
and in America. While men are allowed freedom, the sexual field of women
is becoming restricted to trivial flirtation with the opposite sex, and to
intimacy with their own sex; having been taught independence of men and
disdain for the old theory which placed women in the moated grange of the
home to sigh for a man who never comes, a tendency develops for women to
carry this independence still farther and to find love where they find
work. These unquestionable influences of modern movements cannot directly
cause sexual inversion, but they develop the germs of it, and they
probably cause a spurious imitation. This spurious imitation is due to the
fact that the congenital anomaly occurs with special frequency in women of
high intelligence who, voluntarily or involuntarily, influence others.
Kurella, Bloch, and others believe that the woman movement has
helped to develop homosexuality (see, e.g., I. Bloch, _Beiträge
zur Ætiologie der Psychopathia Sexualis_, 1902, vol. i, p. 248).
Various "feminine Strindbergs of the woman movement," as they
have been termed, displayed marked hostility to men. Anna Rüling
claims that many leaders of the movement, from the outset until
today, have been inverted. Hirschfeld, however (_Die
Homosexualität_, p. 500), after giving special attention to the
matter, concludes that, alike among English suffragettes and in
the German Verein für Frauenstimmrecht, the percentage of inverts
is less than 10 per cent.
FOOTNOTES:
[137] Catharina Margaretha Lincken, who married another woman, somewhat
after the manner of the Hungarian Countess Sarolta Vay (i.e., with the aid
of an artificial male organ), was condemned to death for sodomy, and
executed in 1721 at the age of 27 (F.C. Müller, "Ein weiterer Fall von
conträrer Sexualempfindung," _Friedrich's Blätter für Gerichtliche
Medizin_, Heft 4, 1891). The most fully investigated case of sexual
inversion in a woman in modern times is that of Countess Sarolta Vay
(_Friedrich's Blätter_, Heft, 1, 1891; also Krafft-Ebing, _Psychopathia
Sexualis_, Eng. trans. of 10th. ed., 416-427; also summarized in Appendix
E of earlier editions of the present Study). Sarolta always dressed as a
man, and went through a pseudo-marriage with a girl who was ignorant of
the real sex of her "husband." She was acquitted and allowed to return
home and continue dressing as a man.
[138] Anna Rüling has some remarks on this point, _Jahrbuch für sexuelle
Zwischenstufen_, vol. vii, 1905, p. 141 et seq.
[139] This, of course, by no means necessarily indicates the existence of
sexual inversion, any more than the presence of feminine traits in
distinguished men. I have elsewhere pointed out (e.g., _Man and Woman_,
5th ed., 1915, p. 488) that genius in either sex frequently involves the
coexistence of masculine, feminine, and infantile traits.
[140] Various references to Queen Hatschepsu are given by Hirschfeld (_Die
Homosexualität_, p. 739). Hirschfeld's not severely critical list of
distinguished homosexual persons includes 18 women. It would not be
difficult to add others.
[141] Sophie Hochstetter, in a study of Queen Christina in the _Jahrbuch
für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_ (vol. ix, 1908, p. 168 et seq.), regards
her as bisexual, while H.J. Schouten (_Monatsschrift für
Kriminalanthropologie_, 1912, Heft 6) concludes that she was homosexual,
and believes that it was Monaldeschi's knowledge on this point which led
her to instigate his murder.
[142] Cf. Hans Freimark, _Helena Petrovna Blavatsky_; Levetzow, "Louise
Michel," _Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, vol. vii, 1905, p. 307 et
seq.
[143] Rosa Bonheur, the painter, is a specially conspicuous example of
pronounced masculinity in, a woman of genius. She frequently dressed as a
man, and when dressed as a woman her masculine air occasionally attracted
the attention of the police. See Theodore Stanton's biography.
[144] There is some difference of opinion as to whether there is less real
delinquency among women (see Havelock Ellis, _Man and Woman_, 6th ed.,
1915, p. 469), but we are here concerned with judicial criminality.
[145] This apparently widespread opinion is represented by the remark of a
young man in the eighteenth century (concerning the Lesbian friend of the
woman he wishes to marry), quoted in the Comte de Tilly's _Souvenirs_: "I
confess that that is a kind of rivalry which causes me no annoyance; on
the contrary it amuses me, and I am immoral enough to laugh at it." That
attitude of the educated and refined was not probably shared by the
populace. Madame de Lamballe, who was guillotined at the Revolution, was
popularly regarded as a tribade, and it was said that on this account her
charming head received the special insults of the mob.
[146] Havelock Ellis, _Man and Woman_, 5th ed., 1915, especially chapters
xiii and xv.
[147] Karsch (_Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, vol. iii, 1901, pp.
85-9) brings together some passages concerning homosexuality in women
among various peoples.
[148] Gandavo, quoted by Lomaeco, _Archivio per l'Antropologia_, 1889,
fasc. 1.
[149] _Journal Anthropological Institute_, July-Dec., 1904, p. 342.
[150] G.H. Lowie, "The Assiniboine," Am. Museum of Nat. Hist.,
_Anthropological Papers_, New York, 1909, vol. xiv, p. 223; W. Jones, "Fox
Texts," _Publications of Am. Ethnological Soc._, Leyden, 1907, vol. i, p.
151; quoted by D.C. McMurtrie, "A Legend of Lesbian Love Among the North
American Indians," _Urologic Review_, April, 1914.
[151] _Zeitschrift für Ethnologie_, Heft 6, 1899, p. 669.
[152] I. Bloch, _Die Prostitution_, vol. i, pp. 180, 181.
[153] Corre, _Crime en Pays Creoles_, 1889.
[154] In a Spanish prison, some years ago, when a new governor endeavored
to reform the homosexual manners of the women, the latter made his post so
uncomfortable that he was compelled to resign. Salillas (_Vida Penal en
España_) asserts that all the evidence shows the extraordinary expansion
of Lesbian love in prisons. The _mujeres hombrunas_ receive masculine
names--Pepe, Chulo, Bernardo, Valiente; new-comers are surrounded in the
court-yard by a crowd of lascivious women, who overwhelm them with honeyed
compliments and gallantries and promises of protection, the most robust
virago having most successes; a single day and night complete the
initiation.
[155] Even among Arab prostitutes it is found, according to Kocher, though
among Arab women generally it is rare.
[156] _Monatsschrift für Harnkrankheiten_, Nov., 1905; in his _Tribadie
Berlins_, he states that among 3000 prostitutes at least ten per cent.
were homosexual. See also Parent-Duchâtelet, _De la Prostitution_, 3d ed.,
vol. i, pp. 159, 169; Martineau, _Les Déformations vulvaires et anales_;
and Iwan Bloch, _Beiträge zur Ætiologie der Psychopathia Sexualis_, 1902,
vol. i, p. 244.
[157] Hirschfeld, _Die Homosexualität_, p. 330.
[158] Eulenburg, _Sexuelle Neuropathie_, p. 144.
[159] See vol. vi of these _Studies_, "Sex in Relation to Society," ch.
vii.
[160] The prostitute has sometimes been regarded as a special type,
analogous to the instinctive criminal. This point of view has been
specially emphasized by Lombroso and Ferrero, _La Donna Delinquente_.
Apart from this, these authors regard homosexuality among prostitutes as
due to the following causes (p. 410 et seq.): (_a_) excessive and often
unnatural venery; (_b_) confinement in a prison, with separation from men;
(_c_) close association with the same sex, such as is common in brothels;
(_d_) maturity and old age, inverting the secondary sexual characters and
predisposing to sexual inversion; (_e_) disgust of men produced by a
prostitute's profession, combined with the longing for love. For cases of
homosexuality in American prostitutes, see D. McMurtrie, _Lancet-Clinic_,
Nov. 2, 1912.
[161] Thus Casanova, who knew several nuns intimately, refers to
homosexuality as a childish sin so common in convents that confessors
imposed no penance for it (_Mémoires_, ed. Garnier, vol. iv, p. 517).
Homosexuality in convent schools has been studied by Mercante, _Archivos
di Psiquiatria_, 1905, pp. 22-30.
[162] I quote the following from a private letter written in Switzerland:
"An English resident has told me that his wife has lately had to send away
her parlor-maid (a pretty girl) because she was always taking in strange
women to sleep with her. I asked if she had been taken from hotel service,
and found, as I expected, that she had. But neither my friend nor his wife
suspected the real cause of these nocturnal visits."
[163] For a series of cases of affection of girls for girls, in apparently
normal subjects in the United States, see, e.g., Lancaster, "The
Psychology and Pedagogy of Adolescence," _Pedagogical Seminary_, July,
1897, p. 88; also, for school friendships between girls, exactly
resembling those between boys and girls, Theodate L. Smith, "Types of
Adolescent Affection," ib., June, 1904, pp. 193, 195.
[164] Obici and Marchesini, _Le "Amicizie" di Collegio_, Rome, 1898.
[165] See Appendix B, in which I have briefly summarized the result of the
investigation by Obici and Marchesini, and also brought forward
observations concerning English colleges.
[166] An interesting ancient example of a woman with an irresistible
impulse to adopt men's clothing and lead a man's life, but who did not, so
far as is known, possess any sexual impulses, is that of Mary Frith,
commonly called Moll Cutpurse, who lived in London at the beginning of the
seventeenth century. _The Life and Death of Mrs. Mary Frith_ appeared in
1662; Middleton and Rowley also made her the heroine of their delightful
comedy, _The Roaring Girl (Mermaid Series, Middleton's Plays_, volume ii),
somewhat idealizing her, however. She seems to have belonged to a neurotic
and eccentric stock; "each of the family," her biographer says, "had his
peculiar freak." As a child she only cared for boys' games, and could
never adapt herself to any woman's avocations. "She had a natural
abhorrence to the tending of children." Her disposition was altogether
masculine; "she was not for mincing obscenity, but would talk freely,
whatever came uppermost." She never had any children, and was not taxed
with debauchery: "No man can say or affirm that ever she had a sweetheart
or any such fond thing to dally with her;" a mastiff was the only living
thing she cared for. Her life was not altogether honest, but not so much
from any organic tendency to crime, it seems, as because her abnormal
nature and restlessness made her an outcast. She was too fond of drink,
and is said to have been the first woman who smoked tobacco. Nothing is
said or suggested of any homosexual practices, but we see clearly here
what may be termed the homosexual diathesis.
[167] Hirschfeld, _Die Homosexualität_, p. 137.
[168] S. Weissenberg, _Zeitschrift für Ethnologie_, 1892, Heft 4, p. 280.
[169] This case was described by Gasparini, _Archivio di Psichiatria_,
1908, fasc. 1-2.
[170] Bringing together ten cases of inverted women from various sources
(including the three original cases mentioned above), in only four were
the sexual organs normal; in the others they were more or less
undeveloped.
[171] Homosexual persons generally, male and female, unlike the
heterosexual, are apt to feel more modesty with persons of the same sex
than with those of the opposite sex. See, e.g., Hirschfeld, _Die
Homosexualität_, p. 76.
[172] Kryptadia, vol. vi, p. 197.
[173] The term "cunnilinctus" was suggested to me by the late Dr. J.
Bonus, and I have ever since used it; the Latin authors commonly used
"cunnilingus" for the actor, but had no corresponding term for the action.
Hirschfeld has lately used the term "cunnilinctio" in the same sense, but
such a formation is quite inadmissible. For information on the classic
terms for this perversion, see, e.g., Iwan Bloch, _Ursprung der Syphilis_,
vol. ii, p. 612 et seq.
[174] Casanova, _Mémoires_, ed. Gamier, vol. iv, p. 597.
[175] Hirschfeld deals in a full and authoritative manner with the
differential diagnosis of inversion and the other groups of transitional
sexuality in _Die Homosexualität_, ch. ii; also in his fully illustrated
book _Geschlechtsübergänge_, 1905.
[176] Havelock Ellis, "Auto-erotism," in vol. i of these _Studies_; Iwan
Bloch, _Ursprung der Syphilis_, vol. ii, p. 589; ib., _Die Prostitution_,
vol, i, pp. 385-6; for early references, Crusius, _Untersuchungen zu den
Mimiamben der Herondas_, pp. 129-30.
[177] I have found a notice of a similar case in France, during the
sixteenth century, in Montaigne's _Journal du Voyage en Italie en_ 1850
(written by his secretary); it took place near Vitry le François. Seven or
eight girls belonging to Chaumont, we are told, resolved to dress and to
work as men; one of these came to Vitry to work as a weaver, and was
looked upon as a well-conditioned young man, and liked by everyone. At
Vitry she became betrothed to a woman, but, a quarrel arising, no marriage
took place. Afterward "she fell in love with a woman whom she married, and
with whom she lived for four or five months, to the wife's great
contentment, it is said; but, having been recognized by some one from
Chaumont, and brought to justice, she was condemned to be hanged. She said
she would even prefer this to living again as a girl, and was hanged for
using illicit inventions to supply the defects of her sex" (_Journal_, ed.
by d'Ancona, 1889, p. 11).
[178] Roux, _Bulletin Société d'Anthropologie_, 1905, No. 3. Roux knew a
Comarian woman who, at the age of 50, after her husband's death, became
homosexual and made herself an artificial penis which she used with
younger women.
[179] Hirschfeld, _Die Homosexualität_, p. 47.
[180] There are few traces of feminine homosexuality in English social
history of the past. In Charles the Second's Court, the _Mémoires de
Ghrammont_ tell us, Miss Hobart was credited with Lesbian tendencies.
"Soon the rumor, true or false, of this singularity spread through the
court. They were gross enough there never to have heard of that refinement
of ancient Greece in the tastes of tenderness, and the idea came into
their heads that the illustrious Hobart, who seemed so affectionate to
pretty women, must be different from what she appeared." This passage is
interesting because it shows us how rare was the exception. A century
later, however, homosexuality among English women seems to have been
regarded by the French as common, and Bacchaumont, on January 1, 1773,
when recording that Mlle. Heinel of the Opera was settling in England,
added: "Her taste for women will there find attractive satisfaction, for
though Paris furnishes many tribades it is said that London is herein
superior."
[181] "I believe," writes a well-informed American correspondent, "that
sexual inversion is increasing among Americans--both men and women--and
the obvious reasons are: first, the growing independence of the women,
their lessening need for marriage; secondly, the nervous strain that
business competition has brought upon the whole nation. In a word, the
rapidly increasing masculinity in women and the unhealthy nervous systems
of the men offer the ideal factors for the production of sexual inversion
in their children."
[182] Homosexual women, like homosexual men, now insert advertisements in
the newspapers, seeking a "friend." Näcke ("Zeitungsannoncen von
weiblichen Homosexuellen," _Archiv für Kriminal-Anthropologie_, 1902, p.
225) brought together from Munich newspapers a collection of such
advertisements, most of which were fairly unambiguous: "Actress with
modern ideas desires to know rich lady with similar views, for the sake of
friendly relations, etc.;" "Young lady of 19, a pretty blonde, seeks
another like herself for walks, theatre, etc.," and so on.
CHAPTER V.
THE NATURE OF SEXUAL INVERSION.
Analysis of Histories--Race--Heredity--General Health--First Appearance of
Homosexual Impulse--Sexual Precocity and Hyperesthesia--Suggestion and
Other Exciting Causes of Inversion--Masturbation--Attitude Toward
Women--Erotic Dreams--Methods of Sexual Relationship--Pseudo-sexual
Attraction--Physical Sexual Abnormalities--Artistic and Other
Aptitudes--Moral Attitude of the Invert.
Before stating briefly my own conclusions as to the nature of sexual
inversion, I propose to analyze the facts brought out in the histories
which I have been able to study.[183]
RACE.--All my cases, 80 in number, are British and American, 20 living in
the United States and the rest being British. Ancestry, from the point of
view of race, was not made a matter of special investigation. It appears,
however, that at least 44 are English or mainly English; at least 10 are
Scotch or of Scotch extraction; 2 are Irish and 4 others largely Irish; 4
have German fathers or mothers; another is of German descent on both
sides, while 2 others are of remote German extraction; 2 are partly, and 1
entirely, French; 2 have a Portuguese strain, and at least 2 are more or
less Jewish. Except the apparently frequent presence of the German
element, there is nothing remarkable in this ancestry.
HEREDITY.--It is always difficult to deal securely with the significance
of heredity, or even to establish a definite basis of facts. I have by no
means escaped this difficulty, for in some cases I have not even had an
opportunity of cross-examining the subjects whose histories I have
obtained. Still, the facts, so far as they emerge, have some interest. I
possess some record of heredity in 62 of my cases. Of these, not less than
24, or in the proportion of nearly 39 per cent., assert that they have
reason to believe that other cases of inversion have occurred in their
families, and, while in some it is only a strong suspicion, in others
there is no doubt whatever. In one case there is reason to suspect
inversion on both sides. Usually the inverted relatives have been
brothers, sisters, cousins, or uncles. In one case a bisexual son seems to
have had a bisexual father.
This hereditary character of inversion (which was denied by
Näcke) is a fact of great significance, and, as it occurs in
cases with which I am well acquainted, I can have no doubt
concerning the existence of the tendency. The influence of
suggestion may often be entirely excluded, especially when the
persons are of different sex. Both Krafft-Ebing and Moll noted a
similar tendency. Von Römer states that in one-third of his cases
there was inversion in other members of the family. Hirschfeld
also found that there is a relatively high proportion of cases of
family inversion.
Twenty-six, so far as can be ascertained, belong to reasonably healthy
families; minute investigation would probably reduce the number of these,
and it is noteworthy that even in some of the healthy families there was
only one child born of the parents' marriage. In 28 cases there is more or
less frequency of morbidity or abnormality--eccentricity, alcoholism,
neurasthenia, insanity, or nervous disease--on one or both sides, in
addition to inversion or apart from it. In some of these cases the
inverted offspring is the outcome of the union, of a very healthy with a
thoroughly morbid stock; in some others there is a minor degree of
abnormality on both sides.
GENERAL HEALTH.--It is possible to speak with more certainty of the health
of the individual than of that of his family. Of the 80 cases, 53--or
about two-thirds--may be said to enjoy good, and sometimes even very good,
health, though occasionally there is some slight qualification to be made.
In 22 cases the health is delicate, or at best only fair; in these cases
there is sometimes a tendency to consumption, and often marked
neurasthenia and a more or less unbalanced temperament. Four cases are
morbid to a considerable degree; the remaining case has had insane
delusions which required treatment in an asylum. A considerable
proportion, included among those as having either good or fair health, may
be described as of extremely nervous temperament, and in most cases they
so describe themselves; a certain proportion of these combine great
physical and, especially, mental energy with this nervousness; all these
are doubtless of neurotic temperament.[184] Very few can be said to be
conspicuously lacking in energy. On the whole, therefore, a large
proportion of these inverted individuals are passing through life in an
unimpaired state of health, which enables them to do at least their fair
share of work in the world; in a considerable proportion of my cases that
work is of high intellectual value. Only in 5 cases, it will be seen, or
at most 6, can the general health be said to be distinctly bad.
This result may, perhaps, seem surprising. It must, however, be remembered
that my cases do not, on the whole, represent the class which alone the
physician is usually able to bring forward: i.e., the sexual inverts who
are suffering from a more or less severe degree of complete nervous
breakdown.
There is no frequent relationship between homosexuality and
insanity, and such homosexuality as is found in asylums is mostly
of a spurious character. This point was specially emphasized by
Näcke (e.g., "Homosexualität und Psychose," _Zeitschrift für
Psichiatrie_, vol. lxviii, No. 3, 1911). He quoted the opinions
of various distinguished alienists as to the rarity with which
they had met genuine inverts, and recorded his own experiences.
He had never met a genuine invert in the asylum throughout his
extensive experience, although he was quite willing to admit that
there may be unrecognized inverts in asylums, and one patient
informed him, after leaving, that he was inverted, and had
attracted the attention of the police both before and afterward,
though nothing happened in the asylum. Among 1500 patients in the
asylum during one year, active _pedicatio_ occurred in about 1
per cent. of cases, these patients being frequently idiots or
imbeciles and at the same time masturbators, solitary or mutual.
Hirschfeld informed Näcke that, among homosexual persons,
hysterical conditions (not usually on hereditary basis) are
fairly common, and neurasthenia of high degree decidedly
frequent, but though stages of depression are common he had never
seen pure melancholia and very seldom mania, but paranoiac
delusional ideas frequently, and he agreed with Bryan of
Broadmoor that religious delusions are not uncommon. General
paralysis occurs, but is comparatively rare, and the same may be
said of dementia præcox. On the whole, although Hirschfeld was
unable to give precise figures, there was no reason whatever to
suppose an abnormal prevalence of insanity. This was Näcke's own
view. It is quite true, Näcke concluded, that homosexual actions
occur in every form of psychosis, especially in congenital and
secondary dements, and at periods of excitement, but we are here
more concerned with "pseudo-homosexuality" than with true
inversion. Hirschfeld finds that 75 per cent. inverts are of
sound heredity; this seems too large a proportion; in any case
allowance must be made for differences in method and minuteness
of investigation.
I am fairly certain that thorough investigation would very considerably
enlarge the proportion of cases with morbid heredity. At the same time
this enlargement would be chiefly obtained by bringing minor abnormalities
to the front, and it would then have to be shown how far the families of
average or normal persons are free from such abnormalities. The question
is sometimes asked: What family is free from neuropathic taint? At present
it is difficult to answer this question precisely. There is good ground to
believe that a fairly large proportion of families are free from such
taint. In any case it seems probable that the families to which the
inverted belong do not usually present such profound signs of nervous
degeneration as we were formerly led to suppose. What we vaguely call
"eccentricity" is common among them; insanity is much rarer.
FIRST APPEARANCE OF HOMOSEXUAL INSTINCT.--Out of 72 cases, in 8 the
instinct veered round to the same sex in adult age or at all events after
puberty; in 3 of these there had been a love-disappointment with a woman;
no other cause than this can be assigned for the transition; but it is
noteworthy that in at least 2 of these cases the sexual instinct is
undeveloped or morbidly weak, while a third individual is of somewhat
weak _physique_, and another has long been in delicate health. In a
further case, also somewhat morbid, the development was rather more
complicated.
In 64 cases, or in a proportion of 88 per cent., the abnormal instinct
began in early life, without previous attraction to the opposite sex.[185]
In 27 of these it dates from about puberty, usually beginning at school.
In 39 cases the tendency began before puberty, between the ages of 5 and
11, usually between 7 and 9, sometimes as early as the subject can
remember. It must not be supposed that, in these numerous cases of the
early appearance of homosexuality, the manifestations were of a
specifically physical character, although erections are noted in a few
cases. For the most part sexual manifestations at this early age, whether
homosexual or heterosexual, are purely psychic.[186]
SEXUAL PRECOCITY AND HYPERESTHESIA.--It is a fact of considerable interest
and significance that in so large a number of my cases there was distinct
precocity of the sexual emotions, both on the physical and psychic sides.
There can be little doubt that, as many previous observers have found,
inversion tends strongly to be associated with sexual precocity. I think
it may further be said that sexual precocity tends to encourage the
inverted habit where it exists. Why this should be so is obvious, if we
believe--as there is some reason for believing--that at an early age the
sexual instinct is comparatively undifferentiated in its manifestations.
The precocious accentuation of the sexual impulse leads to definite
crystallization of the emotions at a premature stage. It must be added
that precocious sexual energy is likely to remain feeble, and that a
feeble sexual energy adapts itself more easily to homosexual
relationships, in which there is no definite act to be accomplished, than
to normal relationships. It is difficult to say how many of my cases
exhibit sexual weakness. In 6 or 7 it is evident, and it may be suspected
in many others, especially in those who are, and often describe themselves
as, "sensitive" or "nervous," as well as in those whose sexual development
was very late. In many cases there is marked hyperesthesia, or irritable
weakness. Hyperesthesia simulates strength, and, while there can be little
doubt that some sexual inverts (and more especially bisexuals) do possess
unusual sexual energy, in others it is but apparent; the frequent
repetition of seminal emissions, for example, may be the result of
weakness as well as of strength. It must be added that this irritability
of the sexual centers is, in a considerable proportion of inverts,
associated with marked emotional tendencies to affection and
self-sacrifice. In the extravagance of his affection and devotion, it has
been frequently observed, the male invert resembles many normal women.
SUGGESTION AND OTHER EXCITING CAUSES OF INVERSION.--In 18 of my cases it
is possible that some event, or special environment, in early life had
more or less influence in turning the sexual instinct into homosexual
channels, or in calling out a latent inversion. In 3 cases a
disappointment in normal love seems to have produced a profound nervous
and emotional shock, acting, as we seem bound to admit, on a predisposed
organism, and developing a fairly permanent tendency to inversion. In 8
cases there was seduction by an older person, but in at least 4 or 5 of
these there was already a well-marked predisposition. In at least 8 other
cases, example, usually at school, may probably be regarded as having
exerted some influence. It is noteworthy that in very few of my cases can
we trace the influence of any definite "suggestion," as asserted by
Schrenck-Notzing, who believes that, in the causation of sexual inversion
(as undoubtedly in the causation of erotic fetichism), we must give the
first place to "accidental factors of education and external influence."
He records the case of a little boy who innocently gazed in curiosity at
the penis of his father who was urinating, and had his ears boxed, whence
arose a train of thought and feeling which resulted in complete sexual
inversion. In two of the cases I have reported we have parallel incidents,
and here we see clearly that the homosexual tendency already existed. I do
not question the occurrence of such incidents, but I refuse to accept them
as supplying the causation of inversion, and in so doing I am supported by
all the evidence I am able to obtain. I am in agreement with a
correspondent who wrote:--
"Considering that all boys are exposed to the same order of
suggestions (sight of a man's naked organs, sleeping with a man,
being handled by a man), and that only a few of them become
sexually perverted, I think it reasonable to conclude that those
few were previously constituted to receive the suggestion. In
fact, suggestion seems to play exactly the same part in the
normal and abnormal awakening of sex."
I would go so far as to assert that for normal boys and girls the
developed sexual organs of the adult man or woman--from their size,
hairiness, and the mystery which envelops them--nearly always exert a
certain fascination, whether of attraction or horror.[187] But this has no
connection with homosexuality, and scarcely with sexuality at all. Thus,
in one case known to me, a boy of 6 or 7 took pleasure in caressing the
organs of another boy, twice his own age, who remained passive and
indifferent; yet this child grew up without ever manifesting any
homosexual instinct. The seed of suggestion can only develop when it falls
on a suitable soil. If it is to act on a fairly normal nature the
perverted suggestion must be very powerful or iterated, and even then its
influence will probably only be temporary, disappearing in the presence of
the normal stimulus.[188]
Not only is "suggestion" unnecessary to develop a sexual impulse already
rooted in the organism, but when exerted in an opposite direction it is
powerless to divert that impulse. We see this illustrated in several of
the cases whose histories I have presented. Thus in one case a boy was
seduced by the housemaid at the age of 14 and even derived pleasure from
the girl, yet none the less the native homosexual instinct asserted itself
a year later. In another case heterosexual suggestions were offered and
accepted in early life, yet, notwithstanding, the homosexual attraction
was slowly evolved from within.
I have, therefore, but little to say of the influence of suggestion, which
was formerly exalted to a position of the first importance in books on
sexual inversion. This is not because I underestimate the great part
played by suggestion in many fields of normal and abnormal life. It is
because I have been able to find but few decided traces of it in sexual
inversion. In many cases, doubtless, there may be some slight elements of
suggestion in developing the inversion, though they cannot be traced.[189]
Their importance seems usually questionable even when they are
discovered. Take Schrenck-Notzing's case of the little boy whose ears were
boxed for what his father considered improper curiosity. I find it
difficult to realize that a mighty suggestion can thereby be generated
unless a strong emotion exists for it to unite with; in that case the seed
falls on prepared soil. Is the wide prevalence of normal sexuality due to
the fact that so many little boys have had their ears boxed for taking
naughty liberties with women? If so, I am quite prepared to accept
Schrenck-Notzing's explanation as a complete account of the matter. I know
of one case, indeed, in which an element of what may fairly be called
suggestion can be detected. It is that of a physician who had always been
on very friendly terms with men, but had sexual relations exclusively with
women, finding fair satisfaction, until the confessions of an inverted
patient one day came to him as a revelation; thereafter he adopted
inverted practices and ceased to find any attraction in women. But even in
this case, as I understand the matter, suggestion merely served to reveal
his own nature to the man. For a physician to adopt the perverted habits
which the visit of a chance patient suggests to him can scarcely be a
phenomenon of pure suggestion. We have no reason to suppose that this
physician practised every perversion he heard of from patients; he adopted
that which fitted his own nature.[190] In another case homosexual advances
were made to a youth and accepted, but he had already been attracted to
men in childhood. Again, in another case, there were homosexual
influences in the boyhood of a subject who became bisexual, but as the
subject's father was of similar bisexual temperament we can attach no
potency to the mere suggestions. In another case we find homosexual
influence in childhood, but the child was already delicate, shy, nervous,
and feminine, clearly possessing a temperament predestined to develop in a
homosexual direction.
The irresistible potency of the inner impulse is well illustrated
in a case presented by Hirschfeld and Burchard: "My daughter
Erna," said the subject's mother, "showed boyish inclinations at
the age of 3, and they increased from year to year. She never
played with dolls, only with tin soldiers, guns, and castles. She
would climb trees and jump ditches; she made friends with the
drivers of all the carts that came to our house and they would
place her on the horse's back. The annual circus was a joy to her
for all the year. Even as a child of 4 she was so fearless on
horseback that lookers-on shouted Bravo! and all declared she was
a born horsewoman. It was her greatest wish to be a boy. She
would wear her elder brother's clothes all day, notwithstanding
her grandmother's indignation. Cycling, gymnastics, boating,
swimming, were her passion, and she showed skill in them. As she
grew older she hated prettily adorned hats and clothes. I had
much trouble with her for she would not wear pretty things. The
older she grew the more her masculine and decided ways developed.
This excited much outcry and offence. People found my daughter
unfeminine and disagreeable, but all my trouble and exhortations
availed nothing to change her." Now this young woman whom all the
influences of a normal feminine environment failed to render
feminine was not physiologically a woman at all; the case proved
to be the unique instance of an individual possessing all the
external characteristics of a woman combined with internal
testicular tissue capable of emitting true masculine semen
through the feminine urethra. No suggestions of the environment
could suffice to overcome this fundamental fact of internal
constitution. (Hirschfeld and Burchard, "Spermasekretion aus
einer weiblichen Harnröhre," _Deutsche medizinische
Wochenschrift_, No. 52, 1911.)
I may here quote three American cases (not previously published), for
which I am indebted to Prof. G. Frank Lydston, of Chicago. They seem to me
to illustrate the only kind of suggestions which play much part in the
evolution of inversion. I give them in Dr. Lydston's words:--
CASE I.--A man, 45 years of age, attracted by the allusion to my
essay on "Social Perversion" contained in the English translation
of Krafft-Ebing's _Psychopathia Sexualis_, consulted me regarding
the possible cure of his condition. This individual was a finely
educated, very intelligent man, who was an excellent linguist,
had considerable musical ability, and was in the employ of a firm
whose business was such as to demand on the part of its employés
considerable legal acumen, clerical ability, and knowledge of
real-estate transactions. This man stated that at the age of
puberty, without any knowledge of perversity of sexual feeling,
he was thrown intimately in contact with males of more advanced
years, who took various means to excite his sexual passions, the
result being that perverted sexual practices were developed,
which were continued for a number of years. He thereafter noticed
an aversion to women. At the solicitations of his family he
finally married, without any very intelligent idea as to what, if
anything, might be expected of him in the marital relation.
Absolute impotence--indeed, repugnance for association with his
wife--was the lamentable sequence. A divorce was in contemplation
when, fortunately for all parties concerned, the wife suddenly
died. Being a man of more than ordinary intelligence, this
individual, prior to seeking my aid, had sought vainly for some
remedy for his unfortunate condition. He stated that he believed
there was an element of heredity in his case, his father having
been a dipsomaniac and one brother having died insane. He
nevertheless stated it to be his opinion that, notwithstanding
the hereditary taint, he would have been perfectly normal from a
sexual standpoint had it not been for acquired impressions at or
about the period of puberty. This man presented a typically
neurotic type of _physique_, complained of being intensely
nervous, was prematurely gray, of only fair stature, and had an
uncontrollable nystagmus, which, he said, had existed for some
fifteen years. As might be expected, treatment in this case was
of no avail. I began the use of hypnotic suggestion at the hands
of an expert professional hypnotist. The patient, being called
out of the State, finally gave up treatment, and I have no means
of knowing what his present condition is.
CASE II.--A lady patient of mine who happened to be an actress,
and consequently a woman of the world, brought to me for an
opinion some correspondence which had passed between her younger
brother and a man living in another State, with whom he was on
quite intimate terms. In one of these letters various flying
trips to Chicago for the purpose of meeting the lad, who, by the
way, was only 17 years of age, were alluded to. It transpired
also, as evidenced by the letters, that on several occasions the
young lad had been taken on trips in Pullman cars by his friend,
who was a prominent railroad official. The character of the
correspondence was such as the average healthy man would address
to a woman with whom he was enamored. It seemed that the author
of the correspondence had applied to his boy affinity the name
Cinderella, and the protestations of passionate affection that
were made toward Cinderella certainly would have satisfied the
most exacting woman. The young lad subsequently made a confession
to me, and I put myself in correspondence with his male friend,
with the result that he called upon me and I obtained a full
history of the case. The method of indulgence in this case was
the usual one of oral masturbation, in which the lad was the
passive party. I was unable to obtain any definite data regarding
the family history of the elder individual in this case, but
understand that there was a taint of insanity in his family. He
himself was a robust, fine-looking man, above middle age, who was
well educated and very intelligent, as he necessarily must have
been, because of the prominent position he held with an important
railway company. I will state, as a matter of interest, that the
lad in this case, who is now 23 years of age, has recently
consulted me for _impotentia coëundi_, manifesting a frigidity
for women, and, from the young man's statements, I am convinced
that he is well on the road to confirmed sexual perversion.
An interesting point in this connection is that the young man's
sister, the actress already alluded to, has recently had an
attack of acute mania.
I have had other unpublished cases that might be of interest, but
these two are somewhat classical, and typify to a greater or less
degree the majority of other cases. I will, however, mention one
other case, occurring in a woman.
CASE III.--A married woman 40 years of age. Has been deserted by
her husband because of her perverted sexuality. Neurotic history
on both sides of the family, and several cases of insanity on
mother's side. In this case affinity for the same sex and
perverted desire for the opposite sex existed, a combination by
no means infrequent. Hypnotic suggestion tried, but without
success. Cause was evidently suggestion and example on the part
of another female pervert with whom she associated before her
marriage. Marriage was late, at age of 35. In all these cases
there was an element of what may be called suggestion, but it was
really much more than this; it was probably in each case active
seduction by an elder person of a predisposed younger person. It
will be observed that in each case there was, at the least, an
organic neurotic basis for suggestion and seduction to work on. I
cannot regard these cases as entitled to modify our attitude
toward suggestion.
MASTURBATION.--Moreau believed that masturbation was a cause of sexual
inversion, and Krafft-Ebing looked upon it as leading to all sorts of
sexual perversions; the same opinion was currently repeated by many
writers. It is not now accepted. Moll emphatically rejected the idea that
masturbation can be the cause of inversion; Näcke repeatedly denies that
masturbation, any more than seduction, can ever produce true inversion;
Hirschfeld attaches to it no etiological significance. Many years ago I
gave special attention to this point and reached a similar conclusion.
That masturbation, especially at an early age, may sometimes enfeeble the
sexual activities, and aid the manifestations of inversion, I certainly
believe. But beyond this there is little in the history of my male cases
to indicate masturbation as a cause of inversion. It is true that 44 out
of 51 admit that they have practised masturbation,--at all events,
occasionally, or at some period in their lives,--and it is possible that
this proportion is larger than that found among normal people. Even if so,
however, it is not difficult to account for, bearing in mind the fact that
the homosexual person has not the same opportunities as has the
heterosexual person to gratify his instincts, and that masturbation may
sometimes legitimately appear to him as the lesser of two evils.[191] Not
only has masturbation been practised at no period in at least 7 of the
cases (for concerning several I have no information), but in several
others it was never practised until long after the homosexual instinct had
appeared, in 1 case not till the age of 40, and then only occasionally. In
at least 8 it was only practised at puberty; in at least 8, however, it
began before the age of puberty; at least 9 left off before about the age
of 20. Unfortunately, as yet, we have little definite evidence as to the
prevalence and extent of masturbation among normal individuals.
Among the women masturbation is found in at least 5 cases out of 7. In 1
case there was no masturbation until comparatively late in life, and then
only at rare intervals and under exceptional circumstances. In another
case, some years after the homosexual attraction had been experienced, it
was practised, though not in excess, from the age of puberty for about
four years, and then abandoned; during these years the physical sexual
feelings were more imperative than they were afterward felt to be. In 2
cases masturbation was learned spontaneously soon after puberty, and in 1
of these practised in excess before the manifestations of inversion became
definite. In all cases the subjects are emphatic in asserting that this
practice neither led to, nor was caused by, the homosexual attraction,
which they regard as a much higher feeling, and it must be added that the
occasional practice of masturbation is very far from rare among fairly
normal women.[192]
While this is so, I am certainly inclined to believe that an early and
excessive indulgence in masturbation, though not an adequate cause, is a
favoring condition for the development of inversion, and that this is
especially so in women. The sexual precocity indicated by early and
excessive masturbation doubtless sometimes reveals an organism already
predisposed to homosexuality. But, apart from this, when masturbation
arises spontaneously at an early age on a purely physical basis it seems
to tend to produce a divorce between the physical and the psychic aspects
of sexual love. The sexual manifestations are all diverted into this
physical direction, and the child is ignorant that such phenomena are
normally allied to love; then, when a more spiritual attraction appears
with adolescent development, this divorce is perpetuated. Instead of the
physical and psychic feelings appearing together when the age for sexual
attraction comes, the physical feelings are prematurely twisted from their
natural end, and it becomes abnormally easy for a person of the same sex
to step in and take the place rightfully belonging to a person of the
opposite sex. This has certainly seemed to me the course of events in some
cases I have observed.
ATTITUDE TOWARD THE OPPOSITE SEX.--In 17 cases (of whom 5 are married and
others purposing to marry) there is sexual attraction to both sexes, a
condition formerly called psycho-sexual hermaphroditism, but now more
usually bisexuality. In such cases, although there is pleasure and
satisfaction in relationships with both sexes, there is usually a greater
degree of satisfaction in connection with one sex. Most of the bisexual
prefer their own sex. It is curiously rare to find a person, whether man
or woman, who by choice exercises relationships with both sexes and
prefers the opposite sex. This would seem to indicate that the bisexual
may really be inverts.
In any case bisexuality merges imperceptibly into simple inversion. In at
least 16 of 52 cases of simple inversion in men there has been connection
with women, in some instances only once or twice, in others during several
years, but it was always with an effort, or from a sense of duty and
anxiety to be normal; they never experienced any real pleasure in the act,
or sense of satisfaction after it. Four of these cases are married, but
martial relationships usually ceased after a few years. At least four
others were attracted to women when younger, but are not now; another once
felt sexually attracted to a boyish woman, but never made any attempt to
obtain any relationships with her; 3 or 4 others, again, have tried to
have connection with women, but failed. The largest proportion of my cases
have never had any sexual intimacy with the opposite sex,[193] and some of
these experience what, in the case of the male invert, is sometimes
called _horror feminæ_. But, while woman as an object of sexual desire is
in such cases disgusting to them, and it is usually difficult for a
genuine invert to have connection with a woman except by setting up images
of his own sex, for the most part inverts are capable of genuine
friendships, irrespective of sex.
It is, perhaps, not difficult to account for the horror--much stronger
than that normally felt toward a person of the same sex--with which the
invert often regards the sexual organs of persons of the opposite sex. It
cannot be said that the sexual organs of either sex under the influence of
sexual excitement are esthetically pleasing; they only become emotionally
desirable through the parallel excitement of the beholder. When the
absence of parallel excitement is accompanied in the beholder by the sense
of unfamiliarity as in childhood, or by a neurotic hypersensitiveness, the
conditions are present for the production of intense _horror feminæ_ or
_horror masculis_, as the case may be. It is possible that, as Otto Rank
argues in his interesting study, "Die Naktheit im Sage und Dichtung," this
horror of the sexual organs of the opposite sex, to some extent felt even
by normal people, is embodied in the Melusine type of legend.[194]
EROTIC DREAMS.--Our dreams follow, as a general rule, the impulses that
stir our waking psychic life. The normal man or woman in sexual vigor
dreams of loving a person of the opposite sex; the inverted man dreams of
loving a man, the inverted woman of loving a woman.[195] Dreams thus have
a certain value in diagnosis, more especially since there is less
unwillingness to confess to a perverted dream than to a perverted action.
Ulrichs first referred to the significance of the dreams of inverts. At a
later period Moll pointed out that they have some value in diagnosis when
we are not sure how far the inverted tendency is radical. Then Näcke
repeatedly emphasized the importance of dreams as constituting, he
believed, the most delicate test we possess in the diagnosis of
homosexuality;[196] this was an exaggerated view which failed to take into
account the various influences which may deflect dreams. Hirschfeld has
made the most extensive investigation on this point, and found that among
100 inverts 87 had exclusively homosexual dreams, while most of the rest
had no dreams at all.[197] Among my cases, only 4 definitely state that
there are no erotic dreams, while 31 acknowledge that the dreams are
concerned more or less with persons of the same sex. Of these, at least 16
assert or imply that their dreams are exclusively of the same sex. Two,
though apparently inverted congenitally, have had erotic dreams of women,
in one case more frequently than of men; these two exceptions have no
apparent explanation. Another appears to have sexual dreams of a nightmare
character in which women appear. In another case there were always at
first dreams of women, but this subject had sometimes had connection with
prostitutes, and is not absolutely indifferent to women, while another,
whose dreams remain heterosexual, had in early life some attraction to
girls. In the cases of distinct bisexuality there is no unanimity; 2 dream
of their own sex, 2 dream of both sexes, 1 usually dreams of the opposite
sex, and 1 man, while dreaming of both, dislikes those dreams in which
women figure. In at least 3 cases dreams of a sexual character began at
the age of 8 or earlier.
The phenomena presented by erotic dreams, alike in normal and
abnormal persons, are somewhat complex, and dreams are by no
means a sure guide to the dreamer's real sexual attitude. The
fluctuations of dream imagery may be illustrated by the
experiences of one of my subjects who thus indirectly summarises
his own experiences: "When he was quite a child, he used to be
haunted by gross and grotesque dreams of naked adult men, which
must have been erotic. At the age of puberty he dreamed in two
ways, but always about males. One species of vision was highly
idealistic; a radiant and lovely young man's face with floating
hair appeared to him on a background of dim shadows. The other
was obscene, being generally the sight of a groom's or carter's
genitals in a state of violent erection. He never dreamed
erotically or sentimentally about women; but when the dream was
frightful, the terror-making personage was invariably female. In
ordinary dreams, women of his family or acquaintance played a
trivial part. At the age of 24, having determined to conquer his
homosexual passions, he married, found no difficulty in
cohabiting with his wife, and begat several children, although he
took but little passionate delight in the sexual act. He still
continued to dream exclusively of men, for several years; and the
obscene visions became more frequent than the idealistic.
Gradually, coarse and uninteresting erotic dreams of women began
to haunt his mind in sleep. A curious particular regarding the
new type of vision was that he never dreamed of whole females,
only of their sexual parts, seen in a blur; and the seminal
emissions which attended the mental pictures left a feeling of
fatigue and disgust. In course of time, his wife and he agreed to
live separately so far as sexual relations are concerned. He then
indulged his passion for males, and wholly lost those rudimentary
female dreams which had been developed during the period of
nuptial cohabitation."
Not only is it possible for the genuine invert to be trained into
heterosexual erotic dreams, but homosexual dreams may
occasionally be experienced by persons who are, and always have
been, exclusively heterosexual. I could bring forward much
evidence on this point. (Cf. "Auto-erotism" in vol. i of these
_Studies_.) Both men and women who have always been of pronounced
heterosexual tendency, without a trace of inversion, are liable
to rare homosexual dreams, not necessarily involving orgasm or
even definite sexual excitement, and sometimes accompanied by a
feeling of repugnance. As an example I may present a dream (which
had no known origin) of an exclusively heterosexual lady aged 42;
she dreamed she was in bed with another woman, unknown to her,
and lying on her own stomach, while with her right hand stretched
out she was feeling the other's sexual parts. She could
distinctly perceive the clitoris, vagina, etc.; she felt a sort
of disgust with herself for what she was doing, but continued
until she awoke; she then found herself lying on her stomach as
in the dream and at first thought she must have been touching
herself, but realized that this could not have been the case.
(Niceforo, who believes that inversion may develop out of
masturbation, considers that dreams of masturbation by
association of ideas may take on an inverted character [_Le
Psicopatie Sessuale_, 1897, pp. 35, 69]; this, however, must be
rare, and will not account for most of the dreams in question.)
Näcke and Colin Scott, some years ago, independently referred to
cases in which normal persons were liable to homosexual dreams,
and Féré (_Revue de Médecine_, Dec., 1898) referred to a man who
had a horror of women, but appeared only to manifest
homosexuality in his dreams. Näcke (_Archiv für
Kriminal-Anthropologie_, 1907, Heft I, 2) calls dreams which
represent a reaction of opposition to the dreamer's ordinary life
"contrast dreams." Hirschfeld, who accepts Näcke's "contrast
dreams" in relation to homosexuality, considers that they
indicate a latent bisexuality. We may admit this is so, in the
same sense in which a complementary color image called up by
another color indicates the possibility of perceiving that color.
In most cases, however, it seems to me that homosexual dreams in
normal persons may be simply explained as due to the ordinary
confusion and transition of dream imagery. (See Ellis, _The World
of Dreams_, especially ch. ii.)
_Methods of Sexual Relationship_.--The exact mode in which an inverted
instinct finds satisfaction is frequently of importance from the
medico-legal standpoint;[198] from a psychological standpoint it is of
minor significance, being chiefly of interest as showing the degree to
which the individual has departed from the instinctive feelings of his
normal fellow-beings.
Taking 57 inverted men of whom I have definite knowledge, I find that 12,
restrained by moral or other considerations, have never had any physical
relationship with their own sex. In some 22 cases the sexual relationship
rarely goes beyond close physical contact and fondling, or at most mutual
masturbation and intercrural intercourse. In 10 or 11 cases _fellatio_
(oral excitation)--frequently in addition to some form of mutual
masturbation, and usually, though not always, as the active agency--is the
form preferred. In 14 cases, actual _pedicatio_[199]--usually active, not
passive--has been exercised. In these cases, however, _pedicatio_ is by no
means always the habitual or even the preferred method of gratification.
It seems to be the preferred method in about 7 cases. Several who have
never experienced it, including some who have never practised any form of
physical relationship, state that they feel no objection to _pedicatio_;
some have this feeling in regard to active, others in regard to passive,
_pedicatio_. The proportion of inverts who practise or have at some time
experienced _pedicatio_ thus revealed (nearly 25 per cent.) is large; in
Germany Hirschfeld finds it to be only 8 per cent., and Merzbach only 6. I
believe, however, that a wider induction from a larger number of English
and American cases would yield a proportion much nearer to that found in
Germany.[200]
PSEUDOSEXUAL ATTRACTION.--It is sometimes supposed that in homosexual
relationships one person is always active, physically and emotionally, the
other passive. Between men, at all events, this is very frequently not the
case, and the invert cannot tell if he feels like a man or like a woman.
Thus, one writes:--
"In bed with my friend I feel as he feels, and he feels as I
feel. The result is masturbation, and nothing more or desire for
more on my part. I get it over, too, as soon as possible, in
order to come to the best--sleeping arms round each other, or
talking so."
It remains true, however, that there may usually be traced what it is
possible to call pseudosexual attraction, by which I mean a tendency for
the invert to be attracted toward persons unlike himself, so that in his
sexual relationships there is a certain semblance of sexual opposition.
Numa Praetorius considers that in homosexuality the attraction of
opposites--the attraction for soldiers and other primitive vigorous
types--plays a greater part than among normal lovers.[201] This
pseudosexual attraction is, however, as Hirschfeld points out,[202] and as
we see by the Histories here presented, by no means invariable.
M.N. writes: "To me it appears that the female element must, of
necessity, exist in the body that desires the male, and that
nature keeps her law in the spirit, though she breaks it in the
form. The rest is all a matter of individual temperament and
environment. The female nature of the invert, hampered though it
is by its disguise of flesh, is still able to exert an
extraordinary influence, and calls insistently upon the male.
This influence seems called into action most violently in the
presence of males possessed of strong sexual magnetism of their
own. Such men are generally more or less conscious of the
influence, and the result is either a vague appreciation, which
will make the male wonder why he gets on so well with the invert,
or else the influence will be realized to be something
incongruous and unnatural, and will be resented accordingly.
Sometimes, indeed, the reciprocated feeling (circumstance and
opportunity permitting) will prove strong enough to induce sexual
relations. Reason will then generally overpower instinct, and the
feeling, aroused unaware, will probably be changed into
repulsion. Further, the influence reacts in the same way on
women, who, particularly if they are strongly sexual, experience
involuntary sensations of dislike or antagonism on association
with inverts. There is, however, one terrible reality for the
invert to face, no matter how much he may wish to avoid it and
seek to deceive himself. There exists for him an almost absolute
lack of any genuine satisfaction either in the way of the
affections or desires. His whole life is passed in vainly seeking
and desiring the male, the antithesis of his nature, and in
consorting with inverts he must perforce be content with the male
in form only, the shadow without the substance. Indeed, one
invert necessarily regards another as being of the same undesired
female sex as himself, and for this reason it will be found that,
while friendships between inverts frequently exist (and these are
characteristically feminine, unstable, and liable to betrayal),
love-attachments are less common, and when they occur must
naturally be based upon considerable self-deception. Venal
gratifications are always, of course, as possible as they are
unsatisfactory, and here perhaps some of the peculiarities of
taste accompanying inversion may admit of elucidation. In
considering the peculiar predilection shown by inverts for youths
of inferior social position, for the wearers of uniforms, and for
extreme physical development and virility not necessarily
accompanied by intellectuality, regard must be had to the
probable conduct of women placed in a position of complete
irresponsibility combined with absolute freedom of action and
every opportunity for promiscuity. It seems to me that the
importance of recognizing the underlying female element in
inversion cannot be too strongly insisted upon."
"The majority" [of inverts], writes "Z," "differ in no detail of
their outward appearance, their _physique_, or their dress from
normal men. They are athletic, masculine in habit, frank in
manner, passing through society year after year without arousing
a suspicion of their inner temperament; were it not so, society
would long ago have had its eyes opened to the amount of
perverted sexuality it harbors." These lines were written, not in
opposition to the more subtle distinctions pointed out above, but
in refutation of the vulgar error which confuses the typical
invert with the painted and petticoated creatures who appear in
police-courts from time to time, and whose portraits are
presented by Lombroso, Legludic, etc. On another occasion the
same writer remarked, while expressing general agreement with the
idea of a pseudosexual attraction: "The _liaison_ is by no means
always sought and begun by the person who is abnormally
constituted. I mean that I can cite cases of decided males who
have made up to inverts, and have found their happiness in the
reciprocated passion. One pronounced male of this sort, again,
once said to me, 'men are so much more affectionate than women.'
[Precisely the same words were used by one of my subjects.] Also,
the _liaison_ springs up now and then quite accidentally through
juxtaposition, when it is difficult to say whether either at the
outset had an inverted tendency of any marked quality. In these
cases the sexual relation seems to come on as a heightening of
comradely affection, and is found to be pleasurable--sometimes, I
think, discovered to be safe as well as satisfying. On the other
hand, so far as I know, it is extremely rare to observe a
permanent _liaison_ between two pronounced inverts."
The tendency to pseudosexual attraction in the homosexual would
thus seem to involve a preference for normal persons. How far
this is the case it seems difficult to state positively. Usually,
one may say, an invert falls in love (exactly as in the case of a
normal person) without any intellectual calculation as to the
temperamental ability to return the affection which the object of
his love may possess. Naturally, however, there cannot be any
adequate return of the affection in the absence of an actual or
latent homosexual disposition. On this point an American
correspondent (H.C.), with a wide knowledge of inversion in many
lands, writes: "One of your correspondents declares that inverts
long for sexual relations with normal men rather than with one
another. If this be true, I have never once found it exemplified
in all my wide experience of inverts; and I have submitted his
assertion to more than 50. These have replied invariably that
unless a man is himself homosexual, nearly all the pleasure of
_fellatio_ is absent. The fact is, the majority of inverts flock
together not from exigency, but from choice. The mere sexual act
is, if anything, far less the sole object between inverts than it
is between normal men and women. Why should the invert sigh for
intercourse with normal men, where mutual confidences and
sympathies and love would be out of the question? Personally, I
decline to commit _fellatio_ with a man who is given to women;
the thought of it is repugnant to me. And this is the attitude
with every invert I have questioned. The nearest approach to
confirmation of your correspondent's theory has been when an
extremely feminine invert here and there has admitted the wish
that a certain normal man _were_ inverted. Indeed, the
temperamental gamut of inversion is itself broad enough to
embrace the most widely divergent ideals. As my furthest-reaching
demands attain fruition in the gentle and pretty boy, so his own
robuster affinity resides in me. If inverts were actually women,
then indeed the normal male would be their ideal. But inverts are
not women. Inverts are males capable of passionate friendship,
and their ideal is the male who will give them passionate
friendship in return."
In at least 24, probably many more, of my male cases there is a marked
contrast, and in a still larger number a less-marked contrast, between the
subject and the individuals he is attracted to; either he is of somewhat
feminine and sensitive nature, and admires more simple and virile natures,
or he is fairly vigorous and admires boys who are often of lower social
class. Inverted women also are attracted to more clinging feminine
persons.[203] A sexual attraction for boys is, no doubt, as Moll points
out, that form of inversion which comes nearest to normal sexuality, for
the subject of it usually approaches nearer to the average man in physical
and mental disposition. The reason of this is obvious: boys resemble
women, and therefore it requires a less profound organic twist to become
sexually attracted to them. Anyone who has watched private theatricals in
boys' schools will have observed how easy it is for boys to personate
women successfully, and it is well known that until the middle of the
seventeenth century women's parts on the stage were always taken by boys,
whether or not with injury to their own or other people's morals.[204] It
is also worthy of note that in Greece, where homosexuality flourished so
extensively, and apparently with so little accompaniment of neurotic
degeneration, it was often held that only boys under 18 should be loved;
so that the love of boys merged into love of women. About 18 of my cases
are most strongly attracted to youths,--preferably of about the age of 18
to 20,--and they are, for the most part, among the more normal and healthy
of the cases. A preference for older men, or else a considerable degree of
indifference to age alone, is more common, and perhaps indicates a deeper
degree of perversion.
Putting aside the age of the object desired, it must be said that there is
a distinctly general, though not universal, tendency for sexual inverts to
approach the feminine type, either in psychic disposition or physical
constitution, or both.[205] I cannot say how far this is explained by the
irritable nervous system and delicate health which are so often associated
with inversion, though this is certainly an important factor. Although the
invert himself may stoutly affirm his masculinity, and although this
femininity may not be very obvious, its wide prevalence may be asserted
with considerable assurance, and by no means only among the small minority
of inverts who take an exclusively passive rôle, though in these it is
usually most marked. In this I am confirmed by Q., who writes: "In all, or
certainly almost all, the cases of congenital male inverts (excluding
psycho-sexual hermaphrodites) that I know there has been a remarkable
sensitiveness and delicacy of sentiment, sympathy, and an intuitive habit
of mind, such as we generally associate with the feminine sex, even though
the body might be quite masculine in its form and habit."[206] When,
however, a distinguished invert said to Moll: "We are all women; that we
do not deny," he put the matter in too extreme a form. The feminine traits
of the homosexual are not usually of a conspicuous character. "I believe
that inverts of plainly feminine nature are rare exceptions," wrote
Näcke:[207] and that statement may be accepted even by those who emphasize
the prevalence of feminine traits among inverts.
In inverted women some degree of masculinity or boyishness is equally
prevalent, and it is not usually found in the women to whom they are
attracted. Even in inversion the need for a certain sexual opposition--the
longing for something which the lover himself does not possess--still
prevails. It expresses itself sometimes in an attraction between persons
of different race and color. I am told that in American prisons for women
Lesbian relationships are specially frequent between white and black
women.[208] A similar affinity is found among the Arabs, says Kocher; and
if an Arab woman has a Lesbian friend the latter is usually European. In
Cochin China, too, according to Lorion, while the Chinese are chiefly
active pederasts, the Annamites are chiefly passive.
It must, however, be remembered that, in normal love, homogamy, the
attraction of the like, prevails over heterogamy, the attraction of the
unlike, which is chiefly confined to those features which belong to the
sphere of the secondary sexual characters;[209] the same appears to be
true in inversion, and the homosexual are probably, on the whole, more
attracted by the traits which they seem to themselves to possess than by
those which are foreign to themselves.[210]
PHYSICAL ABNORMALITIES.--The circumstances under which many of my cases
were investigated often made information under this head difficult to
obtain, or to verify. In at least 4 cases the penis is very large, while
in at least 3 it is small and undeveloped, with small and flabby testes.
It seems probable that variations in these two directions are both common,
but it is doubtful whether they possess as much significance as the
tendency to infantilism of the sexual organs in inverted women seems to
possess. Hirschfeld considers that the genital organs of inverts resemble
those of normal people. He finds, however, that phimosis is rather
common.[211]
More significant, perhaps, than specifically genital peculiarities are the
deviations found in the general conformation of the body.[212] In at
least 2 cases there are well-developed breasts, in 1 the breasts swelling
and becoming red.[213] In 1 case there are "menstrual" phenomena, physical
and psychic, recurring every four weeks. In several cases the hips are
broad and the arms rounded, while some are skillful in throwing a ball.
One was born with a double squint. At least 2 were 7 months' children. In
the previous chapter I have referred to the tendency to hypertrichosis and
occasionally oligotrichosis among inverted women; among the men it is the
latter condition which seems more common, and in several cases the bodies
are hairless, or with but scanty hair. A few are left-handed, though not
perhaps an abnormal proportion.[214] The sexual characters of the
handwriting are in some cases clearly inverted, the men writing a feminine
hand and the women a masculine hand.[215] A high feminine voice is
sometimes found.[216]
A marked characteristic of many inverts, though one not easy of precise
definition, is their youthfulness of appearance, and frequently child-like
faces, equally in both sexes. This has often been remarked,[217] and is
pronounced among many of my subjects.
The frequent inability of male inverts to whistle was first pointed out by
Ulrichs, and Hirschfeld has found it in 23 per cent. Many of my cases
confess to this inability, while some of the women inverts can whistle
admirably. Although this inability of male inverts is only found among a
minority, I am quite satisfied that it is well marked among a considerable
minority. One of my correspondents, M.N., writes to me: "With regard to
the general inability of inverts to whistle (I am not able to do so
myself), their fondness for green (my favorite color), their feminine
caligraphy, skill at female occupations, etc., these all seem to me but
indications of the one principle. To go still farther and include trivial
things, few inverts even smoke in the same manner and with the same
enjoyment as a man; they have seldom the male facility at games, cannot
throw at a mark with precision, or even spit!"
Nearly all these peculiarities indicate a minor degree of nervous
disturbance and lead to modification, as my correspondent points out, in a
feminine direction. It is scarcely necessary to add that they by no means
necessarily imply inversion. Shelley, for instance, was unable to whistle,
though he never gave an indication of inversion; but he was a person of
somewhat abnormal and feminine organization, and he illustrates the
tendency of these apparently very insignificant functional anomalies to be
correlated with other and more important psychic anomalies.
The greater part of these various anatomical peculiarities and functional
anomalies point, more or less clearly, to the prevalence among inverts of
a tendency to infantilism, combined with feminism in men and masculinism
in women.[218] This tendency is denied by Hirschfeld, but it is often
well indicated among the subjects whose histories I have been able to
present, and is indeed suggested by Hirschfeld's own elaborate results; so
that it can scarcely be passed over. I regard it as highly significant,
and it is in harmony with all that we are learning to know regarding the
important part played by the internal secretions, alike in inversion and
the general bodily modifications in an infantile, feminine, and masculine
direction.
If we are justified in believing that there is a tendency for inverted
persons to be somewhat arrested in development, approaching the child
type, we may connect this fact with the sexual precocity sometimes marked
in inverts, for precocity is commonly accompanied by rapid arrest of
development.
A correspondent, who is himself inverted, furnishes the following
notes of cases he is well acquainted with; I quote them here, as
they illustrate the anomalies commonly found:--
1. A., male, eldest child of typically neurotic family. Three
children in all: 2 male and 1 female. The other 2 are somewhat
eccentric, unsocial, and sexually frigid, 1 in a marked degree.
The curious point about this case is that A., the only one of the
family possessed of mental ability and social qualifications,
should be inverted. Parents' marriage was very ill-assorted and
inharmonious, the father being of great stature and the mother
abnormally small and of highly nervous temperament, both of
feeble health. Ancestry unfortunate, especially on mother's side.
2. B., male, invert, younger of 2 sons, no other children, has
extremely feminine disposition and appearance, of considerable
personal attraction, and has great musical talent. Penis very
small and marked breast-development.
3. C., male, invert, younger of 2 sons, no other children.
Interval of six years between first and second son. Parents'
marriage one of great affection, but degenerate ancestry on
mother's side. Cancer and scrofula in family.
4. D., male, invert, second child of 6; remainder girls. Of
humble social position. Considerable depravity evinced by all the
members of this family, with the exception of D., who alone
proved steady, honest, and industrious.
5. E., male, invert, second son of family of 3, the youngest
child being a girl, stillborn. Of extreme neurotic temperament
fostered by upbringing. Effeminate in build and disposition;
musically gifted.
6. F., male, invert, second child of family of 5. Eldest child a
girl, died in youth. After F. a boy G., a girl H., and another
girl stillborn. Parents badly matched; mother of considerable
mental and physical strength; father last representative of
moribund stock, the result of intermarriage. Children all
resembling father in appearance and mother in disposition.
Drink-tendency in both boys, to which F.'s death at the age of 30
was mainly due. G. committed suicide some years later. The girl
H. married into a family with worse ancestry than her own. Has
two children:--
7. I. and J., boy and girl, both inverted as far as I am able to
judge. The boy was born with some deformity of the feet and
ankles; is of effeminate tastes and appearance. Boy resembles
mother, and girl, who is of great physical development, resembles
father.
The same correspondent adds:--
"I have noticed little abnormal with regard to the genital
formation of inverts. There are, however, frequent abnormalities
of proportion in their figures, the hands and feet being
noticeably smaller and more shapely, the waist more marked, the
body softer and less muscular. Almost invariably there is either
cranial malformation or the head approaches the feminine in type
and shape."
ARTISTIC AND OTHER APTITUDES.--All avocations are represented among
inverts. Among the subjects here dealt with are found, at one end of the
scale, numerous manual workers, and at the other end an equal number,
sometimes of aristocratic family, who exercise no profession at all. There
are 12 physicians, 9 men of letters, at least 7 are engaged in commercial
life, 6 are artists, architects, or composers, 4 are or have been actors.
These figures cannot give any clue to the relative extent of inversion in
various occupations, but they indicate that no class of occupation
furnishes a safeguard against inversion.
There are, however, certain avocations to which inverts seem especially
called.[219] One of the chief of these is literature. The apparent
predominance of physicians is easily explicable. The frequency with which
literature is represented is probably more genuine. Here, indeed, inverts
seem to find the highest degree of success and reputation. At least half a
dozen of my subjects are successful men of letters, and I could easily
add others by going outside the group of Histories included in this study.
They especially cultivate those regions of _belles-lettres_ which lie on
the borderland between prose and verse. Though they do not usually attain
much eminence in poetry, they are often very accomplished writers of
verse. They may be attracted to history, but rarely attempt tasks of great
magnitude, involving much patient labor, though to this rule there are
exceptions. Pure science seems to have relatively little attraction for
the homosexual.[220]
An examination of my Histories reveals the interesting fact that 45 of the
subjects, or in the proportion of 56 per cent., possess artistic aptitudes
of varying degree. Galton found, from the investigation of nearly 1000
persons, that the average showing artistic tastes in England was only
about 30 per cent. It must also be said that my figures are probably below
the truth, as no special point was made of investigating the matter, and
also that in some cases the artistic ability is of high order.
It is suggested that Adler's theory of
_Minderwertigkeit_--according to which we react strenuously
against our congenital organic defects and fortify them into
virtues--may be applied to the invert's acquirement of artistic
abilities (G. Rosenstein, "Die Theorien der Organminderwertigkeit
und die Bisexualität," _Jahrbuch für Psychoanalytische
Forschungen_, vol. ii, 1910, p. 398). This theory is in some
cases of valuable application, but it seems doubtful to me
whether it is very profitable in the present connection. The
artistic aptitudes of inverts may better be regarded as part of
their organic tendencies than as a reaction against those
tendencies. In this connection I may quote the remarks of an
American correspondent, himself homosexual: "Regarding the
connection between inversion and artistic capacity, so far as I
can see, the temperament of every invert seems to strive to find
artistic expression--crudely or otherwise. Inverts, as a rule,
seek the paths of life that lie in pleasant places; their
resistance to opposing obstacles is elastic, their work is never
strenuous (if they can help it), and their accomplishments hardly
ever of practical use. This is all true of the born artist, as
well. Both inverts and artists are inordinately fond of praise;
both yearn for a life where admiration is the reward for little
energy. In a word, they seem to be 'born tired,' begotten by
parents who were tired, too."
Hirschfeld (_Die Homosexualität_, p. 66) gives a list of pictures
and sculptures which specially appeal to the homosexual.
Prominent among them are representations of St. Sebastian,
Gainsborough's Blue Boy, Vandyck's youthful men, the Hermes of
Praxiteles, Michelangelo's Slave, Rodin's and Meunier's
working-men types.
As regards music, my cases reveal the aptitude which has been
remarked by others as peculiarly common among inverts. It has
been extravagantly said that all musicians are inverts; it is
certain that various famous musicians, among the dead and the
living, have been homosexual. Ingegnieros speaks of a
"genito-musical synæsthesia," analogous to color-hearing, in this
connection. Calesia states (_Archivio di Psichiatria_, 1900, p.
209) that 60 per cent, inverts are musicians. Hirschfeld (_Die
Homosexualität_, p. 500) regards this estimate as excessive, but
he himself elsewhere states (p. 175) that 98 per cent, of male
inverts are greatly attracted to music, the women being decidedly
less attracted. Oppenheim (in a paper summarized in the
_Neurologische Centralblatt_ for June 1, 1910, and the _Alienist
and Neurologist_ for Nov., 1910) well remarks that the musical
disposition is marked by a great emotional instability, and this
instability is a disposition to nervousness. It is thus that
neurasthenia is so common among musicians. The musician has not
been rendered nervous by the music, but he owes his nervousness
(as also, it may be added, his disposition to homosexuality) to
the same disposition to which he owes his musical aptitude.
Moreover, the musician is frequently one-sided in his gifts, and
the possession of a single hypertrophied aptitude is itself
closely related to the neuropathic and psychopathic diathesis.
The tendency to dramatic aptitude--found among a large proportion of my
subjects who have never been professional actors--has attracted the
attention of previous investigators in this field.[221] Thus, Moll refers
to the frequency of artistic, and especially dramatic, talent among
inverts, and remarks that the cause is doubtful. After pointing out that
the lie which they have to be perpetually living renders inverts always
actors, he goes on to say:--
Apart from this, it seems to me that the capacity and the
inclination to conceive situations and to represent them in a
masterly manner corresponds to an abnormal predisposition of the
nervous system, just as does sexual inversion; so that both
phenomena are due to the same source.
I am in agreement with this statement; the congenitally inverted may, I
believe, be looked upon as a class of individuals exhibiting nervous
characters which, to some extent, approximate them to persons of artistic
genius. The dramatic and artistic aptitudes of inverts are, therefore,
partly due to the circumstances of the invert's life, which render him
necessarily an actor,--and in some few cases lead him into a love of
deception comparable with that of a hysterical woman,--and partly, it is
probable, to a congenital nervous predisposition allied to the
predisposition to dramatic aptitude.
One of my correspondents has long been interested in the
frequency of inversion among actors and actresses. He knew an
inverted actor who told him he adopted the profession because it
would enable him to indulge his proclivity; but, on the whole, he
regards this tendency as due to "hitherto unconsidered
imaginative flexibilities and curiosities in the individual. The
actor, _ex hypothesi_, is one who works himself by sympathy
(intellectual and emotional) into states of psychological being
that are not his own. He learns to comprehend--nay, to live
himself into--relations which were originally alien to his
nature. The capacity for doing this--what makes a born
actor--implies a faculty for extending his artistically acquired
experience into life. In the process of his trade, therefore, he
becomes at all points sensitive to human emotions, and, sexuality
being the most intellectually undetermined of the appetites after
hunger, the actor might discover in himself a sort of sexual
indifference, out of which a sexual aberration could easily
arise. A man devoid of this imaginative flexibility could not be
a successful actor. The man who possesses it would be exposed to
divagations of the sexual instinct under esthetical or merely
wanton influences. Something of the same kind is applicable to
musicians and artists, in whom sexual inversion prevails beyond
the average. They are conditioned by their esthetical faculty,
and encouraged by the circumstances of their life to feel and
express the whole gamut of emotional experience. Thus they get an
environment which (unless they are sharply otherwise
differentiated) leads easily to experiments in passion. All this
joins on to what you call the 'variational diathesis' of men of
genius. But I should seek the explanation of the phenomenon less
in the original sexual constitution than in the exercise of
sympathetic, assimilative emotional qualities, powerfully
stimulated and acted on by the conditions of the individual's
life. The artist, the singer, the actor, the painter, are more
exposed to the influences out of which sexual differentiation in
an abnormal direction may arise. Some persons are certainly made
abnormal by nature, others, of this sympathetic artistic
temperament, may become so through their sympathies plus their
conditions of life." It is possible there may be some element of
truth in this view, which my correspondent regarded as purely
hypothetical.
In this connection I may, perhaps, mention a moral quality which is very
often associated with dramatic aptitude, and also with minor degrees of
nervous degeneration, and that is vanity and the love of applause. While
among a considerable section of inverts it is not more marked than among
the non-inverted, if not, indeed, less marked, among another section it is
found in an exaggerated degree. In at least one of my cases vanity and
delight in admiration, both as regards personal qualities and artistic
productions, reach an almost morbid extent. And the quotations from
letters written by various others of my subjects show a curious
complacency in the description of their personal physical characters,
markedly absent in other cases. It is suggested by Alexander Schmid, on
the basis of Adler's views, that this vanity, which sometimes in the
inverted artist becomes an exalted pride, as of a guardian of sacred
mysteries, may be regarded as an effort to secure a compensation for the
consciousness of feminine defect.[222]
The extreme type of this preoccupation with personal beauty is
represented by the history of himself sent by a young Italian of
good family to Zola in the hope--itself a sign of vanity--that
the distinguished novelist would make it the subject of one of
his works. The history is reproduced in the _Archives
d'Anthropologie Criminelle_ (1894) and in _L'Homosexualité et les
Types Homosexuels_ (1910) by "Dr. Laupts" (G. Saint-Paul). I
quote the following passage: "At the age of 18 I was, with few
differences, what I am now (at 23). I am rather below the medium
height (1.65 metres), well proportioned, slender, but not lean.
My torso is superb; a sculptor could find nothing against it, and
would not find it very different from that of Antinotis. My back
is very arched, perhaps too much so; and my hips are very
developed; my pelvis is broad, like a woman's; my knees slightly
approximate; my feet are small; my hands superb; the fingers
curved back and with glistening nails, rosy and polished, cut
squarely like those of ancient statues. My neck is long and
round, the nape charmingly adorned with downy hairs. My head is
charming, and at 18 was more so. The oval of it is perfect and
strikes all by its infantine form. At 23 I am to be taken for 17
at most. My complexion is white and rosy, deepening at the
faintest emotion. The forehead is not beautiful; it recedes
slightly and is hollow at the temples, but, fortunately, it is
half-covered by long hair, of a dark blonde, which curls
naturally. The head is perfect in form, because of the curly
hair, but on examination there is an enormous protuberance at the
occiput. My eyes are oval, of a gray blue, with dark chestnut
eyelashes and thick, arched eyebrows. My eyes are very liquid,
but with dark circles, and bistered; and they are subject to
slight temporary inflammation. My mouth is fairly large, with
thick red lips, the lower pendent; they tell me I have the
Austrian mouth. My teeth are dazzling, though three are decayed
and stopped; fortunately, they cannot be seen. My ears are small
and with very colored lobes. My chin is very fat, and at 18 it
was smooth and velvety as a woman's; at present there is a slight
beard, always shaved. Two beauty spots, black and velvety, on my
left cheek, contrast with my blue eyes. My nose is thin and
straight, with delicate nostrils and a slight, almost insensible
curve. My voice is gentle, and people always regret that I have
not learned to sing." This description is noteworthy as a
detailed portrait of a sexual invert of a certain type; the
whole history is interesting and instructive.
Certain peculiarities in taste as regards costume have rightly or wrongly
been attributed to inverts,--apart from the tendency of a certain group to
adopt feminine habits,--and may here be mentioned. Tardieu many years ago
referred to the taste for keeping the neck uncovered. This peculiarity may
occasionally be observed among inverts, especially the more artistic among
them. The cause does not appear to be precisely vanity so much as that
physical consciousness which is so curiously marked in inverts, and
induces the more feminine among them to cultivate feminine grace of form,
and the more masculine to emphasize the masculine athletic habit.
It has also been remarked that inverts exhibit a preference for green
garments. In Rome _cinædi_ were for this reason called _galbanati_.
Chevalier remarks that some years ago a band of pederasts at Paris wore
green cravats as a badge. This decided preference for green is well marked
in several of my cases of both sexes, and in some at least the preference
certainly arose spontaneously. Green (as Jastrow and others have shown) is
very rarely the favorite color of adults of the Anglo-Saxon race, though
some inquirers have found it to be more commonly a preferred color among
children, especially girls, and it is more often preferred by women than
by men.[223] The favorite color among normal women, and indeed very often
among normal men, though here not so often as blue, is red, and it is
notable that of recent years there has been a fashion for a red tie to be
adopted by inverts as their badge. This is especially marked among the
"fairies" (as a _fellator_ is there termed) in New York. "It is red,"
writes an American correspondent, himself inverted, "that has become
almost a synonym for sexual inversion, not only in the minds of inverts
themselves, but in the popular mind. To wear a red necktie on the street
is to invite remarks from newsboys and others--remarks that have the
practices of inverts for their theme. A friend told me once that when a
group of street-boys caught sight of the red necktie he was wearing they
sucked their fingers in imitation of _fellatio_. Male prostitutes who walk
the streets of Philadelphia and New York almost invariably wear red
neckties. It is the badge of all their tribe. The rooms of many of my
inverted friends have red as the prevailing color in decorations. Among my
classmates, at the medical school, few ever had the courage to wear a red
tie; those who did never repeated the experiment."
MORAL ATTITUDE OF THE INVERT.--There is some interest in tracing the
invert's own attitude toward his anomaly, and his estimate of its
morality. As my cases are not patients seeking to be cured of their
perversion, this attitude cannot be taken for granted. I have noted the
moral attitude in 57 cases. In 8 the subjects loathe themselves, and have
fought in vain against their perversion, which they often regard as a sin.
Nine or ten are doubtful, and have little to say in justification of their
condition, which they regard as perhaps morbid, a "moral disease." One,
while thinking it right to gratify his natural instincts, admits that they
may be vices. The remainder, a large majority (including all the women)
are, on the other hand, emphatic in their assertion that their moral
position is precisely the same as that of the normally constituted
individual, on the lowest ground a matter of taste, and at least two state
that a homosexual relationship should be regarded as sacramental, a holy
matrimony; two or three even regard inverted love as nobler than ordinary
sexual love; several add the proviso that there should be consent and
understanding on both sides, and no attempt at seduction. The chief regret
of 2 or 3 is the double life they are obliged to lead.
When inverts have clearly faced and realized their own nature it is not so
much, it seems, their conscience that worries them, or even the fear of
the police, as the attitude of the world. An American correspondent
writes: "It is the fear of public opinion that hangs above them like the
sword of Damocles. This fear is the heritage of all of us. It is not the
fear of conscience and is not engendered by a feeling of wrongdoing.
Rather, it is a silent submission to prejudices that meet us on every
side. The true normal attitude of the sexual invert (and I have known
hundreds) with regard to his particular passion is not essentially
different from that of the normal man with regard to his."
It is noteworthy that even when the condition is regarded as morbid, and
even when a life of chastity has, on this account, been deliberately
chosen, it is very rare to find an invert expressing any wish to change
his sexual ideals. The male invert cannot find, and has no desire to find,
any sexual charm in a woman, for he finds all possible charms united in a
man. And a woman invert writes: "I cannot conceive a sadder fate than to
be a woman--an average woman reduced to the necessity of loving a man!"
It will be seen that my conclusions under this head are in striking
contrast to those of Westphal, who believed that every invert regarded
himself as morbid, and probably show a much higher proportion of
self-approving inverts than any previous series.[224] This is largely due
to the fact that the cases were not obtained from the consulting-room, and
that they represent in some degree the intellectual aristocracy of
inversion, including individuals who, often not without severe struggles,
have found consolation in the example of the Greeks, or elsewhere, and
have succeeded in attaining a _modus vivendi_ with the moral world, as
they have come to conceive it.
FOOTNOTES:
[183] The following analysis is based on somewhat fuller versions of my
Histories than it was necessary to publish in the preceding chapters, as
well as on various other Histories which are not here published at all.
Numerous apparent discrepancies may thus be explained.
[184] This frequency of nervous symptoms is in accordance with the most
reliable observation everywhere. Thus, Hirschfeld (_Die Homosexualität_,
p. 177) states that of 500 inverts, 62 per cent. showed nervous symptoms
of one kind or another: sleeplessness, sleepiness, tremors, stammering,
etc.
[185] Hirschfeld finds that 54 per cent, of inverts become conscious of
their anomaly under the age of 14. The anomaly may, however, be present at
this early age, but not consciously until later. Hence the larger
percentage recorded above.
[186] In this connection I may quote an observation by Raffalovich: "It is
natural that the invert should very clearly recall the precocity of his
inclinations. In the existence of every invert a moment arrives when he
discovers the enigma of his homosexual tastes. He then classes all his
recollections, and to justify himself in his own eyes he remembers that he
has been what he is from his earliest childhood. Homosexuality has colored
all his young life; he has thought over it, dreamed over it, reflected
over it--very often in perfect innocence. When he was quite small he
imagined that he had been carried off by brigands, by savages; at 5 or 6
he dreamed of the warmth of their chests and of their naked arms. He
dreamed that he was their slave and he loved his slavery and his masters.
He has had not the least thought that is crudely sexual, but he has
discovered his sentimental vocation."
[187] Leppmann mentions a case (certainly extreme and abnormal) of a
little girl of 8 who spent the night hidden on the roof, merely in order
to be able to observe in the morning the sexual organs of an adult male
cousin (_Bulletin de l'Union Internationale de Droit Pénal_, 1896, p.
118).
[188] I fully admit, as all investigators must, the difficulty of tracing
the influence of early suggestions, especially in dealing with persons who
are unaccustomed to self-analysis. Sometimes it happens, especially in
regard to erotic fetichism, that, while direct questioning fails to reach
any early formative suggestion, such influence is casually elicited on a
subsequent occasion.
[189] I may add that I see no fundamental irreconcilability between the
point of view here adopted and the facts brought forward (and wrongly
interpreted) by Schrenck-Notzing. In his _Beiträge zur Ætiologie der
Conträrer Sexualempfindung_ (Vienna, 1895), this writer states: "The
neuropathic disposition is congenital, as is the tendency to precocious
appearance of the appetites, the lack of psychic resistance, and the
tendency to imperative associations; but that heredity can extend to the
object of the appetite, and influence the contents of these characters, is
not shown. Psychological experiences are against it, and the possibility,
which I have shown, of changing these impulses by experiment and so
removing their danger to the character of the individual." It need not be
asserted that "heredity extends to the object of the appetite," but simply
that heredity culminates in an organism which is sexually best satisfied
by that object. It is also a mistake to suppose that congenital characters
cannot be, in some cases, largely modified by such patient and laborious
processes as those carried on by Schrenck-Notzing. In the same pamphlet
this writer refers to moral insanity and idiocy as supporting his point of
view. It is curious that both these congenital manifestations had
independently occurred to me as arguments against his position. The
experiences of Elmira Reformatory and Bicêtre--not to mention institutions
of more recent establishment--long since showed that both the morally
insane and the idiotic can be greatly improved by appropriate treatment.
Schrenck-Notzing seems to be unduly biased by his interest in hypnotism
and suggestion.
[190] "If an invert acquires, under the influence of external conditions,"
Féré wrote with truth (_L'Instinct Sexuel_, p. 238), "it is because he was
born with an aptitude for such acquisition: an aptitude lacking in those
who have been subjected to the same conditions without making the same
acquisitions."
[191] One of my subjects writes: "Inverts are, I think, naturally more
liable to indulge in self-gratification than normal people, partly because
of the perpetual suppression and disappointment of their desires, and also
because of the fact that they actually possess in themselves the desired
form of the male. This idea is a little difficult of explanation, but you
can readily imagine to what frenzies of self-abuse a normal man would be
impelled supposing that he included in his own the form of the female."
[192] I do not here enter upon the consideration of the normal prevalence
and significance of masturbation and allied phenomena, as I have dealt
with this subject in the study of "Auto-erotism," in volume i of these
_Studies_.
[193] Hirschfeld also finds, among German inverts (_Die Homosexualität_,
ch. iii), that the majority (though a smaller majority than I find in
England and the United States) have not had intercourse with women; 53 per
cent., he states, including a few married men, have never even attempted
coitus, and over 50 per cent, are presumably impotent. The number of
inverted women who have never had intercourse with men is still larger.
[194] Otto Rank, _Imago_, Heft 3, 1913.
[195] Erotic dreams have been discussed in "Auto-erotism," vol. i of these
_Studies_, and the wider bearings of the subject in another work, _The
Study of Dreams_. Many references to the extensive literature will be
found in both these places.
[196] E.g., _Archiv für Psychiatrie_, 1899; _Archiv für
Kriminal-Anthropologie_, 1900.
[197] Hirschfeld, _Die Homosexualität_, p. 71 et seq. Hirschfeld considers
that the dreams of the inverted fall into two groups: one in which the
dreamer imagines he is embracing a person of the same sex, and another in
which he imagines that he is himself of the opposite sex. The latter class
of dreams, constituting a pseudo-heterosexual group, seems to me to be
rare, and they may, moreover, occur in heterosexual persons.
[198] See Thoinot and Weysse, _Medico-legal Aspects of Moral Offenses_,
pp. 165, 291, etc.
[199] _Pedicatio_ (or _pædicatio_) is the most generally accepted
technical term for the sodomitical intromission of the penis into the
anus. It is usually derived from the Greek _pais_ (boy), but some
authorities have derived it from _pedex_ or _podex_ (anus). The terms
"paiderastia" and "pederast" are sometimes used to indicate the same act
and agent. This use, however, is undesirable. It is best to confine the
word "paiderastia" to its proper use as the name of the special
institution of Greek boy love. It may be added that the Greeks themselves
had many names (as many as 74) for paiderastia. See, on this subject of
nomenclature, Iwan Bloch, _Der Ursprung der Syphilis_, vol. ii, pp. 527,
563.
[200] It is the grosser forms of perversion which are first revealed in
every field. In the first edition of this Study the predominance of
_pedicatio_ was still greater; it is not practised by any of the subjects
of the Histories added to the present edition, though several see no
objection to it.
[201] _Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, vol. viii, 1906, p. 712.
[202] Hirschfeld, _Die Homosexualität_, p. 276 et seq.
[203] "Men," remarks Q., "tend to fall in love with boys or youths, boys
or youths with grown men, feminine natures with virile natures and _vice
versâ_, and different races with each other."
[204] Stubbes, in his _Anatomy of Abuses_, affirmed that "players and
play-haunters in their secret conclaves play the Sodomites," and refers to
some recent examples of men who had been desperately enamoured of
player-boys thus clad in women's apparel, so far as to solicit them by
words, by letters, even actually to abuse them. Later on, in 1633, Prynne,
in his _Histrio-Mastix_ (part 1, p. 208 et seq.), strongly condemned "this
putting on of woman's array" by actors on the same ground, and adds that
he has heard credibly reported of a scholar of Balliol College that he was
violently enamoured of a boy-player. In Japan, again where, as in China,
woman's parts on the stage are taken by men (not always youths), the
homosexuality of these players became, during the seventeenth and
eighteenth centuries, so notorious that they constituted a class requiring
special regulation as Joro, or prostitutes.
[205] This was remarked by even the earliest modern writers on
homosexuality, like Hössli. See Hirschfeld, "Vom Wesen der Liebe,"
_Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, vol. viii, 1906, p. 124 et seq.
[206] Similarly Numa Praetorius asserts (_Jahrbuch für sexuelle
Zwischenstufen_, vol. viii, p. 732) that even the most virile homosexual
men exhibit feminine traits, and adds that we could scarcely expect it to
be otherwise when we find how constantly homosexual women show masculine
traits.
[207] Näcke, "Die Diagnose der Homosexualität," _Neurologisches
Centralblatt_, April 16, 1908.
[208] So also among American boarding-school girls. Thus Margaret Otis
(_Journal of Abnormal Psychology_, June, 1913) has described the
attraction which negro girls exert on white girls at school. The
correspondence of these lovers, and sometimes their method of sex
gratification, may occasionally be of an even coarsely passionate nature.
[209] See "Sexual Selection in Man," vol. iv of these _Studies_.
[210] Hirschfeld (_Die Homosexualität_, p. 283) found that 55 per cent. of
inverts are attracted to qualities unlike their own, and 45 per cent. to
qualities resembling their own, without regard to whether these qualities
belonged to the secondary sexual sphere. It may be added that as regards
the age of the persons they are attracted to, Hirschfeld (p. 281) admits
two main groups, each including about 45 per cent. of the homosexual;
_ephebophils_, attracted to youths between 14 and 21, and _androphils_,
attracted to adults in the prime of life. This division, as may be seen
from the histories included in the present volume, seems to hold good of
British and American inverts.
[211] Hirschfeld, _Die Homosexualität_, ch. v.
[212] Krafft-Ebing tells of an inverted physician (a man of masculine
development and tastes) who had had sexual relations with 600 more or less
inverted men. He observed no tendency to sexual malformation among them,
but very frequently an approximation to a feminine form of body, as well
as insufficient hair, delicate complexion, and high voice. Well-developed
breasts were not rare, and some 10 per cent, showed a taste for feminine
occupations.
[213] A similar condition of gynecomasty has been observed in connection
with inversion by Moll, Laurent, Wey, etc. Olano ("La Secrecion Mamaria en
los Invertidos Sexuales," _Archivos de Criminologia_, May, 1902, p. 305)
further observed a certain amount of mammary secretion in an inverted man,
20 years of age, in Lima.
[214] Hirschfeld finds. 7 per cent, inverts left-handed, and 6 per cent,
partly so. Fliess attaches special importance to left-handedness in
inversion, believing that in left-handed men feminine secondary sexual
characters are marked, and in left-handed women masculine sexual character
(_Der Ablauf des Lebens_, 1906). I am not prepared to deny this statement,
but, more evidence is needed.
[215] This point has been discussed by Hirschfeld, _Die Homosexualität_,
pp. 156-8.
[216] Bloch (_The Sexual Life of Our Time_, p. 500) attaches importance to
this peculiarity, but it must be remembered that a high-pitched voice
occurs frequently in undoubtedly heterosexual men in whom it seems often
associated with high intellectual ability (Havelock Ellis, _A Study of
British Genius_, p. 200).
[217] See, e.g., Hirschfeld, _Die Homosexualität_, p. 151.
[218] On the general signs of these conditions, see, e.g., H. Meige,
"L'Infantilisme, Le Féminisme et les Hermaphrodites Antiques,"
_L'Anthropologie_. 1895; also Hastings Gilford, "Infantilism," _Lancet_,
February 28 and March 7, 1914.
[219] Merzbach has dealt with the tendency of inverts to adopt special
professions: "Homosexualität und Beruf," _Jahrbuch für sexuelle
Zwischenstufen_, vol. iv, 1902.
[220] Moll's experience in Germany also reveals the prevalence of
inversion among literary men, though, of all occupations, he found the
highest proportion among actors. Jäger has referred to the frequency of
homosexuality among barbers. I have been told that among London
hairdressers homosexuality is so prevalent that there is even a special
attitude which the client may adopt in the chair to make known that he is
an invert. Dr. Kiernan informs me that in Chicago, also, inversion is
specially prevalent among barbers, and he adds that he is acquainted with
two cases among women-barbers, a relatively large proportion. It is not
difficult to understand this, bearing in mind the close physical
association between the barber and his client. "W.G. was a barber's
assistant," writes one of my subjects, "and I took an immense fancy to him
at first-sight. He used to lather me, and the touch of his fingers was a
delight. Later on he shaved me and I always looked forward to going to the
barber's. If he were not able to attend to me I felt an incredible sinking
of heart. The whole day seemed dull and useless. I used to make a mark in
my pocket-diary every time he shaved me."
[221] See, e.g., "Vom Weibmann auf der Bühne," _Jahrbuch für sexuelle
Zwischenstufen_, vol. iii, 1901, p. 313. It is curious to find a
medico-legal record of this connection long before inversion was
recognized. In June, 1833 (see _Annual Register_ under this date), a man
died who had lived as a kept woman under the name of Eliza Edwards. He was
very effeminate in appearance, with beautiful hair, in ringlets two feet
long, and a cracked voice; he played female parts in the theater, "in the
first line of tragedy," and "appeared as a most lady-like woman." The
coroner's jury "strongly recommended to the proper authorities that some
means may be adopted in the disposal of the body which will mark the
ignominy of the crime."
[222] A. Schmid, "Zur Homosexualität," _Zentralblatt für Psychoanalyse_,
vol. i, 1913, p. 237.
[223] See for a summary of various statistics in several countries,
Havelock Ellis, _Man and Woman_, 5th ed., 1914, p. 174; also ib., "The
Psychology of Red," _Popular Science Monthly_, August and September, 1900.
[224] The proportion is not so large, however, as Hirschfeld (_Die
Homosexualität_, p. 314) now finds in Germany, where inverts are better
informed on the subject of this anomaly, for here 95 per cent. regard
their feelings as natural.
CHAPTER VI.
THE THEORY OF SEXUAL INVERSION.
What is Sexual Inversion?--Causes of Diverging Views--The Theory of
Suggestion Unworkable--Importance of the Congenital Element in
Inversion--The Freudian Theory--Embryonic Hermaphroditism as a Key to
Inversion--Inversion as a Variation or "Sport"--Comparison with
Color-blindness, Color-hearing, and Similar Abnormalities--What is an
Abnormality?--Not Necessarily a Disease--Relation of Inversion to
Degeneration--Exciting Causes of Inversion--Not Operative in the Absence
of Predisposition.
The analysis of these cases leads directly up to a question of the first
importance: What is sexual inversion? Is it, as many would have us
believe, an abominably acquired vice, to be stamped out by the prison? or
is it, as a few assert, a beneficial variety of human emotion which should
be tolerated or even fostered? Is it a diseased condition which qualifies
its subject for the lunatic asylum? or is it a natural monstrosity, a
human "sport," the manifestations of which must be regulated when they
become antisocial? There is probably an element of truth in more than one
of these views. Very widely divergent views of sexual inversion are
largely justified by the position and attitude of the investigator. It is
natural that the police-official should find that his cases are largely
mere examples of disgusting vice and crime. It is natural that the asylum
superintendent should find that we are chiefly dealing with a form of
insanity. It is equally natural that the sexual invert himself should find
that he and his inverted friends are not so very unlike ordinary persons.
We have to recognize the influence of professional and personal bias and
the influence of environment.
There have been two main streams of tendency in the views regarding sexual
inversion: one seeking to enlarge the sphere of the acquired (represented
by Binet,--who, however, recognized predisposition,--Schrenck-Notzing, and
recently the Freudians), the other seeking to enlarge the sphere of the
congenital (represented by Krafft-Ebing, Moll, Féré, and today by the
majority of authorities). There is, as usually happens, truth in both
these views. But, inasmuch as those who represent the acquired view often
deny any congenital element, we are called upon to discuss the question.
The view that sexual inversion is entirely explained by the influence of
early association, or of "suggestion," is an attractive one and at first
sight it seems to be supported by what we know of erotic fetichism, by
which a woman's hair, or foot, or even clothing, becomes the focus of a
man's sexual aspirations. But it must be remembered that what we see in
erotic fetichism is merely the exaggeration of a normal impulse; every
lover is to some extent excited by his mistress's hair, or foot, or
clothing. Even here, therefore, there is really what may fairly be
regarded as a congenital element; and, moreover, there is reason to
believe that the erotic fetichist usually displays the further congenital
element of hereditary neurosis. Therefore, the analogy with erotic
fetichism does not bring much help to those who argue that inversion is
purely acquired. It must also be pointed out that the argument for
acquired or suggested inversion logically involves the assertion that
normal sexuality is also acquired or suggested. If a man becomes attracted
to his own sex simply because the fact or the image of such attraction is
brought before him, then we are bound to believe that a man becomes
attracted to the opposite sex only because the fact or the image of such
attraction is brought before him. Such a theory is unworkable. In nearly
every country of the world men associate with men, and women with women;
if association and suggestion were the only influential causes, then
inversion, instead of being the exception, ought to be the rule throughout
the human species, if not, indeed, throughout the whole zoölogical series.
We should, moreover, have to admit that the most fundamental human
instinct is so constituted as to be equally well adapted for sterility as
for that propagation of the race which, as a matter of fact, we find
dominant throughout the whole of life. We must, therefore, put aside
entirely the notion that the direction of the sexual impulse is merely a
suggested phenomenon; such a notion is entirely opposed to observation and
experience, and will with difficulty fit into a rational biological
scheme.
The Freudians--alike of the orthodox and the heterodox schools--have
sometimes contributed, unintentionally or not, to revive the now
antiquated conception of homosexuality as an acquired phenomenon, and that
by insisting that its mechanism is a purely psychic though unconscious
process which may be readjusted to the normal order by psychoanalytic
methods. Freud first put forth a comprehensive statement of his view of
homosexuality in the original and pregnant little book, _Drei Abhandlungen
zur Sexualtheorie_ (1905), and has elsewhere frequently touched on the
subject, as have many other psychoanalysts, including Alfred Adler and
Stekel, who no longer belong to the orthodox Freudian school. When inverts
are psycho-analytically studied, Freud believes, it is found that in early
childhood they go through a phase of intense but brief fixation on a
woman, usually the mother, or perhaps sister. Then, an internal censure
inhibiting this incestuous impulse, they overcome it by identifying
themselves with women and taking refuge in Narcissism, the self becoming
the sexual object. Finally they look for youthful males resembling
themselves, whom they love as their mothers loved them. Their pursuit of
men is thus determined by their flight from women. This view has been set
forth not only by Freud but by Sadger, Stekel, and many others.[225] Freud
himself, however, is careful to state that this process only represents
one type of stunted sexual activity, and that the problem of inversion is
complex and diversified.
This view may be said to assume a bisexual constitution as
normal, and homosexuality arises by the suppression, owing to
some accident, of the heterosexual component, and the path
through an autoerotic process of Narcissism to homosexuality. On
this general Freudian conception of homosexuality numerous
variations have been based, and separate features specially
emphasized, by individual psychoanalysts. Thus Sadger considers
that, beneath the male individual loved by the invert, a female
is concealed, and that this fact may be revealed by
psychoanalysis which removes the upper layer of the psychic
palimpsest; he believes that this disposition of the invert is
favored by a frequent mixture of male and female traits in his
near relatives; originally, "it is not man whom the homosexual
man loves and desires but man and woman together in one form";
the heterosexual element is later suppressed, and then pure
inversion is left. Further, developing Freud's view of the
importance of anal eroticism (Freud, _Sammlung Kleiner Schriften
zur Neurosenlehre_, vol. ii), Sadger thinks that it is even the
rule for a passive invert to have experienced anal eroticism in
childhood and been frequently subjected to enemas, which have led
to the desire for the anal intromission of the penis.
(_Medizinische Klinik_, 1909, No. 2.) Jekels pushes this doctrine
further and declares that all inverts are really passive; the
invert is, in his love, he states, both subject and object; he
identifies himself with his mother and sees in the object of his
love his own youthful person. And what, Jekels asks, is the aim
of this mental arrangement? It can scarcely by other, he replies,
than in the part of the mother to stimulate the anal region of
the object which has now become himself, and to procure the same
pleasure which in childhood he experienced when his mother
satisfied his anal eroticism. Jekels regards this view as the
continuation and concretization of Freud's interpretation; and
the main point in homosexuality, even when apparently passive,
becomes the craving for anal-erotic satisfaction (L. Jekels,
"Einige Bemerkungen zur Trieblehre," _Internationale Zeitschrift
für Aerztliche Psychoanalyse_, Sept., 1913). Most psychoanalysts
are cautious in denying a constitutional or congenital basis to
inversion, though they leave it in the background. Ferenczi, in
an interesting attempt to classify the homosexual
(_Internationale Zeitschrift für Aerztliche Psychoanalyse_,
March, 1914), remarks: "Psychoanalytic investigation shows that
under the name of homosexuality the most various psychic states
are thrown together, on the one hand true constitutional
anomalies (inversion, or subject homoeroticism), on the other
hand psychoneurotic obsessional conditions (object homoeroticism,
or obsessional homoeroticism). The individual of the first kind
essentially feels himself a woman who wishes to be loved by a
man, while the other represents a neurotic flight from women
rather than sympathy to men." The constitutional basis is very
definitely accepted by Rudolf Ortvay who points out
(_Internationale Zeitschrift für Aerztliche Psychoanalyse_, Jan.,
1914) that the biological doctrine of recessives and dominants in
heredity helps to make clear the emergence or suppression of
homosexuality on a bisexual disposition. "Infantile events," he
adds, "which, according to Freud, decide the sexual relations of
adults, can only exert their operation on the foundation of an
organic predisposition, infantile impressions being determined by
hereditary predisposition." Isador Coriat, on the other hand,
while recognizing two forms of inversion, incomplete and
complete, boldly asserts that it is never congenital and never
transmitted through heredity; it is always "originated through a
definite unconscious mechanism" (Coriat, "Homosexuality," _New
York Medical Journal_, March 22, 1913). Adler's view of
homosexuality, as of other allied conditions, differs from that
of most psychoanalysts by insisting on the presence of an
original organic defect which the subject seeks to fortify into a
point of strength; he accepts two chief components of inversion:
a vagueness as to sexual differences and a process of
self-assurance in the form of rebellion and defiance, and even
the feminism of the invert may become a method of gaining power
(A. Adler, _Ueber den Neurösen Charakter_, 1912, p. 21).
The mechanism of the genesis of homosexuality put forward by Freud need
not be dismissed offhand. Freud has often manifested the insight of
genius, and he refrains from molding his conceptions in those inflexible
shapes which have sometimes been adopted by the more dogmatic
psychoanalysts who have followed him. Nor need we be unduly shocked by the
"incestuous" air of the "Oedipus Complex,"[226] as it is commonly called,
which figures as a component of the process. The word "incest," though it
has been used by Freud himself, seems scarcely a proper word to apply to
the vague and elementary feelings of children, especially when those
feelings scarcely pass beyond a stage of non-localized and therefore
really presexual feelings (in the ordinary use of the term "sexual") which
may be regarded as natural and normal. The Freudian conception is
misrepresented and prejudiced by the statement that it involves
"incest."[227] When a child loves its mother with an entire love, that
love necessarily involves the germs which in later life become separated
and developed into sexual love, but it is inaccurate to term this love of
the child "incestuous." It is quite easily conceivable that the psychic
mechanism of the establishment of homosexuality has in some cases
corresponded to the course described by Freud. It may also be admitted
that, as psychoanalysts claim, the pronounced _horror feminæ_ occasionally
found in male inverts may plausibly be regarded as the reversal of an
early and disappointed feminine attraction. But it is impossible to regard
this mechanism as invariable or even frequent. It is quite true, and I
have found ample evidence of the fact, that inverts are often very closely
attached to their mothers, even to a greater degree, indeed, than is the
rule among normal children, and often like to be in constant association
with their mothers. But this attraction is quite misunderstood if it is
regarded as a peculiarly sexual attraction. Indeed, the whole point of the
attraction is that the inverted boy vaguely feels his own feminine
disposition and so shuns the uncongenial amusements and society of his own
sex for the sympathy and community of tastes which he finds concentrated
in his mother. So far from such association being evidence of sexual
attraction it might more reasonably be regarded as evidence of its
absence; just as the association of boys among themselves, and of girls
among themselves, even in co-educational schools, is proof of the
prevalence of heterosexual rather than of homosexual feeling. Confirmation
of this point of view may be found in the fact--overlooked and sometimes
even denied by psychoanalysts--that frequently, even in early childhood
and simultaneously with this community of feeling with his mother, the
homosexual boy is already experiencing the predominant fascination of the
male. He feels it long before the age at which Narcissism is apt to occur,
or at which self-consciousness has become sufficiently developed to allow
the internal censure on unpermitted emotions to operate, or any flight
from them to take place. Moreover, while most authorities have rarely been
able to find any clear evidence of the sexual attraction of male inverts
in childhood to mother or sister,[228] an attraction of this kind to
father or brother seems less difficult to find, and if found it is
incompatible with the typical Freudian process. In my own observation,
among the Histories here recorded, there are at least two clear examples
of such an attraction in childhood. It must further be said that any
theory of the etiology of homosexuality which leaves out of account the
hereditary factor in inversion cannot be admitted. The evidence for the
frequency of homosexuality among the near relatives of the inverted is now
indisputable. I have traced it in a considerable proportion of cases, and
in many of these the evidence is unquestionable and altogether independent
of the statement of the subject himself, whose opinion may be held to be
possibly biased or unreliable.[229] This hereditary factor seems indeed to
be called for by the Freudian theory itself. On that theory we need to
know how it is that the subject passes through psychic phases, and reaches
an emotional disposition, so unlike that of normal persona. The existence
of a definite hereditary tendency in a homosexual direction removes that
difficulty. Freud himself recognizes this and clearly asserts congenital
psycho-sexual constitution, which must involve predisposition. On a
general survey, therefore, it would appear that, on the psychic side, we
may accept the reality of unconscious dynamic processes which in
particular cases may be of the Freudian or similar type. But while the
study of such mechanisms may illuminate the psychology of homosexuality,
they leave untouched the fundamental organic factors now accepted by most
authorities.[230]
The rational way of regarding the normal sexual instinct is as an inborn
organic impulse, reaching full development about the time of puberty.[231]
During the period of development suggestion and association may come in to
play a part in defining the object of the emotion; the soil is now ready,
but the variety of seeds likely to thrive in it is limited. That there is
a greater indefiniteness in the aim of the sexual impulse at this period
we may well believe. This is shown not only by occasional tentative signs
of sexual emotion directed toward the same sex in childhood, but by the
frequently ideal and unlocalized character of the normal passion even at
puberty. But the channel of sexual emotion is not thereby turned into an
abnormal path. Whenever this happens we are bound to believe--and we have
many grounds for believing--that we are dealing with an organism which
from the beginning is abnormal. The same seed of suggestion is sown in
various soils; in the many it dies out; in the few it flourishes. The
cause can only be a difference in the soil.
If, then, we must postulate a congenital abnormality in order to account
satisfactorily for at least a large proportion of sexual inverts, wherein
does that abnormality consist? Ulrichs explained the matter by saying that
in sexual inverts a male body coexists with a female soul: _anima
muliebris in corpore virile inclusa_. Even writers of scientific eminence,
like Magnan and Gley, have adopted this phrase in a modified form,
considering that in inversion a female brain is combined with a male body
or male glands. This is, however, not an explanation. It merely
crystallizes into an epigram the superficial impression of the
matter.[232]
We can probably grasp the nature of the abnormality better if we reflect
on the development of the sexes and on the latent organic bisexuality in
each sex. At an early stage of development the sexes are
indistinguishable, and throughout life the traces of this early community
of sex remain. The hen fowl retains in a rudimentary form the spurs which
are so large and formidable in her lord, and sometimes she develops a
capacity to crow, or puts on male plumage. Among mammals the male
possesses useless nipples, which occasionally even develop into breasts,
and the female possesses a clitoris, which is merely a rudimentary penis,
and may also develop. The sexually inverted person does not usually
possess any gross exaggeration of these signs of community with the
opposite sex. But, as we have seen, there are a considerable number of
more subtle approximations to the opposite sex in inverted persons, both
on the physical and the psychic side. Putting the matter in a purely
speculative shape, it may be said that at conception the organism is
provided with about 50 per cent. of male germs and about 50 per cent. of
female germs, and that, as development proceeds, either the male or the
female germs assume the upper hand, until in the maturely developed
individual only a few aborted germs of the opposite sex are left. In the
homosexual, however, and in the bisexual, we may imagine that the process
has not proceeded normally, on account of some peculiarity in the number
or character of either the original male germs or female germs, or both,
the result being that we have a person who is organically twisted into a
shape that is more fitted for the exercise of the inverted than of the
normal sexual impulse, or else equally fitted for both.[233]
The conception of the latent bisexuality of all males and females
cannot fail to be fairly obvious to intelligent observers of the
human body. It emerges at an early period in the history of
philosophic thought, and from the first was occasionally used for
the explanation of homosexuality. Plato's myth in the _Banquet_
and the hermaphroditic statues of antiquity show how acute minds,
working ahead of science, exercised themselves with these
problems. (For a fully illustrated study of the ancient
conception of hermaphroditism in sculpture see L.S.A.M. von
Römer, "Ueber die Androgynische Idee des Lebens," _Jahrbuch für
sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, vol. v, 1903, pp. 711-939.) Parmenides,
following Alcmaeon, the philosophic physician who discovered that
the brain is the central organ of intellect, remarks Gomperz
(_Greek Thinkers_, Eng. tr., vol. i, p. 183), used the idea of
variation in the proportion of male and female generative
elements to account for idiosyncrasies of sexual character. After
an immense interval Hössli, the inverted Swiss man-milliner, in
his _Eros_ (1838) put forth the Greek view anew. Schopenhauer,
again from the philosophical side, recognized the bisexuality of
the human individual (see Juliusburger, _Allgemeine Zeitschrift
für Psychiatrie_, 1912, p. 630), and Ulrichs, from 1862 onward,
adopted a similar doctrine, on a Platonic basis, to explain the
"Uranian" constitution. After this the idea began to be more
precisely developed from the scientific side, though not at first
with reference to homosexuality, and more especially by the great
pioneers of the doctrine of Evolution. Darwin emphasized the
significance of the facts on this point, as later Weismann, while
Haeckel, who was one of the earliest Darwinians, has in recent
years clearly recognized the bearing on the interpretation of
homosexuality of the fact that the ancestors of the vertebrates
were hermaphrodites, as vertebrates themselves still are in their
embryonic disposition (Haeckel, in _Jahrbuch für sexuelle
Zwischenstufen_, April, 1913, pp. 262-3, 287). This view had,
however, been set forth at an earlier date by individual
physicians, notably in America by Kiernan (_American Lancet_,
1884, and _Medical Standard_, November and December, 1888), and
Lydston (_Philadelphia Medical and Surgical Reporter_, September,
1889, and _Addresses and Essays_, 1892).
In 1893, in his _L'Inversion Sexuelle_, Chevalier, a pupil of
Lacassagne--who had already applied the term "hermaphrodisme
moral" to this anomaly--explained congenital homosexuality by the
idea of latent bisexuality. Dr. G. de Letamendi, Dean of the
Faculty of Medicine of Madrid, in a paper read before the
International Medical Congress at Rome in 1894, set forth a
principle of panhermaphroditism--a hermaphroditic
bipolarity--which involved the existence of latent female germs
in the male, latent male germs in the female, which latent germs
may strive for, and sometimes obtain, the mastery. In February,
1896, the first version of the present chapter, setting forth the
conception of inversion as a psychic and somatic development on
the basis of a latent bisexuality, was published in the
_Centralblatt für Nervenheilkunde und Psychiatrie_. Kurella (ib.,
May, 1890) adopted a somewhat similar view, even arguing that the
invert is a transitional form between the complete man or woman
and the hermaphrodite. In Germany a patient of Krafft-Ebing had
worked out the same idea, connecting inversion with fetal
bisexuality (eighth edition _Psychopathia Sexualis_, p. 227).
Krafft-Ebing himself at first simply asserted that, whether
congenital or acquired, there must be _Belastung_; inversion is a
"degenerate phenomenon," a functional sign of degeneration
(Krafft-Ebing, "Zur Erklärung der conträren Sexualempfindung,"
_Jahrbuch für Psychiatrie_, 1894). In the later editions of
_Psychopathia Sexualis_, however (1896 and onward and notably in
_Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, vol. iii, 1901), he went
farther, adopting the explanation on the lines of original
bisexuality (English translation of tenth edition, pp. 336-7). In
much the same language as I have used he argued that there has
been a struggle in the centers, homosexuality resulting when the
center antagonistic to that represented by the sexual gland
conquers, and psycho-sexual hermaphroditism resulting when both
centers are too weak to obtain victory, in either case such
disturbance not being a psychic degeneration or disease, but
simply an anomaly comparable to a malformation and quite
consonant with psychic health. This is the view now widely
accepted by investigators of sexual inversion. (Much material
bearing on the history of this conception has been brought
together by Hirschfeld, in _Die Homosexualität_, ch. xix, and
previously in "Vom Wesen der Liebe," _Jahrbuch für sexuelle
Zwischenstufen_, vol. viii, 1906, pp. 111-133.)
A similar or allied view is now constantly met with in writers of
scientific authority who are only incidentally concerned with the
study of sexual inversion. Thus Halban ("Die Entstehung des
Geschlechtscharaktere," _Archiv für Gynäkologie_, 1903) regards
hermaphroditism, which he would extend to the psychic sphere, as
a state in which a double sexual impulse determines the course of
fetal and later development. Shattock and Seligmann ("True
Hermaphroditism in the Domestic Fowl, with Remarks on
Allopterotism," _Transactions of Pathological Society of London_,
vol. lvii, part i, 1906), pointing out that mere atrophy of the
ovary cannot account for the appearance in the hen bird of male
characters which are not retrogressive but progressive, argues
that such birds are really bisexual or hermaphrodite, either by
the single "ovary" being really bisexual, as was the case with a
fowl they examined, or that the sexual glands are paired, one
being male and the other female, or else that there is misplaced
male tissue in a neighboring viscus like the adrenal or kidney,
the male elements asserting themselves when the female elements
degenerate. "Hermaphroditism," they conclude, "far from being a
phenomenon altogether abnormal amongst the higher vertebrates,
should be viewed rather as a reversion to the primitive ancestral
phase in which bisexualism was the normal disposition.... True
hermaphroditism in man being established, the question arises
whether lesser grades do not occur.... Remote evidence of
bisexuality in the human subject may, perhaps, be afforded by the
psychical phenomenon of sexual perversion and inversion."
Similarly in a case of unilateral secondary male character in an
otherwise female pheasant, C.J. Bond has more recently shown
(Section of Zoölogy, Birmingham Meeting of British Medical
Association, _British Medical Journal_, Sept. 20, 1913) that an
ovi-testis was present, with degenerating ovarian tissue and
developing testicular tissue, and such islands of actively
growing male tissue can frequently be found, he states, in the
degenerating ovaries of female birds which have put forth male
plumage. Sir John Bland-Sutton, referring to the fact that the
external conformation of the body affords no positive certainty
as to the nature of the internal sexual glands, adds (_British
Medical Journal_, Oct. 30, 1909): "It is a fair presumption that
some examples of sexual frigidity and sex perversion may be
explained by the possibility that the individuals concerned may
possess sexual glands opposite in character to those indicated by
the external configuration of their bodies." Looking at the
matter more broadly and fundamentally in its normal aspects,
Heape declares (_Proceedings of the Cambridge Philosophical
Society_, vol. xiv, part ii, 1907) that "there is no such thing
as a pure male or female animal, but that all contain a dominant
and recessive sex, except those hermaphrodites in which both
sexes are equally represented.... There seems to me ample
evidence for the conclusion that there is no such thing as a pure
male or female." F.H.A. Marshall, again, in his standard manual,
_The Physiology of Reproduction_ (1910, p. 655 et seq.), is
inclined to accept the same view. "If it be true," he remarks,
"that all individuals are potentially bisexual and that changed
circumstances, leading to a changed metabolism, may, in
exceptional circumstances, even in adult life, cause the
development of the recessive characters, it would seem extremely
probable that the dominance of one set of sexual characters over
the other may be determined in some cases at an early stage of
development in response to a stimulus which may be either
internal or external." So also Berry Hart ("Atypical Male and
Female Sex-Ensemble," a paper read before Edinburgh Obstetrical
Society, _British Medical Journal_, June 20, 1914, p. 1355)
regards the normal male or female as embodying a maximum of the
potent organs of his or her own sex with a minimum of non-potent
organs of the other sex, with secondary sex traits congruent. Any
increase in the minimum gives a diminished maximum and
non-congruence of the secondary characters.
We thus see that the ancient medico-philosophic conception of organic
bisexuality put forth by the Greeks as the key to the explanation of
sexual inversion, after sinking out of sight for two thousand years, was
revived early in the nineteenth century by two amateur philosophers who
were themselves inverted (Hössli, Ulrichs), as well as by a genuine
philosopher who was not inverted (Schopenhauer). Then the conception of
latent bisexuality, independently of homosexuality, was developed from the
purely scientific side (by Darwin and evolutionists generally). In the
next stage this conception was adopted by the psychiatric and other
scientific authorities on homosexuality (Krafft-Ebing and the majority of
other students). Finally, embryologists, physiologists of sex and
biologists generally, not only accept the conception of bisexuality, but
admit that it probably helps to account for homosexuality. In this way the
idea may be said to have passed into current thought. We cannot assert
that it constitutes an adequate explanation of homosexuality, but it
enables us in some degree to understand what for many is a mysterious
riddle, and it furnishes a useful basis for the classification not only
of homosexuality, but of the other mixed or intermediate sexual anomalies
in the same group. The chief of these intermediate sexual anomalies are:
(1) physical hermaphroditism in its various stages; (2) gynandromorphism,
or eunuchoidism, in which men possess characters resembling those of males
who have been early castrated and women possess similarly masculine
characters; (3) sexo-esthetic inversion, or Eonism (Hirschfeld's
transvestism or cross-dressing), in which, outside the specifically sexual
emotions, men possess the tastes of women and women those of men.
Hirschfeld has discussed these intermediate sexual stages in
various works, especially in _Geschlechtsübergänge_ (1905), _Die
Transvestiten_ (1910), and ch. xi of _Die Homosexualität_.
Hermaphroditism (the reality of which has only of late been
recognized and is still disputed) and pseudohermaphroditism; in
their physical variations are fully dealt with in the great work,
richly illustrated, _Hermaphroditismus beim Menschen_, by F.L.
von Neugebauer, of Warsaw. Neugebauer published an earlier and
briefer study of the subject in the _Jahrbuch für sexuelle
Zwischenstufen_ vol. iv, 1902, pp. 1-176, with a bibliography in
vol. viii (1906) of the same _Jahrbuch_, pp. 685-700. Hirschfeld
emphasizes the fact that neither hermaphroditism nor eunuchoidism
is commonly associated with homosexuality, and that a large
proportion of the cases of transvestism, as defined by him, are
heterosexual. True inversion seems, however, to be not
infrequently found among pseudohermaphrodites; Neugebauer records
numerous cases; Magnan has published a case in a girl brought up
as a youth (_Gazette médical de Paris_, March 31, 1911) and
Lapointe a case in a man brought up as a girl (_Revue de
psychiatrie_, 1911, p. 219). Such cases may be accounted for by
the training and associations involved by the early error in
recognition of sex, and perhaps still more by a really organic
predisposition to homosexuality, although the sexual psychic
characters are not necessarily bound up with the coexistence of
corresponding sexual glands. Halban (_Archiv für Gynäkologie_
1903) goes so far as to class the homosexual as "real
pseudohermaphrodites," exactly comparable to a man with a female
breast or a woman with a beard, and proposes to term
homosexuality "pseudohermaphroditus masculinus psychicus." This,
however, is an unnecessary and scarcely satisfactory confusion.
To place the group of homosexual phenomena among other intermediate groups
on the organic bisexual basis is a convenient classification. It can
scarcely be regarded as a complete explanation. It is probable that we may
ultimately find a more fundamental source of these various phenomena in
the stimulating and inhibiting play of the internal secretions.[234] Our
knowledge of the intimate association between the hormones and sexual
phenomena is already sufficient to make such an explanation intelligible;
the complex interaction of the glandular internal secretions and their
liability to varying disturbance in balance may well suffice to account
for the complexity of the phenomena. It would harmonize with what we know
of the occasional delayed manifestations of homosexuality, and would not
clash with their congenital nature, for we know that a disordered state of
the thymus, for instance, may be hereditary, and it is held that status
lymphaticus may be either inborn or acquired.[235] Normal sexual
characters seem to depend largely upon the due co-ordination of the
internal secretions, and it is reasonable to suppose that sexual
deviations depend upon their inco-ordination. If a man is a man, and a
woman a woman, because (in Blair Bell's phrase) of the totality of their
internal secretions, the intermediate stages between the man and the woman
must be due to redistribution of those internal secretions.[236]
We know that various internal secretions possess an influential sexual
effect. Thus the atrophy of the thymus seems to be connected with sexual
development at puberty; the thyroid reinforces the genital glands; adrenal
overdevelopment can produce in a female the secondary characteristics of
the male, as well as cause precocious development of maleness; etc. "An
alteration in the metabolism," as F.H.A. Marshall suggests, "even in
comparatively late life, may initiate changes in the direction of the
opposite sex." Metabolic chemical processes may thus be found to furnish a
key to complex and subtle sexual variations, alike somatic and psychic,
although we must still regard such processes as arising on an inborn
predisposition.
Whatever its ultimate explanation, sexual inversion may thus fairly be
considered a "sport," or variation, one of those organic aberrations which
we see throughout living nature, in plants and in animals.
It is not here asserted, as I would carefully point out, that an inverted
sexual instinct, or organ for such instinct, is developed in early
embryonic life; such a notion is rightly rejected as absurd. What we may
reasonably regard as formed at an early stage of development is strictly a
predisposition; that is to say, such a modification of the organism that
it becomes more adapted than the normal or average organism to experience
sexual attraction to the same sex. The sexual invert may thus be roughly
compared to the congenital idiot, to the instinctive criminal, to the man
of genius, who are all not strictly concordant with the usual biological
variation (because this is of a less subtle character), but who become
somewhat more intelligible to us if we bear in mind their affinity to
variations. Symonds compared inversion to color-blindness; and such a
comparison is reasonable. Just as the ordinary color-blind person is
congenitally insensitive to those red-green rays which are precisely the
most impressive to the normal eye, and gives an extended value to the
other colors,--finding that blood is the same color as grass, and a florid
complexion blue as the sky,--so the invert fails to see emotional values
patent to normal persons, transferring those values to emotional
associations which, for the rest of the world, are utterly distinct. Or we
may compare inversion to such a phenomenon as color-hearing, in which
there is not so much defect as an abnormality of nervous tracks producing
new and involuntary combinations. Just as the color-hearer instinctively
associates colors with sounds, like the young Japanese lady who remarked
when listening to singing, "That boy's voice is red!" so the invert has
his sexual sensations brought into relationship with objects that are
normally without sexual appeal.[237] And inversion, like color-hearing is
found more commonly in young subjects, tending to become less marked, or
to die out, after puberty. Color-hearing, while an abnormal phenomenon, it
must be added, cannot be called a diseased condition, and it is probably
much less frequently associated with other abnormal or degenerative
stigmata than is inversion; there is often a congenital element, shown by
the tendency to hereditary transmission, while the associations are
developed in very early life, and are too regular to be the simple result
of suggestion.[238]
All such organic variations are abnormalities. It is important that we
should have a clear idea as to what an abnormality is. Many people imagine
that what is abnormal is necessarily diseased. That is not the case,
unless we give the word disease an inconveniently and illegitimately wide
extension. It is both inconvenient and inexact to speak of
color-blindness, criminality, and genius as diseases in the same sense as
we speak of scarlet fever or tuberculosis or general paralysis as
diseases. Every congenital abnormality is doubtless due to a peculiarity
in the sperm or oval elements or in their mingling, or to some disturbance
in their early development. But the same may doubtless be said of the
normal dissimilarities between brothers and sisters. It is quite true that
any of these aberrations may be due to antenatal disease, but to call them
abnormal does not beg that question. If it is thought that any authority
is needed to support this view, we can scarcely find a weightier than that
of Virchow, who repeatedly insisted on the right use of the word
"anomaly," and who taught that, though an anomaly may constitute a
predisposition to disease, the study of anomalies--pathology, as he called
it, teratology as we may perhaps prefer to call it--is not the study of
disease, which he termed nosology; the study of the abnormal is perfectly
distinct from the study of the morbid. Virchow considers that the region
of the abnormal is the region of pathology, and that the study of disease
must be regarded distinctly as nosology. Whether we adopt this
terminology, or whether we consider the study of the abnormal as part of
teratology, is a secondary matter, not affecting the right understanding
of the term "anomaly" and its due differentiation from the term "disease."
At the Innsbruck meeting of the German Anthropological Society,
in 1894, Virchow thus expressed himself: "In old days an anomaly
was called pathos, and in this sense every departure from the
norm is for me a pathological event. If we have ascertained such
a pathological event, we are further led to investigate what
_pathos_ was the special cause of it.... This cause may be, for
example, an external force, or a chemical substance, or a
physical agent, producing in the normal condition of the body a
change, an anomaly pathos. This can become hereditary under some
circumstances, and then become the foundation for certain small
hereditary characters which are propagated in a family; in
themselves they belong to pathology, even although they produce
no injury. For I must remark that pathological does not mean
harmful; it does not indicate disease; disease in Greek is nosos,
and it is nosology that is concerned with disease. The
pathological under some circumstances can be advantageous"
(_Correspondenz-blatt Deutsch Gesellschaft für Anthropologie_,
1894). These remarks are of interest when we are attempting to
find the wider bearings of such an anomaly as sexual inversion.
This same distinction has more recently been emphasized by
Professor Aschoff (_Deutsche medizinische Wochenschrift_,
February 3, 1910; of. _British Medical Journal_, April 9, 1910,
p. 892), as against Ribbert and others who would unduly narrow
the conception of pathos. Aschoff points out that, not merely for
the sake of precision and uniformity of terminology but of clear
thinking, it is desirable that we should retain a distinction in
regard to which Galen and the ancient physicians were very
definite. They used pathos as the wider term involving affection
(_affectio_) in general, not necessarily impairment of vital
tissue; when that was involved there was nosos, disease. We have
to recognize the distinction even if we reject the terminology.
A word may be said as to the connection between sexual inversion and
degeneration. In France especially, since the days of Morel, the stigmata
of degeneration are much spoken of. Sexual inversion is frequently
regarded as one of them: i.e., as an episodic syndrome of a hereditary
disease, taking its place beside other psychic stigmata, such as
kleptomania and pyromania. Krafft-Ebing long so regarded inversion; it is
the view of Magnan, one of the earliest investigators of
homosexuality;[239] and it was adopted by Möbius. Strictly speaking, the
invert is degenerate; he has fallen away from the genus. So is a
color-blind person. But Morel's conception of degenerescence has
unfortunately been coarsened and vulgarized.[240] As it now stands, we
gain little or no information by being told that a person is a
"degenerate." It is only, as Näcke constantly argued, when we find a
complexus of well-marked abnormalities that we are fairly justified in
asserting that we have to deal with a condition of degeneration. Inversion
is sometimes found in such a condition. I have, indeed, already tried to
suggest that a condition of diffused minor abnormality may be regarded as
a basis of congenital inversion. In other words, inversion is bound up
with a modification of the secondary sexual characters. But these
anomalies and modifications are not invariable,[241] and are not usually
of a serious character; inversion is rare in the profoundly degenerate. It
is undesirable to call these modifications "stigmata of degeneration," a
term which threatens to disappear from scientific terminology, to become a
mere term of literary and journalistic abuse. So much may be said
concerning a conception or a phrase of which far too much has been made in
popular literature. At the best it remains vague and unfitted for
scientific use. It is now widely recognized that we gain little by
describing inversion as a degeneration. Näcke, who attached significance
to the stigmata of degeneration when numerous, was especially active in
pointing out that inverts are not degenerate, and frequently returned to
this point. Löwenfeld, Freud, Hirschfeld, Bloch, Rohleder all reject the
conception of sexual inversion as a degeneracy.
Moll is still unable to abandon altogether the position that
since inversion involves a disharmony between psychic disposition
and physical conformation we must regard it as morbid, but he
recognizes (like Krafft-Ebing) that it is properly viewed as
being on the level of a deformity, that is, an abnormality,
comparable to physical hermaphroditism. (A. Moll, "Sexuelle
Zwischenstufen," _Zeitschrift für aerztliche Fortbildung_, No.
24, 1904.) Näcke repeatedly emphasized the view that inversion is
a congenital non-morbid abnormality; thus in the last year of his
life he wrote (_Zeitschrift für die Gesamte Neurologie und
Psychiatrie_, vol. xv, Heft 5, 1913): "We must not conceive of
homosexuality as a degeneration or a disease, but at most as an
abnormality, due to a disturbance of development." Löwenfeld,
always a cautious and sagacious clinical observer, agreeing with
Näcke and Hirschfeld, regards inversion as certainly an
abnormality, but not therefore morbid; it may be associated with
disease and degeneration, but is usually simply a variation from
the norm, not to be regarded as morbid or degenerate, and not
diminishing the value of the individual as a member of society
(Löwenfeld, _Ueber die sexuelle Konstitution_, 1911, p. 166; also
_Zeitschrift für Sexualwissenschaft_, Feb., 1908, and
_Sexual-Probleme_, April, 1908). Aletrino of Amsterdam pushes the
view that inversion is a non-morbid abnormality to an undue
extreme by asserting that "the uranist is a normal variety of the
species _Homo sapiens_" ("Uranisme et Dégénérescence," _Archives
d'Anthropologie Criminelle_, Aug.-Sept., 1908); inversion may be
regarded as (in the correct sense of the word here adopted) a
pathological abnormality, but not as an anthropological human
variety comparable to the Negro or the Mongolian man. (For
further opinions in favor of inversion as an anomaly, see
Hirschfeld, _Die Homosexualität_, p. 388 et seq.)
Sexual inversion, therefore, remains a congenital anomaly, to be classed
with other congenital abnormalities which have psychic concomitants. At
the very least such congenital abnormality usually exists as a
predisposition to inversion. It is probable that many persons go through
the world with a congenital predisposition to inversion which always
remains latent and unroused; in others the instinct is so strong that it
forces its own way in spite of all obstacles; in others, again, the
predisposition is weaker, and a powerful exciting cause plays the
predominant part.
We are thus led to the consideration of the causes that excite the latent
predisposition. A great variety of causes has been held to excite to
sexual inversion. It is only necessary to mention those which I have found
influential. The first to come before us is our school-system, with its
segregation of boys and girls apart from each other during the periods of
puberty and adolescence. Many inverts have not been to school at all, and
many who have been pass through school-life without forming any passionate
or sexual relationship; but there remain a large number who date the
development of homosexuality from the influences and examples of
school-life. The impressions received at the time are not less potent
because they are often purely sentimental and without any obvious sensual
admixture. Whether they are sufficiently potent to generate permanent
inversion alone may be doubtful, but, if it is true that in early life the
sexual instincts are less definitely determined than when adolescence is
complete, it is conceivable, though unproved, that a very strong
impression, acting even on a normal organism, may cause arrest of sexual
development on the psychic side.
Another exciting cause of inversion is seduction. By this I mean the
initiation of the young boy or girl by some older and more experienced
person in whom inversion is already developed, and who is seeking the
gratification of the abnormal instinct. This appears to be a not uncommon
incident in the early history of sexual inverts. That such
seduction--sometimes an abrupt and inconsiderate act of mere sexual
gratification--could by itself produce a taste for homosexuality is highly
improbable; in individuals not already predisposed it is far more likely
to produce disgust, as it did in the case of the youthful Rousseau. "He
only can be seduced," as Moll puts it, "who is capable of being seduced."
No doubt it frequently happens in these, as so often in more normal
"seductions," that the victim has offered a voluntary or involuntary
invitation.
Another exciting cause of inversion, to which little importance is usually
attached, but which I find to have some weight, is disappointment in
normal love. It happens that a man in whom the homosexual instinct is yet
only latent, or at all events held in a state of repression, tries to form
a relationship with a woman. This relationship may be ardent on one or
both sides, but--often, doubtless, from the latent homosexuality of the
lover--it comes to nothing. Such love-disappointments, in a more or less
acute form, occur at some time or another to nearly everyone. But in these
persons the disappointment with one woman constitutes motive strong enough
to disgust the lover with the whole sex and to turn his attention toward
his own sex. It is evident that the instinct which can thus be turned
round can scarcely be strong, and it seems probable that in some of these
cases the episode of normal love simply serves to bring home to the invert
the fact that he is not made for normal love. In other cases, it
seems,--especially those that are somewhat feeble-minded and
unbalanced,--a love-disappointment really does poison the normal instinct,
and a more or less impotent love for women becomes an equally impotent
love for men. The prevalence of homosexuality among prostitutes may be, to
a large extent, explained by a similar and better-founded disgust with
normal sexuality.[242]
These three influences, therefore,--example at school, seduction,
disappointment in normal love,--all of them drawing the subject away from
the opposite sex and concentrating him on his own sex, are exciting causes
of inversion; but they require a favorable organic predisposition to act
on, while there are a large number of cases in which no exciting cause at
all can be found, but in which, from earliest childhood, the subject's
interest seems to be turned on his own sex, and continues to be so turned
throughout life.
At this point I conclude the analysis of the psychology of sexual
inversion as it presents itself to me. I have sought only to bring out the
more salient points, neglecting minor points, neglecting also those groups
of inverts who may be regarded as of secondary importance. The average
invert, moving in ordinary society, is a person of average general health,
though very frequently with hereditary relationships that are markedly
neurotic. He is usually the subject of a congenital predisposing
abnormality, or complexus of minor abnormalities, making it difficult or
impossible for him to feel sexual attraction to the opposite sex, and easy
to feel sexual attraction to his own sex. This abnormality either appears
spontaneously from the first, by development or arrest of development, or
it is called into activity by some accidental circumstance.
FOOTNOTES:
[225] See _passim, Jahrbuch für Psychoanalytische Forschungen,
Zentralblatt für Psychoanalyse_, and _Internationale Zeitschrift für
Aerztliche Psychoanalyse_; also Sadger, "Zur Aetiologie der Konträren
Sexualempfindung," _Medizinische Klinik_, 1909, No. 2.
[226] For an exposition of this by an able English representative of
Freudian doctrines, see Ernest Jones, "The Oedipus Complex As An
Explanation of Hamlet's Mystery," _American Journal of Psychology_,
January, 1910.
[227] The love of relations may be tinctured by all degrees of sexual
love, some of which are so faint and vague that they cannot be considered
unnatural or abnormal; it is misleading to term them incestuous. The
Russian novelist, Artzibascheff, in his _Sanine_ described a brother's
affection for his sister as thus touched with a perception of her sexual
charm (I refer to the French translation), and the book has consequently
been much abused as "incestuous," though the attitude described is very
pale and conventional compared to the romantic passion sung in Shelley's
_Laon and Cythna_, or the tragic exaltation of the same passion in Ford's
great play, "_'Tis Pity She's a Whore_."
[228] Thus Numa Praetorius, a sagacious observer with, a very wide and
thorough knowledge of homosexuality, finds himself quite unable to accept
the "Oedipus Complex" explanation of inversion (_Jahrbuch für sexuelle
Zwischenstufen_, July, 1914, p. 362).
[229] It cannot be maintained that the frequency of inversion among the
near relatives of inverts is a chance coincidence, for it must be
remembered that few estimates of the prevalence of inversion yield a
higher proportion than 3 per cent.
[230] See also a discussion of the Freudian view by Hirschfeld, who
concludes (_Die Homosexualität_, p. 344) that we can only accept the
Freudian mechanism as rare, and in all cases subordinate to organic
predisposition.
[231] It has been denied by some (Meynert, Näcke, etc.) that there is any
sexual _instinct_ at all. I may as well, therefore, explain in what sense
I use the word. (See also "Analysis of the Sexual Impulse" in vol. iii of
these _Studies_.) I mean an inherited aptitude the performance of which
normally demands for its full satisfaction the presence of a person of the
opposite sex. It might be asserted that there is no such thing as an
instinct for food, that it is all imitation, etc. In a sense this is true,
but the automatic basis remains. A chicken from an incubator needs no hen
to teach it to eat. It seems to discover eating and drinking, as it were,
by chance, at first eating awkwardly and eating everything, until it
learns what will best satisfy its organic mechanism. There is no instinct
for food, it may be, but there is an instinct which is only satisfied by
food. It is the same with the "sexual instinct." The tentative and
omnivorous habits of the newly hatched chicken may be compared to the
uncertainty of the sexual instinct at puberty, while the sexual pervert is
like a chicken that should carry on into adult age an appetite for worsted
and paper. It may be added here that the question of the hereditary nature
of the sexual instinct has been exhaustively discussed and decisively
affirmed by Moll in his _Untersuchungen über die Libido Sexualis_, 1898.
Moll attaches importance to the inheritance of the normal aptitudes for
sexual reaction in an abnormally weak degree as a factor in the
development of sexual perversions.
[232] This view was revived in a modified form by Näcke (_Zeitschrift für
die gesamte Neurologie und Psychiatrie_, vol. xv, Heft 5, 1913), who
supposed that there may be an anatomical "homosexual center" in the brain;
i.e., a feminine libido-center in the inverted man, and a masculine
libido-center in the inverted woman. He expressed a hope that in the
future the brains of inverted persons would be more carefully
investigated.
[233] I do not present this view as more than a picture which helps us to
realize the actual phenomena which we witness in homosexuality, although I
may add that so able a teratologist as Dr. J.W. Ballantyne considers that
"it seems a very possible theory."
[234] This explanation of homosexuality has already been tentatively put
forth. Thus, Iwan Bloch (_Sexual Life of Our Time_, ch. xix, Appendix)
vaguely suggests a new theory of homosexuality as dependent on chemical
influences. Hirschfeld also believes (_Die Homosexualität_, ch. xx) that
the study of the internal secretions is the path to the deepest
foundations of inversion.
[235] A.E. Garrod, "The Thymus Gland in its Clinical Aspects," _British
Medical Journal_, Oct. 3, 1914
[236] "The pure female and the pure male are produced by all the internal
secretions," Blair Bell, "The Internal Secretions," _British Medical
Journal_, Nov. 15, 1913.
[237] After this chapter was first published (in the _Centralblatt für
Nervenheilkunde_, February, 1896), Féré also compared congenital inversion
to color-blindness and similar anomalies (Féré, "La Descendance d'un
Inverti," _Revue Générale de Clinique et Thérapeutique_, 1896), while
Ribot referred to the analogy with color-hearing (_Psychology of the
Emotions_, part ii, ch. vii).
[238] See, e.g., Flournoy, _Des Phenomènes de Synopsie_, Geneva, 1893; and
for a brief discussion of the general phenomena of synesthesia, E. Parish,
_Hallucinations and Illusions (Contemporary Science Series_), chapter vii;
Bleuler, article "Secondary Sensations," in Tuke's _Dictionary of
Psychological Medicine_; and Havelock Ellis, _Man and Woman_, 5th ed.,
1915, pp. 181-4.
[239] Magnan has in recent years reaffirmed this view ("Inversion Sexuelle
et Pathologic Mentale," _Revue de Psychothérapie_, March, 1914): "The
invert is a diseased person, a degenerate."
[240] It is this fact which has caused the Italians to be shy of using the
word "degeneration;" thus, Marro, in his great work, _I Caratteri del
Delinquenti_, made a notable attempt to analyze the phenomena lumped
together as degenerate into three groups: atypical, atavistic, and morbid.
[241] Hirschfeld and Burchard among 200 inverts found pronounced stigmata
of degeneration in only 16 per cent. (Hirschfeld, _Die Homosexualität_,
ch. xx.)
[242] Alcohol has sometimes been considered an important exciting cause of
homosexuality, and alcoholism is certainly not uncommon in the heredity of
inverts; according to Hirschfeld (_Die Homosexualität_, p. 386) it is well
marked in one of the parents in over 21 per cent, of cases. But it
probably has no more influence as an exciting cause in the individual
homosexual person than in the individual heterosexual person. From the
Freudian standpoint, indeed, Abraham believes (_Zeitschrift für
Sexualwissenschaft_, Heft 8, 1908) that even in normal persons alcohol
removes the inhibition from a latent homosexuality, and Juliusburger from
the same standpoint (_Zentralblatt für Psychoanalyse_, Heft 10 and 11,
1912) thinks that the alcoholic tendency is unconsciously aroused by the
homosexual impulse in order to reach its own gratification. But we may
accept Näcke's conclusions (_Allgemeine Zeitschrift für Psychiatrie_, vol.
lxviii, 1911, p. 852), that (1) alcohol cannot produce homosexuality in
persons not predisposed, that (2) it may arouse it in those who are
predisposed, that (3) the action of alcohol is the same on the homosexual
as the heterosexual, and that (4) alcoholism is not common among inverts.
CHAPTER VII.
CONCLUSIONS.
The Prevention of Homosexuality--The Influence of the
School--Coeducation--The Treatment of Sexual
Inversion--Castration--Hypnotism--Associational
Therapy--Psycho-analysis--Mental and Physical Hygiene--Marriage--The
Children of Inverts--The Attitude of Society--The Horror Aroused by
Homosexuality--Justinian--The _Code Napoléon_--The State of the Law in
Europe Today--Germany--England--What Should be our Attitude toward
Homosexuality?
Having now completed the psychological analysis of the sexual invert, so
far as I have been able to study him, it only remains to speak briefly of
the attitude of society and the law. First, however, a few words as to the
medical and hygienic aspects of inversion. The preliminary question of the
prevention of homosexuality is in too vague a position at present to be
profitably discussed. So far as the really congenital invert is concerned,
prevention can have but small influence; but sound social hygiene should
render difficult the acquisition of homosexual perversity, or what has
been termed pseudo-homosexuality. It is the school which is naturally the
chief theater of immature and temporary homosexual manifestations, partly
because school life largely coincides with the period during which the
sexual impulse frequently tends to be undifferentiated, and partly because
in the traditions of large and old schools an artificial homosexuality is
often deeply rooted.
Homosexuality in English schools has already been briefly
referred to in chapter iii. As a precise and interesting picture
of the phenomena in French schools, I may mention a story by
Albert Nortal, _Les Adolescents Passionnés_ (1913), written
immediately after the author left college, though not published
until more than twenty-five years later, and clearly based on
personal observation and experience. As regards German schools,
see, e.g., Moll, _Untersuchungen über die Libido Sexualis_, p.
449 et seq., and for sexual manifestations in early life
generally, the same author's _Sexual Life of the Child_; also
Hirschfeld, _Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, vol. v,
1903, p. 47 et seq., and, for references, Hirschfeld, _Die
Homosexualität_, p. 46 et seq.
While much may be done by physical hygiene and other means to prevent the
extension of homosexuality in schools,[243] it is impossible, and even
undesirable, to repress absolutely the emotional manifestations of sex in
either boys or girls who have reached the age of puberty.[244] It must
always be remembered that profoundly rooted organic impulses cannot be
effectually combated by direct methods. Writing of a period two centuries
ago, Casanova, in relating his early life as a seminarist trained to the
priesthood, describes the precautions taken to prevent the youths entering
each other's beds, and points out the folly of such precautions.[245] As
that master of the human heart remarks, such prohibitions intensify the
very evil they are intended to prevent by invoking in its aid the impulse
to disobedience natural to every child of Adam and Eve, and the
observation has often been repeated by teachers since. We probably have to
recognize that a way to render such manifestations wholesome, as well as
to prepare for the relationships of later life, is the adoption, so far as
possible, of the method of coeducation of the sexes,[246]--not, of course,
necessarily involving identity of education for both sexes,--since a
certain amount of association between the sexes helps to preserve the
healthiness of the sexual emotional attitude. Association between the
sexes will not, of course, prevent the development of congenital
inversion. In this connection it is pointed out by Bethe that it was
precisely in Sparta and Lesbos, where homosexuality was most ideally
cultivated, that the sexes, so far as we know, associated more freely than
in any other Greek State.[247]
The question of the treatment of homosexuality must be approached with
discrimination, caution, and skepticism. Nowadays we can have but little
sympathy with those who, at all costs, are prepared to "cure" the invert.
There is no sound method of cure in radical cases.
At one time the seemingly very radical method of castration was advocated
and occasionally carried out, as in a case I have recorded in a previous
chapter (History XXVI). Like all methods of treatment, it is sometimes
believed to have been successful by those who carried it out. Usually,
after a short period, it is found to be unsuccessful, and in some cases
the condition, especially the mental condition, is rendered worse. It is
not difficult to understand why this should be. Sexual inversion, is not a
localized genital condition. It is a diffused condition, and firmly
imprinted on the whole psychic state. There may be reasons for castration,
or the slighter operation of vasectomy, but, although sexual tension may
be thereby diminished, no authority now believes that any such operation
will affect the actual inversion. Castration of the body in adult age
cannot be expected to produce castration of the mind. Moll, Féré, Näcke,
Bloch, Rohleder, Hirschfeld, are all either opposed to castration for
inversion, or very doubtful as to any beneficial results.
In a case communicated to me by Dr. Shufeldt, an invert had
himself castrated at the age of 26 to diminish sexual desire,
make himself more like a woman, and to stop growth of beard. "But
the only apparent physical effect," he wrote, "was to increase my
weight 10 per cent., and render me a semi-invalid for the rest
of my life. After two years my sexuality decreased, but that may
have been due to satiety or to advancing years. I was also
rendered more easily irritated over trifles and more revengeful.
Terrible criminal auto-suggestions came into my head, never
experienced before." Féré (_Revue de Chirurgie_, March 10, 1905)
published the case of an invert of English origin who had been
castrated. The inverted impulse remained unchanged, as well as
sexual desire and the aptitude for erection; but neurasthenic
symptoms, which had existed before, were aggravated; he felt less
capable to resist his impulses, became migratory in his habits of
life, and addicted to the use of laudanum. In a case recorded by
C.H. Hughes (_Alienist and Neurologist_, Aug., 1914) the results
were less unsatisfactory; in this case the dorsal nerve of the
penis was first excised, without any result (see also _Alienist
and Neurologist_, Feb., 1904, p. 70, as regards worse than
useless results of cutting the pudic nerve), and a year or so
later the testes were removed and the patient gained tranquillity
and satisfaction; his homosexual inclinations appeared to go, and
he began to show inclination for asexualized women, being
specially anxious to meet with a woman whose ovaries had been
removed on account of inversion. (Reference may also be made to
Näcke, "Die Ersten Kastrationen aus sozialen Grunden auf
europäischen Boden," _Neurologisches Centralblatt_, 1909, No. 5,
and E. Wilhelm in _Juristisch-psychiatrische Grenzfragen_, vol.
viii, Heft 6 and 7, 1911.)
More trust has usually been placed in the psychotherapeutical than the
surgical treatment of homosexuality. At one time hypnotic suggestion was
carried out very energetically on homosexual subjects. Krafft-Ebing seems
to have been the first distinguished advocate of hypnotism for application
to the homosexual. Dr. von Schrenck-Notzing displayed special zeal and
persistency in this treatment. He undertook to treat even the most
pronounced cases of inversion by courses lasting more than a year, and
involving, in at least one case, nearly one hundred and fifty hypnotic
sittings; he prescribed frequent visits to the brothel, previous to which
the patient took large doses of alcohol; by prolonged manipulations a
prostitute endeavored to excite erection, a process attended with varying
results. It appears that in some cases this course of treatment was
attended by a certain sort of success, to which an unlimited good will on
the part of the patient, it is needless to say, largely contributed. The
treatment was, however, usually interrupted by continual backsliding to
homosexual practices, and sometimes, naturally, the cure involved a
venereal disorder. The patient was enabled to marry and to beget
children.[248] It is a method of treatment which seems to have found few
imitators. This we need not regret. The histories I have recorded in
previous chapters show that it is not uncommon for even a pronounced
invert to be able sometimes to effect coitus. It often becomes easy if at
the time he fixes his thoughts on images connected with his own sex. But
the perversion remains unaffected; the subject is merely (as one of Moll's
inverts expressed it) practising masturbation _per vaginam_. Such
treatment is a training in vice, and, as Raffalovich points out, the
invert is simply perverted and brought down to the vicious level which
necessarily accompanies perversity.[249]
There can be no doubt that in slight and superficial cases of
homosexuality, suggestion may really exert an influence. We can scarcely
expect it to exert such influence when the homosexual tendency is deeply
rooted in an organic inborn temperament. In such cases indeed the subject
may resist suggestion even when in the hypnotic state. This is pointed out
by Moll, a great authority on hypnotism, and with much experience of its
application to homosexuality, but never inclined to encourage an
exaggerated notion of its efficacy in this field. Forel, who was also an
authority on hypnotism, was equally doubtful as to its value in relation
to inversion, especially in clearly inborn cases. Krafft-Ebing at the end
said little about it, and Näcke (who was himself without faith in this
method of treating inversion) stated that he had been informed by the
last homosexual case treated by Krafft-Ebing by hypnotism that, in spite
of all good-will on the patient's side, the treatment had been quite
useless. Féré, also, had no belief in the efficacy of suggestive
treatment, nor has Merzbach, nor Rohleder. Numa Praetorius states that the
homosexual subjects he is acquainted with, who had been so treated, were
not cured, and Hirschfeld remarks that the inverts "cured" by hypnotism
were either not cured or not inverted.[250]
Moll has shown his doubt as to the wide applicability of suggestive
therapeutics in homosexuality by developing in recent years what he terms
association-therapy. In nearly all perverse individuals, he points out,
there is a bridge,--more or less weak, no doubt,--which leads to the
normal sexual life. By developing such links of association with
normality, Moll believes, it may be possible to exert a healing influence
on the homosexual. Thus a man who is attracted to boys may be brought to
love a boyish woman.[251] Indications of this kind have long been observed
and utilized, though not developed into a systematic method of treatment.
In the case of bisexual individuals, or of youthful subjects whose
homosexuality is not fully developed, it is probable that this method is
beneficial. It is difficult to believe, however, that it possesses any
marked influence on pronounced and developed cases of inversion.[252]
Somewhat the same aim as Moll's association-therapy, though on the basis
of a more elaborate theory, is sought by Freud's psychoanalytic method of
treating homosexuality. For the psychoanalytic theory (to which reference
was made in the previous chapter) the congenital element of inversion is a
rare and usually unimportant factor; the chief part is played by perverse
psychic mechanisms. It is the business of psychoanalysis to straighten
these out, and from the bisexual constitution, which is regarded as common
to every one, to bring into the foreground the heterosexual elements, and
so to reconstruct a normal personality, developing new sexual ideals from
the patient's own latent and subconscious nature. Sadger has especially
occupied himself with the psychoanalytic treatment of homosexuality and
claims many successes.[253] Sadger admits that there are many limits to
the success of this treatment, and that it cannot affect the inborn
factors of homosexuality when present. Other psychoanalysts are less
sanguine as to the cure of inversion. Stekel appears to have stated that
he has never seen a complete cure by psychoanalysis, and Ferenezi is not
able to give a good account of the results; especially as regards what he
terms obsessional homosexuality, he states that he has never succeeded in
effecting a complete cure, although obsessions in general are especially
amenable to psychoanalysis.[254]
I have met with at least two homosexual persons who had undergone
psychoanalytic treatment and found it beneficial. One, however, was
bisexual, so that the difficulties in the way of the success--granting it
to be real--were not serious. In the other case, the inversion persisted
after treatment, exactly the same as before. The benefit he received was
due to the fact that he was enabled to understand himself better and to
overcome some of his mental difficulties. The treatment, therefore, in his
case, was not a method of cure, but of psychic hygiene, of what Hirschfeld
would call "adaptation-therapy." There can be no doubt that--even if we
put aside all effort at cure and regard an invert's condition as inborn
and permanent--a large and important field of treatment here still
remains.
As we have seen in the two previous chapters, sexual inversion cannot be
regarded as essentially an insane or psychopathic state.[255] But it is
frequently associated with nervous conditions which may be greatly
benefited by hygiene and treatment, without any attempt at all to overcome
a homosexual attitude which may be too deeply rooted to be changed. The
invert is specially liable to suffer from a high degree of neurasthenia,
often involving much nervous weakness and irritability, loss of
self-control, and genital hyperesthesia.[256] Hirschfeld finds that over
67 per cent. inverts suffer from nervous troubles, and among the cases
dealt with in the present _Study_ (as shown in chapter v) slight nervous
functional disturbances are very common. These are conditions which may be
ameliorated, and they may be treated in much the same way as if no
inversion existed, by physical and mental tonics; or, if necessary,
sedatives; by regulated gymnastics and out-of-door exercises; and by
occupations which employ, without overexerting, the mind. Very great and
permanent benefit may be obtained by a prolonged course of such mental and
physical hygiene; the associated neurasthenic conditions may be largely
removed, with the morbid fears, suspicions, and irritabilities that are
usually part of neurasthenia, and the invert may be brought into a fairly
wholesome and tonic condition of self-control.
The inversion is not thus removed. But if the patient is still young, and
if the perversion does not appear to be deeply rooted in the organism, it
is probable that--provided his own good-will is aiding--general hygienic
measures, together with removal to a favorable environment, may gradually
lead to the development of the normal sexual impulse. If it fails to do
so, it becomes necessary to exercise great caution in recommending
stronger methods. Purely "Platonic association with the other sex," Moll
points out, "leads to better results than any prescribed attempt at
coitus." For even when such attempt is successful, it is not usually
possible to regard the results with much satisfaction. Not only is the
acquisition of the normal instinct by an invert very much on a level with
the acquisition of a vice, but probably it seldom succeeds in eradicating
the original inverted instinct.[257] What usually happens is that the
person becomes capable of experiencing both impulses,--not a specially
satisfactory state of things. It may be disastrous, especially if it leads
to marriage, as it may do in an inverted man or still more easily in an
inverted woman. The apparent change does not turn out to be deep, and the
invert's position is more unfortunate than his original position, both for
himself and for his wife.[258]
It may be observed in the Histories brought forward in chapter iii that
the position of married inverts (we must, of course, put aside the
bisexual) is usually more distressing than that of the unmarried. Among my
cases 14 per cent. are married. Hirschfeld finds that 16 per cent. of
inverts are married and 50 per cent. are impotent; he is unable to find a
single cure of homosexuality, and seldom any improvement, due to marriage;
nearly always the impulse remains unaffected. The invert's happiness is,
however, often affected for the worse, and not least by the feeling that
he is depriving his wife of happiness. An invert, who had left his country
through fear of arrest and married a rich woman who was in love with him,
said to Hirschfeld: "Five years' imprisonment would not have been worse
than one year of marriage."[259] In a marriage of this kind the homosexual
partner and the normal partner--however ignorant of sexual matters--are
both conscious, often with equal pain, that, even in the presence of
affection and esteem and the best will in the world, there is something
lacking. The instinctive and emotional element, which is the essence of
sexual love and springs from the central core of organic personality,
cannot voluntarily be created or even assumed.[260]
For the sake of the possible offspring, also, marriage is to be avoided.
It is sometimes entirely for the sake of children that the invert desires
to marry. But it must be pointed out that homosexuality is undoubtedly in
many cases inherited. Often, it is true, the children turn out fairly
well, but, in many cases, they bear witness that they belong to a neurotic
and failing stock;[261] Hirschfeld goes so far as to say that it is always
so, and concludes that from the eugenic standpoint the marriage of a
homosexual person is always very risky. In a large number of cases such
marriages prove sterile. The tendency to sexual inversion in eccentric and
neurotic families seems merely to be nature's merciful method of winding
up a concern which, from her point of view, has ceased to be profitable.
As a rule, inverts have no desire to be different from what they
are, and, if they have any desire for marriage, it is usually
only momentary. Very pathetic appeals for help are, however,
sometimes made. I may quote from a letter addressed to me by a
gentleman who desired advice on this matter: "In part, I write to
you as a moralist and, in part, as to a physician. Dr. Q. has
published a book in which, without discussion, hypnotic treatment
of such cases was reported as successful. I am eager to know if
your opinion remains what it was. This new assurance comes from a
man whose moral firmness and delicacy are unquestionable, but you
will easily imagine how one might shrink from the implantation of
new impulses in the unconscious self, since newly created
inclinations might disturb the conditions of life. At any rate,
in my ignorance of hypnotism I fear that the effort to give the
normal instinct might lead to marriage without the assurance that
the normal instinct would be stable. I write, therefore, to
explain my present condition and crave your counsel. It is with
the greatest reluctance that I reveal the closely guarded secret
of my life. I have no other abnormality, and have not hitherto
betrayed my abnormal instinct. I have never made any person the
victim of passion: moral and religious feelings were too
powerful. I have found my reverence for other souls a perfect
safeguard against any approach to impurity. I have never had
sexual interest in women. Once I had a great friendship with a
beautiful and noble woman, without any mixture of sexual feeling
on my part. I was ignorant of my condition, and I have the bitter
regret of having caused in her a hopeless love--proudly and
tragically concealed to her death. My friendships with men,
younger men, have been colored by passion, against which I have
fought continually. The shame of this has made life a hell, and
the horror of this abnormality, since I came to know it as such,
has been an enemy to my religious faith. Here there could be no
case of a divinely given instinct which I was to learn to use in
a rational and chaste fashion, under the control of spiritual
loyalty. The power which gave me life seemed to insist on my
doing that for which the same power would sting me with remorse.
If there is no remedy I must either cry out against the injustice
of this life of torment between nature and conscience, or submit
to the blind trust of baffled ignorance. If there is a remedy
life will not seem to be such an intolerable ordeal. I am not
pleading that I must succumb to impulse. I do not doubt that a
pure celibate life is possible so far as action is concerned. But
I cannot discover that friendship with younger men can go on
uncolored by a sensuous admixture which fills me with shame and
loathing. The gratification of passion--normal or abnormal--is
repulsive to esthetic feeling. I am nearly 42 and I have always
diverted myself from personal interests that threatened to become
dangerous to me. More than a year ago, however, a new fate seemed
to open to my unhappy and lonely life. I became intimate with a
young man of 20, of the rarest beauty of form and character. I am
confident that he is and always has been pure. He lives an
exalted moral and religious life dominated by the idea that he
and all men are partners of the divine nature, and able in the
strength of that nature to be free from evil. I believe him to be
normal. He shows pleasure in the society of attractive young
women and in an innocent, light-hearted way refers to the time
when he may be able to marry. He is a general favorite, but
turned to me as to a friend and teacher. He is poor, and it was
possible for me to guarantee him a good education. I began to
help him from the longings of a lonely life. I wanted a son and
a friend in my inward desolation. I craved the companionship of
this pure and happy nature. I felt such a reverence for him that
I hoped to find the sensuous element in me purged away by his
purity. I am, indeed, utterly incapable of doing him harm; I am
not morally weak; nevertheless the sensuous element is there, and
it poisons my happiness. He is ardently affectionate and
demonstrative. He spends the summers with me in Europe, and the
tenderness he feels for me has prompted him at times to embrace
and kiss me as he always has done to his father. Of late I have
begun to fear that without will or desire I may injure the
springs of feeling in him, especially if it is true that the
homosexual tendency is latent in most men. The love he shows me
is my joy, but a poisoned joy. It is the bread and wine of life
to me; but I dare not think what his ardent affection might ripen
into. I can go on fighting the battle of good and evil in my
attachment to him, but I cannot define my duty to him. To shun
him would be cruelty and would belie his trust in human fidelity.
Without my friendship he will not take my money--the condition of
a large career. I might, indeed, explain to him what I explain to
you, but the ordeal and shame are too great, and I cannot see
what good it would do. If he has the capacity of homosexual
feeling he might be violently stimulated; if he is incapable of
it, he would feel repulsion.
"Suppose, then, that I should seek hypnotic treatment, I still do
not know what tricks an abnormal nature might play me when
diverted by suggestion. I might lose the joy of this friendship
without any compensation. I am afraid; I am afraid! Might I not
be influenced to shun the only persons who inspire unselfish
feeling?
"Bear with this account of my story. Many virtues are easy for
me, and my life is spent in pursuits of culture. Alas, that all
the culture with which I am credited, all the prayers and
aspirations, all the strong will and heroic resolves have not rid
my nature of this evil bent! What I long for is the right to
love, not for the mere physical gratification, for the right to
take another into the arms of my heart and profess all the
tenderness I feel, to find my joy in planning his career with
him, as one who is rightfully and naturally entitled to do so. I
crave this since I cannot have a son. I leave the matter here.
"When I read what I have written I see how pointless it is. It is
possible, indeed, that brooding over my personal calamity
magnifies in my mind the sense of danger to this friend through
me, and that I only need to find the right relation of
friendliness coupled with aloofness which will secure him against
any too ardent attachment. Certainly I have no fear that I shall
forget myself. Yet two things array themselves on the other
side: I rebel inwardly against the necessity of isolating myself
as if I were a pestilence, and I rebel against the taint of
sensuous feeling. The normal man can feel that his instinct is no
shame when the spirit is in control. I know that to the
consciousness of others my instinct itself would be a shame and a
baseness, and I have no tendency to construct a moral system for
myself. I have, to be sure, moments when I declare to myself that
I will have my sensuous gratification as well as other men, but,
the moment I think of the wickedness of it, the rebellion is soon
over. The disesteem of self, the sense of taint, the necessity of
withdrawing from happiness lest I communicate my taint, that is a
spiritual malady which makes the ground-tone of my existence one
of pain and melancholy. Should you have only some moral
consolation without the promise of medical assistance I should
feel grateful."
In such a case as this, one can do little more than advise the
sufferer that, however painful his lot may be, it is not without
its consolations, and that he would be best advised to pursue, as
cheerfully as may be, the path that he has already long since
marked out for himself. The invert sometimes fails to realize
that for no man with high moral ideals, however normal he may be,
is the conduct of life easy, and that if the invert has to be
satisfied with affection without passion, and to live a life of
chastity, he is doing no more than thousands of normal men have
done, voluntarily and contentedly. As to hypnotism in such a case
as this, it is altogether unreasonable to expect that suggestion
will supplant the deeply rooted organic impulses that have grown
up during a lifetime.
We may thus conclude that in the treatment of inversion the most
satisfactory result is usually obtained when it is possible by direct and
indirect methods to reduce the sexual hyperesthesia which frequently
exists, and by psychic methods to refine and spiritualize the inverted
impulse, so that the invert's natural perversion may not become a cause of
acquired perversity in others. The invert is not only the victim of his
own abnormal obsession, he is the victim of social hostility. We must seek
to distinguish the part in his sufferings due to these two causes. When I
review the cases I have brought forward and the mental history of inverts
I have known, I am inclined to say that if we can enable an invert to be
healthy, selfrestrained and selfrespecting, we have often done better than
to convert him into the mere feeble simulacrum of a normal man. An appeal
to the _paiderastia_ of the best Greek days, and the dignity, temperance,
even chastity, which it involved, will sometimes find a ready response in
the emotional, enthusiastic nature of the congenital invert. Plato's
Dialogues have frequently been found a source of great help and
consolation by inverts. The "manly love" celebrated by Walt Whitman in
_Leaves of Grass_, although it may be of more doubtful value for general
use, furnishes a wholesome and robust ideal to the invert who is
insensitive to normal ideals.[262]
Among recent books, _Ioläus: An Anthology of Friendship_, edited
by Edward Carpenter, may be recommended. A similar book in
German, of a more extended character, is _Lieblingminne und
Freudesliebe in der Weltliteratur_, edited by Elisár von Kupffer.
Mention may also be made of the _Freundschaft_ (1912) of Baron
von Gleichen-Russwurm, a sort of literary history of friendship,
without specific reference to homosexuality, although many
writers of inverted tendency are introduced. Platen's
_Tagebücher_ are notable as the diary of an invert of high
character and ideals. The volumes of the _Jahrbuch für sexuelle
Zwischenstufen_ contain many studies bearing on the ideal and
esthetic aspects of homosexuality.
Various modern poets of high ability have given expression to
emotions of exalted or passionate friendship toward individuals
of the same sex, whether or not such friendship can properly be
termed homosexual. It is scarcely necessary to refer to _In
Memoriam_, in which Tennyson enshrined his affection for his
early friend, Arthur Hallam, and developed a picture of the
universe on the basis of that affection. The poems of Edward
Cracroft Lefroy are notable, and Mr. John Gambril Nicholson has
privately issued several volumes of verse (_A Chaplet of
Southernwood, A Garland of Ladslove_, etc.) showing delicate
charm combined with high technical skill. Some books mainly or
entirely written in prose may fairly be included in the same
group. Such are _In the Key of Blue_, by John Addington Symonds,
and the _Memoirs of Arthur Hamilton_ (published anonymously by a
well-known author, A.C. Benson), in which on somewhat Platonic
lines the idea is worked out that the individual sufferer must
pass "from the love of one fair form to the love of abstract
beauty" and "from the contemplation of his own suffering to the
consideration of the root of all human suffering."
As regards the modern poetic literature of feminine homosexuality
there is probably nothing to put beside the various
volumes--pathetic in their brave simplicity and sincerity--of
"Renée Vivien" (see _ante_, p. 200). Most other feminine singers
of homosexuality have cautiously thrown a veil of heterosexuality
over their songs.
Novels of a more or less definitely homosexual tone are now very
numerous in English, French, German, and other languages. In
English the homosexuality is for the most part veiled and the
narrative deals largely with school-life and boys in order that
the emotional and romantic character of the relations described
may appear more natural. Thus _Tim_, an anonymously published
book by H.O. Sturgis (1891), described the devotion of a boy to
an older boy at Eton and his death at an early age. _Jaspar
Tristram_, by A.W. Clarke (1899), again, is a well-written story
of a schoolboy friendship of homosexual tone; a boy is
represented as feeling attraction to boys who are like girls, and
a girl became attractive to the hero because she is like a boy
and recalls her brother whom he had formerly loved. _The Garden
God: A Tale of Two Boys_, by Forrest Reid (1905), is another
rather similar book, in its way a charming and delicately written
idyll. _Imre: A Memorandum_, (1906), by "Xavier Mayne" (the
pseudonym of an American author, who has also written _The
Intersexes_), privately issued at Naples, is a book of a
different class; representing the frankly homosexual passion of
two mutually attracted men, an Englishman who is supposed to
write the story and a Hungarian officer; it embodies a notable
narrative of homosexual development which is probably more or
less real.
In French there are a number of novels dealing with
homosexuality, sometimes sympathetically, sometimes with artistic
indifference, sometimes satirically. André Gide (in
_L'Immoraliste_ and other books), Rachilde (Madame Vallette),
Willy (in the well-known _Claudine_ series) may be mentioned,
among other writers of more or less distinction, who have once or
oftener dealt with homosexuality. Special reference should be
made to the Belgian author George Eekhoud, whose _Escal-Vigor_
(prosecuted at Bruges on its publication) is a book of special
power. The homosexual stories of Essebac, of which _L'Elu_
(1902) is considered the best, are of a romantic and sentimental
character. _Lucien_ (1910), by Binet-Valmer, is a penetrating and
scarcely sympathetic study of inversion. Nortal's _Les
Adolescents Passionnés_ (already mentioned, p. 325) is a notably
intimate and precise study of homosexuality in French schools. It
would be easy to mention many others.
In Germany during recent years many novels of homosexual
character have been published. They are not usually, it would
seem, of high literary character, but are sometimes notable as
being more or less disguised narratives of real fact. Body's _Aus
Eines Mannes Mädchenjahren_ is said to be a faithful
autobiography. _Der Neue Werther: eine Hellenische
Passions-geschichte_ by Narkissos (1902) is also said to be
authentic. Another book that may be mentioned is Konradin's _Ein
Junger Platos: Aus dem Leben eines Entgbeistes_ (1914). The
German belletristic literature of homosexuality, as well as that
of other countries, will be found adequately summarized and
criticised by Numa Praetorius in the volumes of the _Jahrbuch für
sexuelle Zwischenstufen_. See also Hirschfeld's _Die
Homosexualität_, pp. 47 and 1018 et seq.
It is by some such method of self-treatment as this that most of the more
highly intelligent men and women whose histories I have already briefly
recorded have at last slowly and instinctively reached a condition of
relative health and peace, both physical and moral. The method of
self-restraint and self-culture, without self-repression, seems to be the
most rational method of dealing with sexual inversion when that condition
is really organic and deeply rooted. It is better that a man should be
enabled to make the best of his own strong natural instincts, with all
their disadvantages, than that he should be unsexed and perverted, crushed
into a position which he has no natural aptitude to occupy. As both
Raffalovich and Féré have insisted, it is the ideal of chastity, rather
than of normal sexuality, which the congenital invert should hold before
his eyes. He may not have in him the making of _l'homme moyen sensuel_; he
may have in him the making of a saint.[263] What good work in the world
the inverted may do is shown by the historical examples of distinguished
inverts; and, while it is certainly true that these considerations apply
chiefly to the finer-grained natures, the histories I have brought
together suffice to show that such natures constitute a considerable
proportion of inverts. The helplessly gross sexual appetite cannot thus be
influenced; but that remains true whether the appetite is homosexual or
heterosexual, and nothing is gained by enabling it to feed on women as
well as on men.
A strictly ascetic life, it needs scarcely be said, is with difficulty
possible for all persons, either homosexual or heterosexual. It is,
however, outside the province of the physician to recommend his inverted
patients to live according to their homosexual impulses, even when those
impulses seem to be natural to the person displaying them. The most that
the physician is entitled to do, it seems to me, is to present the
situation clearly, and leave to the patient a decision for which he must
himself accept the responsibility. Forel goes so far as to say that he
sees no reason why inverts should not build cities of their own and marry
each other if they so please, since they can do no harm to normal adults,
while children can be protected from them.[264] Such notions are, however,
too far removed from our existing social conventions to be worth serious
consideration.
The standpoint here taken up, it may be remarked, by no means
denies to the invert a right to the fulfillment of his impulses.
Numa Praetorius remarks, it would seem justly, that while the
invert must properly be warned against unnatural sexual license,
and while those who are capable of continence do well to preserve
it, to deny all right to sexual activity to the invert merely
causes those inverts who are incapable of self-control to throw
recklessly aside all restraints (_Zeitschrift für sexuelle
Zwischenstufen_, vol. viii, 1906, p. 726). The invert has the
right to sexual indulgence, it may be, but he has also the duty
to accept the full responsibility for his own actions, and the
necessity to recognize the present attitude of the society he
lives in. He cannot be advised to set himself in violent
opposition to that society.
The world will not be a tolerable place for pronounced inverts
until they are better understood, and that will involve a radical
change in general and even medical opinion. An inverted
physician, of high character and successful in his profession,
writes to me on this point: "The first, and easiest, thing to do,
it seems to me, is to convince the medical profession that we
unfortunate people are not only as sane, but as moral, as our
normal brothers; and that we are even more alive to the supreme
necessity of self-control (necessary from every point of view)
than they. It is not license we want, but justice; it is the
cruelty and prejudice of convention which we wish to abolish--not
the proper and just indignation of society with crimes against
the social order. We want to make it possible for us to satisfy
our inborn instincts (which are not concerned essentially with
sexual acts, so called, alone) without thereby becoming
criminals. One of us who would, under any circumstances, seduce a
person of his own sex of immature age, and particularly one whose
sexual complexion was unknown, deserves the severe punishment
which would be meted out to a normal person who did the same to a
young girl--_but no more_; while, so long as no public offense is
given, there should be _no penalty or obloquy whatever_ attached
to sexual acts committed with full consent between mature
persons. These acts may or may not be wrong and immoral, just as
sexual acts between mature persons of different sexes may or may
not be wrong or immoral. But in neither case has the law any
concern; and public opinion should make no distinction between
the two. It is in the highest degree important that it should be
clearly understood that we want no relaxation of moral
obligations. At present we suffer an inconceivably cruel wrong."
We have always to remember, and there is, indeed, no possibility of
forgetting, that the question of homosexuality is a social question.
Within certain limits, the gratification of the normal sexual impulse,
even outside marriage, arouses no general or profound indignation; and is
regarded as a private matter; rightly or wrongly, the gratification of the
homosexual impulse is regarded as a public matter. This attitude is more
or less exactly reflected in the law. Thus it happens that whenever a man
is openly detected in a homosexual act, however exemplary his life may
previously have been, however admirable it may still be in all other
relations, every ordinary normal citizen, however licentious and
pleasure-loving his own life may be, feels it a moral duty to regard the
offender as hopelessly damned and to help in hounding him out of society.
At very brief intervals cases occur, and without reaching the newspapers
are more or less widely known, in which distinguished men in various
fields, not seldom clergymen, suddenly disappear from the country or
commit suicide in consequence of some such exposure or the threat of it.
It is probable that many obscure tragedies could find their explanation in
a homosexual cause.
Some of the various tragic ways in which homosexual passions are
revealed to society may be illustrated by the following
communication from a correspondent, not himself inverted, who
here narrates cases that came under his observation in various
parts of the United States. The cases referred to will be known
to many, but I have disguised the names of persons and places:--
"At the age of 14 I was a chorister at ---- church, whose
choirmaster, an Englishman named M.W.M., was an accomplished man,
seemingly a perfect gentleman, and a devout churchman. He never
seemed to care for the society of ladies, never mingled much with
the men, but sought companionship with the choristers of my age.
He frequently visited at the homes of his favorites, to tea, and
when he asked the parents' consent for George's or Frank's
company on an excursion or to the theater, and then to spend the
night with him, such request was invariably granted. I shall ever
remember my first night with him; he began by fondling and
caressing me, quieting my alarm by assurances of not hurting me,
and after invoking me to secrecy and with promises of many future
pleasures, I consented to his desire or passion, which he seemed
to satisfy by an attempt at _fellatio_. Was this depravity? I
would say 'No!' after reading his subsequent confession, found in
his room after his death by suicide. This was brought about by
his too intimate relations with the rector's son who contracted
St. Vitus's dance and in the delirium of a fever that followed
from nervous exhaustion told of him and his doings. A thorough
investigation took place and M. fled, a broken-hearted and
disgraced man, who, as the result of remorse, relentless
persecution, and exposure through several years, ended his life
by drowning himself. In his confession he spoke of having been
raised under a very strong moral restraint and having lived an
exemplary life, with the exception of this strange desire that
his will-power could not control.
"The next case is that of C.H. He came of an old family of brainy
men who have, and do yet, occupy prominent places in the pulpit
and the bar, and was himself a gifted young attorney. I knew him
intimately, as for six years he was a close neighbor and we were
associated in lodge-work. He was an effeminate little fellow:
height, 5 feet 2 inches; weight, 105 pounds; very near-sighted;
and he had a light voice, not a treble or falsetto, but still a
voice that detracted materially from the beautiful rhetoric that
flowed from his lips. He had served his country as its
representative in the Legislature and had received the nomination
for senator, over a hard-fought political battle. The last
canvass and speeches were made at a town which was, in
consequence, crowded. That night H. had to occupy a room with a
stranger, named E., a travelling salesman. There were two beds in
this room. Mr. E., on the following day told several people that
during the night he was awakened by H., who had come over to his
bed and had his mouth on his 'person,' and that he had threatened
to kick him out of the room, but that H. pleaded with him and
fell on his knees and swore that he had been overcome by a
passion that he had heretofore controlled, and begged of him not
to expose him. These facts coming to the notice of his opponents,
within twenty-four hours, they hastened to take advantage of it
by placarding H. as a second Oscar Wilde, and stating the facts
as far as decency and the law allowed. H.'s friends came to him
and gave him one of two alternatives: if guilty, either to kill
himself or leave that section forever; if not guilty, to slay his
traducer, E.H. affirmed his innocence, and in company with two
friends, C. and J., took the train for ----. Learning there that
E. was at a town twelve miles east, they hired a fast livery and
drove overland. They found E. at the station, awaiting the
arrival of a train. H., with a pistol, strode forward and in his
excitement said: 'You exposed me, did you?' Being near-sighted,
his aim proved wide of the mark. E. sprang forward and grappled
with H. for possession of the pistol, and was fired upon by C.
and J., who shot him in the back. He expired in a few minutes,
his last statement being to the effect that H. was guilty as
accused. H., C., and J. were sentenced to the penitentiary for
life. During my six years' acquaintance with H. I knew of nothing
derogatory to his character, nor has anyone ever come forward to
say that on any other occasion he ever displayed this weakness. I
know his early life had a pure atmosphere, as he was an only
child and the idol of both his parents, who builded high their
hopes of his future success, and who survive this disgrace, but
are broken-hearted.
"The next case is that of the Rev. T.W., professor at the
University of ----. Mr. W. is a scholarly gentleman, affable in
his address, eloquent in his oratory, and a fine classical
scholar. He was exposed by some of his students, who, to use a
slang phrase, accused him of being a 'head-worker.' At his
examination by the faculty he confessed his weakness, and said
he could not control his unholy passion. His resignation was
accepted both by the church and the college, and he left.
"I know of a few other cases that have their peculiar traits, and
am confident that these persons did not become possessed of this
habit through the so-called 'indiscretions of youth,' as in every
case their early life was freer from contamination than that of
90 per cent. of the boys who, on reaching man's estate, have,
like myself, no desire to deviate from the old-fashioned way
formulated by our ancient sire, Adam."
It can scarcely be said that the consciousness of this attitude of society
is favorable to the invert's attainment of a fairly sane and well-balanced
state of mind. This is, indeed, one of the great difficulties in his way,
and often causes him to waver between extremes of melancholia and
egotistic exaltation. We regard all homosexuality with absolute and
unmitigated disgust. We have been taught to venerate Alexander the Great,
Epaminondas, Socrates, and other antique heroes; but they are safely
buried in the remote past, and do not affect our scorn of homosexuality in
the present.
It was in the fourth century, at Rome, that the strong modern opposition
to homosexuality was first clearly formulated in law.[265] The Roman race
had long been decaying; sexual perversions of all kinds flourished; the
population was dwindling. At the same time, Christianity, with its
Judaic-Pauline antagonism to homosexuality, was rapidly spreading. The
statesmen of the day, anxious to quicken the failing pulses of national
life, utilized this powerful Christian feeling. Constantine, Theodosius,
and Valentinian all passed laws against homosexuality, the last, at all
events, ordaining as penalty the _vindices flammæ_; but their enactments
do not seem to have been strictly carried out. In the year 538, Justinian,
professing terror of certain famines, earthquakes, and pestilences in
which he saw the mysterious "recompense which was meet" prophesied by St.
Paul,[266] issued his edict condemning unnatural offenders to the sword,
"lest as the result of these impious acts" (as the preamble to his Novella
77 has it) "whole cities should perish, together with their inhabitants;
for we are taught by Holy Scripture that through these acts cities have
perished with the men in them."[267] This edict (which Justinian followed
up by a fresh ordinance to the same effect) constituted the foundation of
legal enactment and social opinion concerning the matter in Europe for
thirteen hundred years.[268] In France the _vindices flammæ_ survived to
the last; St. Louis had handed over these sacrilegious offenders to the
Church to be burned; in 1750 two pederasts were burned in the Place de
Grève, and only a few years before the Revolution a Capuchin monk named
Pascal was also burned.
After the Revolution, however, began a new movement, which has continued
slowly and steadily ever since, though it still divides European nations
into two groups. Justinian, Charlemagne, and St. Louis had insisted on the
sin and sacrilege of sodomy as the ground for its punishment.[269] It was
doubtless largely as a religious offense that the _Code Napoléon_ omitted
to punish it. The French law makes a clear and logical distinction between
crime on the one hand, vice and irreligion on the other, only concerning
itself with the former. Homosexual practices in private, between two
consenting adult parties, whether men or women, are absolutely unpunished
by the _Code Napoléon_ and by French law of today. Only under three
conditions does the homosexual act come under the cognizance of the law
as a crime: (1) when there is _outrage public à la pudeur_,--i.e., when
the act is performed in public or with a possibility of witnesses; (2)
when there is violence or absence of consent, in whatever degree the act
may have been consummated; (3) when one of the parties is under age, or
unable to give valid consent; in some cases it appears possible to apply
Article 334 of the penal code, directed against habitual excitation to
debauch of young persons of either sex under the age of 21.
This method of dealing with unnatural offenses has spread widely, at first
because of the political influence of France, and more recently because
such an attitude has commended itself on its merits. In Belgium the law is
similar to that of the _Code Napoléon_, as it is also in Italy, Spain,
Portugal, Roumania, Japan, and numerous South American lands. In
Switzerland the law is a little vague and varies slightly in the different
cantons, but it is not severe; in Geneva and some other cantons there is
no penalty; the general tendency is to inflict brief imprisonment when
serious complaints have been lodged, and cases can sometimes be settled
privately by the magistrate.
The only large European countries in which homosexuality _per se_ remains
a penal offense appear to be Germany, Austria, Russia, and England. In
several of the German States, such as Bavaria and Hanover, simple
homosexuality formerly went unpunished, but when the laws of Prussia were
in 1871 applied to the new German Empire this ceased to be the case, and
unnatural carnality between males became an offense against the law. This
article of the German Code (Section 175) has caused great discussion and
much practical difficulty, because, although the terms of the law make it
necessary to understand by _widernatürliche Unzucht_ other practices
besides _pædicatio_, not every homosexual practice is included; it must be
some practice resembling normal coitus. There is a widespread opinion that
this article of the code should be abolished; it appears that at one time
an authoritative committee pronounced in favor of this step, and their
proposition came near adoption. The Austrian law is somewhat similar to
the German, but it applies to women as well as to men; this is logical,
for there is no reason why homosexuality should be punished in men and
left unpunished in women. In Russia the law against homosexual practices
appears to be very severe, involving, in some cases, banishment to Siberia
and deprivation of civil rights; but it can scarcely be rigorously
executed.
The existing law in England is severe, but simple. Carnal knowledge _per
anum_ of either a man or a woman or an animal is punishable by a sentence
of penal servitude with not less than three years, or of imprisonment with
not more than two years. Even "gross indecency" between males, however
privately committed, has been since 1885 a penal offense.[270] The clause
is open to criticism. With the omission of the words "or private," it
would be sound and in harmony with the most enlightened European
legislation; but it must be pointed out that an act only becomes indecent
when those who perform it or witness it regard it as indecent. The act
which brought each of us into the world is not indecent; it would become
so if carried on in public. If two male persons, who have reached years of
discretion, consent together to perform some act of sexual intimacy in
private, no indecency has been committed. If one of the consenting parties
subsequently proclaims the act, indecency may doubtless be created, as may
happen also in the case of normal sexual intercourse, but it seems
contrary to good policy that such proclamation should convert the act
itself into a penal offense. Moreover, "gross indecency" between males
usually means some form of mutual masturbation; no penal code regards
masturbation as an offense, and there seems to be no sufficient reason why
mutual masturbation should be so regarded.[271] The main point to be
insured is that no boy or girl who has not reached years of discretion
should be seduced or abused by an older person, and this point is equally
well guaranteed on the basis introduced by the _Code Napoléon_. However
shameful, disgusting, personally immoral, and indirectly antisocial it may
be for two adult persons of the same sex, men or women, to consent
together to perform an act of sexual intimacy in private, there is no
sound or adequate ground for constituting such act a penal offense by law.
One of the most serious objections to the legal recognition of private
"gross indecency" is the obvious fact that only in the rarest cases can
such indecency become known to the police, and we thus perpetrate what is
very much like a legal farce. "The breaking of few laws," as Moll truly
observes, regarding the German law, "so often goes unpunished as of this."
It is the same in England, as is amply evidenced by the fact that, of the
English sexual inverts, whose histories I have obtained, not one, so far
as I am aware, has ever appeared in a police-court on this charge.
It may further be pointed out that legislation against homosexuality has
no clear effect either in diminishing or increasing its prevalence. This
must necessarily be so as regards the kernel of the homosexual group, if
we are to regard a considerable proportion of cases as congenital. In
France homosexuality _per se_ has been untouched by the law for a century;
yet it abounds, chiefly, it seems, among the lowest in the community;
although the law is silent, social feeling is strong, and when--as has
been the case in one instance--a man of undoubted genius has his name
associated with this perversion it becomes difficult or impossible for the
admirers of his work to associate with him personally; very few cases of
homosexuality have been recorded in France among the more intelligent
classes; the literature of homosexuality is there little more than the
literature of male prostitution, as described by police-officials, and as
carried on largely for the benefit of foreigners. In Germany and Austria,
where the law against homosexuality is severe, it abounds also, perhaps
to a much greater extent than in France;[272] it certainly asserts itself
more vigorously; a far greater number of cases have been recorded than in
any other country, and the German literature of homosexuality is very
extensive, often issued in popular form, and sometimes enthusiastically
eulogistic. In England the law is exceptionally severe; yet, according to
the evidence of those who have an international acquaintance with these
matters, homosexuality is fully as prevalent as on the Continent; some
would say that it is more so. Much the same is true of the United States,
though there is less to be seen on the surface. It cannot, therefore, be
said that legislative enactments have very much influence on the
prevalence of homosexuality. The chief effect seems to be that the attempt
at suppression arouses the finer minds among sexual inverts to undertake
the enthusiastic defense of homosexuality, while coarser minds are
stimulated to cynical bravado.[273]
As regards the prevalence of homosexuality in the United States,
I may quote from a well-informed American correspondent:--
"The great prevalence of sexual inversion in American cities is
shown by the wide knowledge of its existence. Ninety-nine normal
men out of a hundred have been accosted on the streets by
inverts, or have among their acquaintances men whom they know to
be sexually inverted. Everyone has seen inverts and knows what
they are. The public attitude toward them is generally a negative
one--indifference, amusement, contempt.
"The world of sexual inverts is, indeed, a large one in any
American city, and it is a community distinctly organized--words,
customs, traditions of its own; and every city has its numerous
meeting-places: certain churches where inverts congregate;
certain cafés well known for the inverted character of their
patrons; certain streets where, at night, every fifth man is an
invert. The inverts have their own 'clubs,' with nightly
meetings. These 'clubs' are, really, dance-halls, attached to
_saloons_, and presided over by the proprietor of the saloon,
himself almost invariably an invert, as are all the waiters and
musicians. The frequenters of these places are male sexual
inverts (usually ranging from 17 to 30 years of age); sightseers
find no difficulty in gaining entrance; truly, they are welcomed
for the drinks they buy for the company--and other reasons.
Singing and dancing turns by certain favorite performers are the
features of these gatherings, with much gossip and drinking at
the small tables ranged along the four walls of the room. The
habitués of these places are, generally, inverts of the most
pronounced type, i.e., the completely feminine in voice and
manners, with the characteristic hip motion in their walk; though
I have never seen any approach to feminine dress there, doubtless
the desire for it is not wanting and only police regulations
relegate it to other occasions and places. You will rightly infer
that the police know of these places and endure their existence
for a consideration; it is not unusual for the inquiring stranger
to be directed there by a policeman."
The Oscar Wilde trial (see _ante_, p. 48), with its wide
publicity, and the fundamental nature of the questions it
suggested, appears to have generally contributed to give
definiteness and self-consciousness to the manifestations of
homosexuality, and to have aroused inverts to take up a definite
attitude. I have been assured in several quarters that this is so
and that since that case the manifestations of homosexuality have
become more pronounced. One correspondent writes:--
"Up to the time of the Oscar Wilde trial I had not known what the
condition of the law was. The moral question in itself--its
relation to my own life and that of my friends--I reckoned I had
solved; but I now had to ask myself how far I was justified in
not only breaking the law, but in being the cause of a like
breach in others, and others younger than myself. I have never
allowed the _dictum_ of the law to interfere with what I deemed
to be a moral development in any youth for whom I am responsible.
I cannot say that the trial made me alter my course of life, of
the rightness of which I was too convincingly persuaded, but it
made me much more careful, and it probably sharpened my sense of
responsibility for the young. Reviewing the results of the trial
as a whole, it doubtless did incalculable harm, and it
intensified our national vice of hypocrisy. But I think it also
may have done some good in that it made those who, like myself,
have thought and experienced deeply in the matter--and these must
be no small few--ready to strike a blow, when the time comes,
for what we deem to be right, honorable, and clean."
From America a lady writes with reference to the moral position
of inverts, though without allusion to the Wilde trial:--
"Inverts should have the courage and independence to be
themselves, and to demand an investigation. If one strives to
live honorably, and considers the greatest good to the greatest
number, it is not a crime nor a disgrace to be an invert. I do
not need the law to defend me, neither do I desire to have any
concessions made for me, nor do I ask my friends to sacrifice
their ideals for me. I too have ideals which I shall always hold.
All that I desire--and I claim it as my right--is the freedom to
exercise this divine gift of loving, which is not a menace to
society nor a disgrace to me. Let it once be understood that the
average invert is not a moral degenerate nor a mental degenerate,
but simply a man or a woman who is less highly specialized, less
completely differentiated, than other men and women, and I
believe the prejudice against them will disappear, and if they
live uprightly they will surely win the esteem and consideration
of all thoughtful people. I know what it means to an invert--who
feels himself set apart from the rest of mankind--to find one
human heart who trusts him and understands him, and I know how
almost impossible this is, and will be, until the world is made
aware of these facts."
But, while the law has had no more influence in repressing abnormal
sexuality than, wherever it has tried to do so, it has had in repressing
the normal sexual instinct, it has served to foster another offense. What
is called blackmailing in England, _chantage_ in France, and _Erpressung_
in Germany--in other words, the extortion of money by threats of exposing
some real or fictitious offense--finds its chief field of activity in
connection with homosexuality.[274] No doubt the removal of the penalty
against simple homosexuality does not abolish blackmailing, as the
existence of this kind of _chantage_ in France shows, but it renders its
success less probable.
On all these grounds, and taking into consideration the fact that the
tendency of modern legislation generally, and the consensus of
authoritative opinion in all countries, are in this direction, it seems
reasonable to conclude that neither "sodomy" (i.e., _immissio membri in
anum hominis vel mulieris_) nor "gross indecency" ought to be penal
offenses, except under certain special circumstances. That is to say, that
if two persons of either or both sexes, having reached years of
discretion,[275] privately consent to practise some perverted mode of
sexual relationship, the law cannot be called upon to interfere. It should
be the function of the law in this matter to prevent violence, to protect
the young, and to preserve public order and decency. Whatever laws are
laid down beyond this must be left to the individuals themselves, to the
moralists, and to social opinion.
At the same time, and while such a modification in the law seems to be
reasonable, the change effected would be less considerable than may appear
at first sight. In a very large proportion, indeed, of cases boys are
involved. It is instructive to observe that in Legludic's 246 cases
(including victims and aggressors together) in France, 127, or more than
half, were between the ages of 10 and 20, and 82, or exactly one-third,
were between the ages of 10 and 14. A very considerable field of operation
is thus still left for the law, whatever proportion of cases may meet with
no other penalty than social opinion.
That, however, social opinion--law or no law--will speak with no uncertain
voice is very evident. Once homosexuality was primarily a question of
population or of religion. Now we hear little either of its economic
aspects or of its sacrilegiousness; it is for us primarily a disgusting
abomination, i.e., a matter of taste, of esthetics; and, while unspeakably
ugly to the majority, it is proclaimed as beautiful by a small minority. I
do not know that we need find fault with this esthetic method of judging
homosexuality. But it scarcely lends itself to legal purposes. To indulge
in violent denunciation of the disgusting nature of homosexuality, and to
measure the sentence by the disgust aroused, or to regret, as one English
judge is reported to have regretted when giving sentence, that "gross
indecency" is not punishable by death, is to import utterly foreign
considerations into the matter. The judges who yield to this temptation
would certainly never allow themselves to be consciously influenced on the
bench by their political opinions. Yet esthetic opinions are quite as
foreign to law as political opinions. An act does not become criminal
because it is disgusting. To eat excrement, as Moll remarks, is extremely
disgusting, but it is not criminal. The confusion which thus exists, even
in the legal mind, between the disgusting and the criminal is additional
evidence of the undesirability of the legal penalty for simple
homosexuality. At the same time it shows that social opinion is amply
adequate to deal with the manifestations of inverted sexuality. So much
for the legal aspects of sexual inversion.
But while there can be no doubt about the amply adequate character of the
existing social reaction to all manifestations of perverted sexuality, the
question still remains how far not merely the law, but also the state of
public opinion, should be modified in the light of such a psychological
study as we have here undertaken. It is clear that this public opinion,
molded chiefly or entirely with reference to gross vice, tends to be
unduly violent in its reaction. What, then, is the reasonable attitude of
society toward the congenital sexual invert? It seems to lie in the
avoidance of two extremes. On the one hand, it cannot be expected to
tolerate the invert who flouts his perversion in its face, and assumes
that, because he would rather take his pleasure with a soldier or a
policeman than with their sisters, he is of finer clay than the vulgar
herd. On the other, it might well refrain from crushing with undiscerning
ignorance beneath a burden of shame the subject of an abnormality which,
as we have seen, has not been found incapable of fine uses. Inversion is
an aberration from the usual course of nature. But the clash of contending
elements which must often mark the history of such a deviation results now
and again--by no means infrequently--in nobler activities than those
yielded by the vast majority who are born to consume the fruits of the
earth. It bears, for the most part, its penalty in the structure of its
own organism. We are bound to protect the helpless members of society
against the invert. If we go farther, and seek to destroy the invert
himself before he has sinned against society, we exceed the warrant of
reason, and in so doing we may, perhaps, destroy also those children of
the spirit which possess sometimes a greater worth than the children of
the flesh.
Here we may leave this question of sexual inversion. In dealing with it I
have sought to avoid that attitude of moral superiority which is so common
in the literature of this subject, and have refrained from pointing out
how loathsome this phenomenon is, or how hideous that. Such an attitude is
as much out of place in scientific investigation as it is in judicial
investigation, and may well be left to the amateur. The physician who
feels nothing but disgust at the sight of disease is unlikely to bring
either succor to his patients or instruction to his pupils.
That the investigation we have here pursued is not only profitable to us
in succoring the social organism and its members, but also in bringing
light into the region of sexual psychology, is now, I hope, clear to every
reader who has followed me to this point. There are a multitude of social
questions which we cannot face squarely and honestly unless we possess
such precise knowledge as has been here brought together concerning the
part played by the homosexual tendency in human life. Moreover, the study
of this perverted tendency stretches beyond itself;
"O'er that art
Which you say adds to Nature, is an art
That Nature makes."
Pathology is but physiology working under new conditions. The stream of
nature still flows into the bent channel of sexual inversion, and still
runs according to law. We have not wasted our time in this toilsome
excursion. With the knowledge here gained we are the better equipped to
enter upon the study of the wider questions of sex.
FOOTNOTES:
[243] In this connection I may refer to Moll's _Sexual Life of the Child_,
to the writings of Dr. Clement Dukes, physician to Rugby School, who fully
recognizes the risks of school-life, and to the discussion on sexual vice
in schools, started by an address by the Rev. J.M. Wilson, head-master of
Clifton College, in the English _Journal of Education_, 1881-82.
[244] With regard to the importance of the sexual emotions generally and
their training, see the well-known book by Edward Carpenter, _Love's
Coming of Age_; Professor Gurlitt ("Knabenfreundschaften,"
_Sexual-Probleme_, Oct., 1909) also upholds the intimate friendships of
youth, which in his own experience have not had even a suspicion of
homosexuality.
[245] Casanova, _Mémoires_, vol. i (edition Garnier), p. 160. See also
remarks by an experienced master in one of the largest English public
schools, which I have brought forward in vol. i of these _Studies_,
"Auto-erotism," 3d ed., 1910.
[246] See, e.g., Professor J.R. Angell, "Some Reflections upon the
Reaction from Coeducation," _Popular Science Monthly_, Nov., 1902; also
Moll's _Sexual Life of the Child_, ch. ix, and for a general discussion of
coeducation, S. Poirson, _La Coéducation_, 1911.
[247] Bethe, "Die Dorische Knabenliebe," _Rheinisches Museum für
Philologie_; vol. lxii, Heft 3, p. 440; cf. Edward Carpenter,
_Intermediate Types among Primitive Folk_, ch. vi.
[248] Schrenck-Notzing, _Die Suggestionstherapie bei krankhaften
Erscheinungen des Geschlechtsinnes_, 1892. (Eng. trans. _Therapeutic
Suggestion_, 1895.)
[249] Raffalovich, _Uranisme et Unisexualité_, 1896, p. 16. He remarks
that the congenital invert who has never had relations with women, and
whose abnormality, to use Krafft-Ebing's distinction, is a perversion and
not a perversity, is much less dangerous and apt to seduce others than the
more versatile and corrupt person who has known all methods of
gratification.
[250] See, e.g., Moll, _Die Konträre Sexualempfindung_, ch. xi; Forel,
_Die Sexuelle Frage_, ch. xiv; Näcke, "Die Behandlung der Homosexualität,"
_Sexual-Probleme_, Aug., 1910; Hirschfeld, _Die Homosexualität_, ch. xxii.
[251] Moll, _Zeitschrift für Psychotherapie_, 1911, Heft 1; id., _Handbuch
der Sexualwissenschaften_, 1912, p. 662 et seq.
[252] This is also the opinion of Numa Praetorius, _Jahrbuch für sexuelle
Zwischenstufen_, Jan., 1913, p. 222.
[253] See, especially, Sadger, _Zeitschrift für Sexualwissenschaft_, Heft
12, 1908; also _Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, vol. ix, 1908;
Sadger's methods are criticised by Hirschfeld, _Die Homosexualität_, ch.
xxii, and defended by Sadger, _Internationale Zeitschrift für Aerztliche
Psychoanalyse_, July, 1914, p. 392. For a discussion of the psychoanalytic
treatment of homosexuality by a leading American Freudian, see Brill,
_Journal American Medical Association_, Aug. 2, 1913.
[254] _Internationale Zeitschrift für Aerztliche Psychoanalyse_, March,
1914.
[255] This is now generally recognized. See, e.g., Roubinovitch and Borel,
"Un Cas d'Uranisme," _L'Encéphale_, Aug., 1913. These authors conclude
that it is today impossible to look upon inversion as the equivalent or
the symptom of a psychopathic state, though we have to recognize that it
frequently coexists with morbid emotional states. Näcke, also, in his
extensive experience, found that homosexuality is rare in asylums and
slight in character; he dealt with this question on various occasions;
see, e.g., _Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, vol. viii, 1906.
[256] Krafft-Ebing considered that the temporary or lasting association of
homosexuality with neurasthenia having its root in congenital conditions
is "almost invariable," and some authorities (like Meynert) have regarded
inversion as an accidental growth on the foundation of neurasthenia.
[257] Féré expressed himself concerning the general treatment of
homosexuality in the same sense, and even more emphatically (Féré,
_L'Instinct Sexuel_, 1899, pp. 272, 286). He considers that all forms of
congenital inversion resist treatment, and that, since a change in the
invert's instincts must be regarded rather as a perversion of the invert
than a cure of the inversion, one may be permitted to doubt not only the
utility of the treatment, but even the legitimacy of attempting it. The
treatment of sexual inversion, he declared, is as much outside the
province of medicine as the restoration of color-vision in the
color-blind. The ideal which the physician and the teacher must place
before the invert is that of chastity; he must seek to harness his wagon
to a star.
[258] I have been told by a distinguished physician, who was consulted in
the case, of a congenital invert highly placed in the English government
service, who married in the hope of escaping his perversion, and was not
even able to consummate the marriage. It is needless to insist on the
misery which is created in such cases. It is not, of course, denied that
such marriages may not sometimes become eventually happy. Thus Kiernan
("Psychical Treatment of Congenital Sexual Inversion," _Review of Insanity
and Nervous Diseases_, June, 1894) reports the case of a thoroughly
inverted girl who married the brother of the friend to whom she was
previously attached merely in order to secure his sister's companionship.
She was able to endure and even enjoy intercourse by imagining that her
husband, who resembled his sister, was another sister. Liking and esteem
for the husband gradually increased and after the sister died a child was
born who much resembled her; "the wife's esteem passed through love of the
sister to intense natural love of the daughter, as resembling the sister;
through this to normal love of the husband as the father and brother." The
final result may have been satisfactory, but this train of circumstances
could not have been calculated beforehand. Moll is also opposed, on the
whole (e.g., _Deutsche medicinische Presse_, No. 6, 1902), to marriage and
procreation by inverts.
[259] Hirschfeld, _Die Homosexualität_, ch. xxi. It might seem on
theoretical grounds that the marriage of a homosexual man with a
homosexual woman might turn out well. Hirschfeld, however, states that he
knows of 14 such marriages, and the theoretical expectation has not been
justified; 3 of the cases speedily terminated in divorce, 4 of the couples
lived separately, and all but 2 of the remaining couples regretted the
step they had taken. I may add that in such a case even the expectation of
happiness scarcely seems reasonable, since neither of the parties can feel
a true mating impulse toward the other.
[260] Hirschfeld also notes (_Die Homosexualität_, p. 95) that women often
instinctively feel that there is something wrong in the love of their
inverted husbands who may perhaps succeed in copulating, but betray their
deepest feelings by a repugnance to touch the sexual parts with the hand.
The homosexual woman, also, as Hirschfeld elsewhere points out with cases
in illustration (p. 84), may suffer seriously through being subjected to
normal sexual relationships.
[261] Féré reports the case of an invert of great intellectual ability who
had never had any sexual relationships, and was not averse from a chaste
life; he was urged by his doctor to acquire the power of normal
intercourse and to marry, on the ground that his perversion was merely a
perversion of the imagination. He did so, and, though he married a
perfectly strong and healthy woman, and was himself healthy, except in so
far as his perversion was concerned, the offspring turned out
disastrously. The eldest child was an epileptic, almost an imbecile, and
with strongly marked homosexual impulses; the second and third children
were absolute idiots; the youngest died of convulsions in infancy (Féré,
_L'Instinct Sexuel_, p. 269 et seq.) No doubt this is not an average case,
but the numerous examples of the offspring of similar marriages brought
forward by Hirschfeld (op. cit., p. 391) scarcely present a much better
result.
[262] It is scarcely necessary to add that the same principle is adaptable
to the case of homosexual women. "In all such cases," writes an American
woman physician, "I would recommend that the moral sense be trained and
fostered, and the persons allowed to keep their individuality, being
taught to remember always that they are different from others, rather
sacrificing their own feelings or happiness when necessary. It is good
discipline for them, and will serve in the long run to bring them more
favor and affection than any other course. This quality or idiosyncrasy is
not essentially evil, but, if rightly used, may prove a blessing to others
and a power for good in the life of the individual; nor does it reflect
any discredit upon its possessor."
[263] The existence of an affinity between homosexuality and the religious
temperament has been referred to in ch. i as recognized in many parts of
the world. See, for a more extended discussion, Horneffer, _Der Priester_,
and Bloch, _Die Prostitution_, vol. i, pp. 101-110. The psychoanalysts
have also touched on this point; thus Pfister, _Die Frommingkeit des
Grafen von Zinzendorf_ (1910), argues that the founder of the pietistic
sect of the Herrenhuter was of sublimated homosexual (or bisexual)
temperament.
[264] Forel, _Die Sexuelle Frage_, p. 528. Such ideas are, of course,
often put forward by inverts themselves.
[265] Roman law previously seems to have been confined in this matter to
the protection of boys. The Scantinian and other Roman laws against
paiderasty seem to have been usually a dead letter. See, for various notes
and references, W.G. Holmes, _The Age of Justinian and Theodora_, vol. i,
p. 121.
[266] Epistle to the Romans, chapter i, verses 26-7.
[267] In practice this penalty of death appears to have been sometimes
commuted to ablation of the sexual organs.
[268] For a full sketch of the legal enactments against homosexual
intercourse in ancient and modern times, see Numa Praetorius, "Die
straflichen Bestimmungen gegen den gleichgeschlechtlichen Verkehr,"
_Jahrbuch für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, vol. i, pp. 97-158. This writer
points out that Justinian, and still more clearly, Pius V, in the
sixteenth century, distinguished between occasional homosexuality and
deep-rooted inversion, habitual offenders alone, not those who had only
been guilty once or twice, being punished.
[269] The influence of the supposed connection of sodomy with unbelief,
idolatry, and heresy in arousing the horror of it among earlier religions
has been emphasized by Westermarck, _The Origin and Development of the
Moral Ideas_, vol. i, p. 486 et seq.
[270] "Any male person who in public or private commits, or is a party to
the commission of, or procures or attempts to procure the commission by
any male person of, any act of gross indecency with another male person,
shall be guilty of a misdemeanor, and, being convicted thereof, shall be
liable at the discretion of the court to be imprisoned for any term not
exceeding two years, with or without hard labor."
[271] This point is brought forward by Dr. Léon de Rode in his report on
"L'Inversion Génitale et la Législation," prepared for the Third
(Brussels) Congress of Criminal Anthropology in 1892. The same point is
insisted on by some of my correspondents.
[272] It is a remarkable and perhaps significant fact that, while
homosexuality is today in absolute disrepute in France, it was not so
under the less tolerant law of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries.
The Duc de Gesvres, as described by Besenval (_Mémoires_, i, p. 178), was
a well-marked invert of feminine type, impotent, and publicly affecting
all the manners of women; yet he was treated with consideration. In 1687
Madame, the mother of the Regent, writes implying that "all the young men
and many of the old" practised pederasty: _il n'y a que les gens du commun
qui aiment les femmes_. The marked tendency to inversion in the French
royal family at this time is well known.
[273] A man with homosexual habits, I have been told, declared he would be
sorry to see the English law changed, as then he would find no pleasure in
his practices.
[274] Blackmailing appears to be the most serious risk which the invert
runs. Hirschfeld states in an interesting study of blackmailing (_Jahrbuch
für sexuelle Zwischenstufen_, April, 1913) that his experience shows that
among 10,000 homosexual persons hardly one falls a victim to the law, but
over 3000 are victimized by blackmailers.
[275] Krafft-Ebing would place this age not under 16, the age at which in
England girls may legally consent to normal sexual intercourse
(_Psychopathia Sexualis_, 1893, p. 419). It certainly should not be lower.
APPENDICES.
APPENDIX A.
HOMOSEXUALITY AMONG TRAMPS.
BY "JOSIAH FLYNT."
I have made a rather minute study of the tramp class in the United States,
England, and Germany, but I know it best in the States. I have lived with
the tramps there for eight consecutive months, besides passing numerous
shorter periods in their company, and my acquaintance with them is nearly
of ten years' standing. My purpose in going among them has been to learn
about their life in particular and outcast life in general. This can only
be done by becoming part and parcel of its manifestations.
There are two kinds of tramps in the United States: out-of-works and
"hoboes." The out-of-works are not genuine vagabonds; they really want
work and have no sympathy with the hoboes. The latter are the real tramps.
They make a business of begging--a very good business too--and keep at it,
as a rule, to the end of their days. Whisky and _Wanderlust_, or the love
of wandering, are probably the main causes of their existence; but many of
them are discouraged criminals, men who have tried their hand at crime and
find that they lack criminal wit. They become tramps because they find
that life "on the road" comes the nearest to the life they hoped to lead.
They have enough talent to do very well as beggars, better, generally
speaking, then the men who have reached the road simply as drunkards; they
know more about the tricks of the trade and are cleverer in thinking out
schemes and stories. All genuine tramps in America are, however, pretty
much the same, as far as manners and philosophy are concerned, and all are
equally welcome at the "hang-out."[276] The class of society from which
they are drawn is generally the very lowest of all, but there are some
hoboes who have come from the very highest, and these latter are
frequently as vicious and depraved as their less well-born brethren.
Concerning sexual inversion among tramps, there is a great deal to be
said, and I cannot attempt to tell all I have heard about it, but merely
to give a general account of the matter. Every hobo in the United States
knows what "unnatural intercourse" means, talking about it freely, and,
according to my finding, every tenth man practises it, and defends his
conduct. Boys are the victims of this passion. The tramps gain possession
of these boys in various ways. A common method is to stop for awhile in
some town, and gain acquaintance with the slum children. They tell these
children all sorts of stories about life "on the road," how they can ride
on the railways for nothing, shoot Indians, and be "perfeshunnels"
(professionals), and they choose some boy who specially pleases them. By
smiles and flattering caresses they let him know that the stories are
meant for him alone, and before long, if the boy is a suitable subject, he
smiles back just as slyly. In time he learns to think that he is the
favorite of the tramp, who will take him on his travels, and he begins to
plan secret meetings with the man. The tramp, of course, continues to
excite his imagination with stories and caresses, and some fine night
there is one boy less in the town. On the road the lad is called a
"prushun," and his protector a "jocker." The majority of prushuns are
between 10 and 15 years of age, but I have known some under 10 and a few
over 15. Each is compelled by hobo law to let his jocker do with him as he
will, and many, I fear, learn to enjoy his treatment of them. They are
also expected to beg in every town they come to, any laziness on their
part receiving very severe punishment.
How the act of unnatural intercourse takes place is not entirely clear;
the hoboes are not agreed. From what I have personally observed I should
say that it is usually what they call "leg-work" (intercrural), but
sometimes _immissio penis in anum_, the boy, in either case, lying on his
stomach. I have heard terrible stories of the physical results to the boy
of anal intercourse.
One evening, near Cumberland, Pennsylvania, I was an unwilling witness of
one of the worst scenes that can be imagined. In company with eight
hoboes, I was in a freight-car attached to a slowly moving train. A
colored boy succeeded in scrambling into the car, and when the train was
well under way again he was tripped up and "seduced" (to use the hobo
euphemism) by each of the tramps. He made almost no resistance, and joked
and laughed about the business as if he had expected it. This, indeed, I
find to be the general feeling among the boys when they have been
thoroughly initiated. At first they do not submit, and are inclined to run
away or fight, but the men fondle and pet them, and after awhile they do
not seem to care. Some of them have told me that they get as much pleasure
out of the affair as the jocker does. Even little fellows under 10 have
told me this, and I have known them to willfully tempt their jockers to
intercourse. What the pleasure consists in I cannot say. The youngsters
themselves describe it as a delightful tickling sensation in the parts
involved, and this is possibly all that it amounts to among the smallest
lads. Those who have passed the age of puberty seem to be satisfied in
pretty much the same way that the men are. Among the men the practice is
decidedly one of passion. The majority of them prefer a prushun to a
woman, and nothing is more severely judged than rape. One often reads in
the newspapers that a woman has been assaulted by a tramp, but the
perverted tramp is never the guilty party.
I believe, however, that there are a few hoboes who have taken to boys
because women are so scarce "on the road." For every woman in hoboland
there are a hundred men. That this disproportion has something to do with
the popularity of boys is made clear by the following case: In a gaol,
where I was confined for a month during my life in vagabondage, I got
acquainted with a tramp who had the reputation of being a "sod"
(sodomist). One day a woman came to the gaol to see her husband, who was
awaiting trial. One of the prisoners said he had known her before she was
married and had lived with her. The tramp was soon to be discharged, and
he inquired where the woman lived. On learning that she was still
approachable, he looked her up immediately after his release, and
succeeded in staying with her for nearly a month. He told me later that he
enjoyed his life with her much more than his intercourse with boys. I
asked him why he went with boys at all, and he replied: "'Cause there
ain't women enough. If I can't get them I've got to have the other."
It is in gaols that one sees the worst side of this perversion. In the
daytime the prisoners are let out into a long hall, and can do much as
they please; at night they are shut up, two and even four in a cell. If
there are any boys in the crowd, they are made use of by all who care to
have them. If they refuse to submit, they are gagged and held down. The
sheriff seldom knows what goes on, and for the boys to say anything to him
would be suicidal. There is a criminal ignorance all over the States
concerning the life of these gaols, and things go on that would be
impossible in any well-regulated prison. In one of these places I once
witnessed the fiercest fight I have ever seen among hoboes; a boy was the
cause of it. Two men said they loved him, and he seemed to return the
affection of both with equal desire. A fight with razors was suggested to
settle who should have him.[277] The men prepared for action, while the
crowd gathered round to watch. They slashed away for over half an hour,
cutting each other terribly, and then their backers stopped them for fear
of fatal results. The boy was given to the one who was hurt the least.
Jealousy is one of the first things one notices in connection with this
passion. I have known them to withdraw entirely from the "hang-out" life
simply to be sure that their prushuns were not touched by other tramps.
Such attachments frequently last for years, and some boys remain with
their first jockers until they are "emancipated."
Emancipation means freedom to "snare" some other boy, and make him submit
as the other had been obliged to submit when younger. As a rule, the
prushun is freed when he is able to protect himself. If he can defend his
"honor" from all who come, he is accepted into the class of "old stagers,"
and may do as he likes. This is the one reward held out to prushuns during
their apprenticeship. They are told that some day they can have a boy and
use him as they have been used. Thus hoboland is always sure of recruits.
It is difficult to say how many tramps are sexually inverted. It is not
even certainly known how many vagabonds there are in the country. I have
stated in one of my papers on tramps that, counting the boys, there are
between fifty and sixty thousand genuine hoboes in the United States. A
vagabond in Texas who saw this statement wrote me that he considered my
estimate too low. The newspapers have criticised it as too high, but they
are unable to judge. If my figures are, as I believe, at least
approximately correct, the sexually perverted tramps may be estimated at
between five and six thousand; this includes men and boys.
I have been told lately by tramps that the boys are less numerous than
they were a few years ago. They say that it is now a risky business to be
seen with a boy, and that it is more profitable, as far as begging is
concerned, to go without them. Whether this means that the passion is less
fierce than it used to be, or that the men find sexual satisfaction among
themselves, I cannot say definitely. But from what I know of their
disinclination to adopt the latter alternative, I am inclined to think
that the passion may be dying out somewhat. I am sure that women are not
more numerous "on the road" than formerly, and that the change, if real,
has not been caused by them. So much for my finding in the United States.
In England, where I have also lived with tramps for some time, I have
found very little contrary sexual feeling. In Germany, also, excepting in
prisons and work-houses, it seems very little known among vagabonds. There
are a few Jewish wanderers (sometimes peddlers) who are said to have boys
in their company, and I am told that they use them as the hoboes in the
United States use their boys, but I cannot prove this from personal
observation. In England I have met a number of male tramps who had no
hesitation in declaring their preference for their own sex, and
particularly for boys, but I am bound to say that I have seldom seen them
with boys; as a rule, they were quite alone, and they seem to live chiefly
by themselves.
It is a noteworthy fact that both in England and Germany there are a great
many women "on the road," or, at all events, so near it that intercourse
with them is easy and cheap. In Germany almost every town has its quarter
of "Stadt-Schieze"[278]: women who sell their bodies for a very small sum.
They seldom ask over thirty or forty pfennigs for a night, which is
usually spent in the open air. In England it is practically the same
thing. In all the large cities there are women who are glad to do business
for three or four pence, and those "on the road" for even less.
The general impression made on me by the sexually perverted men I have met
in vagabondage is that they are abnormally masculine. In their intercourse
with boys they always take the active part. The boys have, in some cases,
seemed to me uncommonly feminine, but not as a rule. In the main, they are
very much like other lads, and I am unable to say whether their liking for
the inverted relationship is inborn or acquired. That it is, however, a
genuine liking, in altogether too many instances, I do not, in the least,
doubt. As such, and all the more because it is such, it deserves to be
more thoroughly investigated and more reasonably treated.
"Josiah Flynt" who wrote the foregoing account of tramp-life for the
second edition of this volume, was well known as author, sociologist, and
tramp. He was especially, and it would seem by innate temperament, the
tramp, which part he looked to perfection (he himself referred to his
"weasoned face and diminutive form") and felt completely at home in. He
was thus able to throw much light on the psychology of the tramp, and his
books (such as _Tramping with Tramps_) are valuable from this point of
view. His real name was F. Willard and he was a nephew of Miss Frances
Willard. He died in Chicago, in 1907, at the age of 38, shortly after
writing a frank and remarkable _Autobiography_. I am able to supplement
his observations on tramps, so far as England is concerned, by the
following passages from a detailed record sent to me by an English
correspondent:--
"I am a male invert with complete feminine, sexual inclinations. Different
meetings with 'tramps' led me to seek intimacy with them and for about
twenty years I have gone on the 'tramp' myself so that I might come in the
closest contact with them, in England, Scotland, and Wales.
"As in the United States, there are two classes of tramps those who would
work, such as harvesters, road-makers, etc., and those who will not work,
but make tramping a profession. Among both these classes my experience is
that 90 per cent, or I even would be bold enough to say 100 per cent,
indulge in homosexuality when the opportunity occurs, and I do not make
any distinction between the two classes.
"There are numerous reasons for this and I will state a few. A certain
number may prefer normal connection with a female, but except for those
who tramp in vans and a limited number who have 'donnas' with them, women
are not available, as prostitutes very seldom allow intimacy for 'love'
except when drunk. Tramps are also afraid of any venereal disease as it
means the misery of the Lock Hospital. Most of them are sociable and
prefer to tramp with a 'make.' With this mate, with whom he sleeps and
rests and 'boozes' when they are in funds, sexual intimacy naturally takes
place, as my experience has been that one of the two is male and the
other female in their sexual desires, but I have known instances where
they have acted both roles. Then male prostitution is to be had for
nothing, and even occasionally when a tramp meets a 'toff' it is a means
of earning money, either fairly or otherwise. I have never known a male
tramp to refuse satisfaction if I offered a drink or two, or a small sum
of money. One told me that he envied 'no lords or toffs' as long as he got
plenty of 'booze and buggery.'
"Another one, who told me that he had been twenty-five years on the road,
said that he could not endure to sleep alone. (He was a pedlar, openly of
cheap religious books and secretly of the vilest pamphlets and
photographs). He had 'done time' and he said the greatest punishment to
him was not being able to have a 'make' who would submit to penetration,
though he was not particular what form the sexual act took. Another fine
young man, whom I chanced to meet the very day he had been released from a
long sentence in prison for burglary and with whom I passed a night of
incessant and almost brutal intimacy, said his punishment was seeing men
always about him and being unable to have connection with them. Another
and very powerful influence in 'tramps' toward homosexuality is that, in
the low lodging houses they are obliged to frequent, a single bed is
perhaps double to one with a bedmate whom perhaps he has never seen
before, and especially in hot weather, when the rule is nakedness.
"My sexual desires being for the male invert I have come most in contact
with them and have found that they form much the larger class. Among
harvesters and seafaring tramps it is seldom you find a 'dandy' such as I
was considered, and as such I was eagerly courted, and any suggestion of
intimacy on my part quickly responded to. As regards the use of young boys
for homosexual indulgence, it is not common as it is too dangerous, though
I have known boys, especially those belonging to vans or gypsies, to
prostitute themselves, always for money.
"On one occasion I saw a boy who created quite an outburst of lust of
homosexual nature. The incident took place in a small seafaring town in
Scotland one evening before a Fair was to be held. It occurred in a low
public house where a number of very rough and mostly drunken men were
assembled. A blind man came in led by an extremely pretty but
effeminate-looking youth of about 17, wearing a ragged kilt and with bare
legs and feet. He had long, curling, fair hair which reached to his
shoulders and on it an old bonnet was perched. He also wore an old
velveteen shooting jacket. All eyes were turned on the pair and they were
quickly offered drinks. A remark was made by one man that he believed the
youth was a lassie. The boy said, 'I will show you I am a laddie,' and
pulled up his kilt, exposing his genitals and then his posterior.
Boisterous laughter greeted this indecent exposure and suggestion, and
more drinks were provided. The blind man then played his fiddle and the
boy danced with frequent recurrences of the same indecencies. He was
seized, kissed, and caressed by quite a number of men, some of whom
endeavored to masturbate him, which he resisted, but performed it for
them. After the closing time came, I and about ten or twelve men all
occupied the same room; the old man continued to play, and the youth,
stark naked, continued to dance and suggested we others should do so, and
an erotic scene took place which was only closed to view by the 'boss' who
was present putting out the lamp.
"Two classes of tramps I have met openly declare their preference for
homosexuality. They are men who have been in the army and sailors and
seafaring men in general. It is said that 'Jack has a wife in every port,'
but I believe from my experience that the wife in many cases is of the
male sex, and this among those of all nationalities, as is the case with
soldiers. Among these also jealousy is more common than amongst ordinary
tramps, and if you are 'dandy' to a soldier, if you make advances or
receive them from a senior, trouble is likely to occur between them.
"I could give many instances of my own personal experiences to show that
'tramps' are looked upon by men in the country districts as legitimate,
complacent, and purchaseable objects for homosexual lust."
FOOTNOTES:
[276] This is the home of the fraternity. Practically it is any corner
where they can lay their heads; but, as a rule, it is either a
lodging-house, a freight-car, or a nest in the grass near the railway
watering-tank.
[277] All hoboes carry razors, both for shaving and for defense. Strange
to say, they succeed in smuggling them into gaols, as they are never
searched thoroughly.
[278] This word is of Hebrew origin, and means girl (_Mädchen_).
APPENDIX B.
THE SCHOOL-FRIENDSHIPS OF GIRLS.
I.
A school-friendship is termed by Italian girls a "flame" (_flamma_). This
term, as explained by Obici and Marchesini, indicates, in school-slang,
both the beloved person and the friendship in the abstract; but it is a
friendship which has the note of passion as felt and understood in this
environment. In every college the "flame" is regarded as a necessary
institution. The relationship is usually of a markedly Platonic character,
and generally exists between a boarder on one side and a day-pupil on the
other. Notwithstanding, however, its apparently non-sexual nature, all the
sexual manifestations of college youth circle around it, and in its
varying aspects of differing intensity all the gradations of sexual
sentiment may be expressed.
Obici and Marchesini carried on their investigation chiefly among the
pupils of Normal schools, the age of the girls being between 12 and 19 or
20. There are both boarders and day-pupils at these colleges; the boarders
are most inflammable, but it is the day-pupils who furnish the sparks.
Obici and Marchesini received much assistance in their studies from former
pupils who are now themselves teachers. One of these, a day-pupil who had
never herself been either the object or the agent in one of these
passions, but had had ample opportunity of making personal observations,
writes as follows: "The 'flame' proceeds exactly like a love-relationship;
it often happens that one of the girls shows man-like characteristics,
either in physical type or in energy and decision of character; the other
lets herself be loved, acting with all the obstinacy--and one might almost
say the shyness--of a girl with her lover. The beginning of these
relationships is quite different from the usual beginnings of friendship.
It is not by being always together, talking and studying together, that
two become 'flames'; no, generally they do not even know each other; one
sees the other on the stairs, in the garden, in the corridors, and the
emotion that arises is nearly always called forth by beauty and physical
grace. Then the one who is first struck begins a regular courtship:
frequent walks in the garden when the other is likely to be at the window
of her class-room, pauses on the stairs to see her pass; in short, a mute
adoration made up of glances and sighs. Later come presents of beautiful
flowers, and little messages conveyed by complacent companions. Finally,
if the 'flame' shows signs of appreciating all these proofs of affection,
comes the letter of declaration. Letters of declaration are long and
ardent, to such a degree that they equal or surpass real
love-declarations. The courted one nearly always accepts, sometimes with
enthusiasm, oftenest with many objections and doubts as to the affection
declared. It is only after many entreaties that she yields and the
relationship begins."
Another collaborator who has herself always aroused very numerous "flames"
gives a very similar description, together with other particulars. Thus
she states: "It may be said that 60 per cent. of the girls in a college
have 'flame' relationships, and that of the remaining 40 only half refuse
from deliberate repulsion to such affections; the other 20 are excluded
either because they are not sufficiently pleasing in appearance or because
their characters do not inspire sympathy." And, regarding the method of
beginning the relationship, she writes: "Sometimes 'flames' arise before
the two future friends have even seen each other, merely because one of
them is considered as beautiful, sympathetic, nice, or elegant. Elegance
exerts an immense fascination, especially on the boarders, who are bound
down by monotonous and simple habits. As soon as a boarder hears of a
day-pupil that she is charming and elegant she begins to feel a lively
sympathy toward her, rapidly reaching anxiety to see her. The longed-for
morning at length arrives. The beloved, unconscious of the tumult of
passions she has aroused, goes into school, not knowing that her walk, her
movements, her garments are being observed from stairs or dormitory
corridor.... For the boarders these events constitute an important part of
college-life, and often assume, for some, the aspect of a tragedy, which,
fortunately, may be gradually resolved into a comedy or a farce."
Many letters are written in the course of these relationships; Obici and
Marchesini have been able to read over 300 such letters which had been
carefully preserved by the receivers and which, indeed, formed the chief
material for their study. These letters clearly show that the "flame" most
usually arises from a physical sympathy, an admiration of beauty and
elegance. The letters written in this "flame" relationship are full of
passion; they appear to be often written during periods of physical
excitement and psychic erethism, and may be considered, Obici and
Marchesini remark, a form of intellectual onanism, of which the writers
afterward feel remorse and shame as of a physically dishonorable act. In
reference to the underlying connection of these feelings with the sexual
impulse, one of the lady collaborators writes: "I can say that a girl who
is in love with a man never experiences 'flame' emotions for a companion."
Obici and Marchesini thus summarize the differential character of "flames"
as distinguished from ordinary friendships: "(1) the extraordinary
frequency with which, even by means of subterfuges, the lovers exchange
letters; (2) the anxiety to see and talk to each other, to press each
other's hands, to embrace and kiss; (3) the long conversations and the
very long reveries; (4) persistent jealousy, with its manifold arts and
usual results; (5) exaltation of the beloved's qualities; (6) the habit of
writing the beloved's name everywhere; (7) absence of envy for the loved
one's qualities; (8) the lover's abnegation in conquering all obstacles to
the manifestations of her love; (9) the vanity with which some respond to
'flame' declarations; (10) the consciousness of doing a prohibited thing;
(11) the pleasure of conquest, of which the trophies (letters, etc.) are
preserved."
The difference between a "flame" and a friendship is very well marked in
the absolute exclusiveness of the former, whence arises the possibility
of jealousy. At the same time friendship and love are here woven together.
The letters are chaste (a few exceptions among so many letters not
affecting this general rule), and the purity of the flame relationship is
also shown by the fact that it is usually between boarders and day-pupils,
girls in different classes and different rooms, and seldom between those
who are living in close proximity to each other. "Certainly," writes one
of the lady collaborators, "the first sensual manifestations develop in
girls with physical excitement pure and simple, but (at all events, I
would wish to believe it) the majority of college-girls find sufficient
satisfaction in being as near as possible to the beloved person (of
whichever sex), in mutual admiration and in kissing, or, very frequently,
in conversation that is by no means moral, though usually very
metaphorical. The object of such conversation is to discover the most
important mysteries of human nature, the why and the wherefore; it deals
with natural necessities, which the girl feels and has an intuition of,
but as yet knows nothing definite about. Such conversations are the order
of the day in schools and in colleges and specially revolve around
procreation, the most difficult mystery of all. They are a heap of
stupidities." This lady had only known of one definitely homosexual
relationship during the whole of her college-life; the couple in question
were little liked and had no other "flames." The chief general sexual
manifestations, this lady concludes, which she had noted among her
companions was a constant preoccupation with sexual mysteries and the
necessity of talking about them perpetually.
Another lady collaborator who had lived in a Normal school had had
somewhat wider experiences. She entered at the age of 14 and experienced
the usual loneliness and unhappiness of a new pupil. One day as she was
standing pensive and alone in a corner of the room, a companion--one who
on her arrival had been charged to show her over the college--ran up to
her, "embracing me, closing by mouth with a kiss, and softly caressing my
hair. I gazed at her in astonishment, but experienced a delicious
sensation of supreme comfort. Here began the idyll! I was subjected to a
furious tempest of kisses and caresses which quite stunned me and made me
ask myself the reason of such a new and unforeseen affection. I
ingenuously inquired the reason, and the reply was: 'I love you; you
struck me immediately I saw you, because you are so beautiful and so
white, and because it makes me happy and _soothes_ me when I can pass my
hands through your hair and kiss your plump, white face. I need a soul and
a body.' This seemed to me the language of a superior person, for I could
not grasp all its importance. As on the occasion when she first embraced
me, I looked at her in astonishment and could not for the moment respond
to a new fury of caresses and kisses. I felt that they were not like the
kisses of my mamma, my papa, my brother, and other companions; they gave
me unknown sensations; the contact of those moist and fleshy lips
disturbed me. Then came the exchange of letters and the usual rights and
duties of 'flames.' When we met in the presence of others we were only to
greet each other simply, for 'flames' were strictly prohibited. I obeyed
because I liked her, but also because I was afraid of her Othello-like
jealousy. She would suffocate me, even bite me, when I played, joyously
and thoughtlessly, with others, and woe to me if I failed to call her when
I was combing my hair. She liked to see me with my hair down and would
rest her head on my shoulder, especially if I were partially undressed. I
let her do as she liked, and she would scold me severely because I was
never first in longing for her, running to meet her, and kissing her. But
at the same time the thought of losing her, the thought that perhaps one
day she would shower her caresses on others, secretly wounded my heart.
But I never told her this! One day, however, when with the head-mistress
gazing at a beautiful landscape, I was suddenly overwhelmed with sadness
and burst out crying. The head-mistress inquired what was the matter, and
throwing myself in her arms I sobbed: 'I love her, and I shall die if she
leaves off loving me!' She smiled, and the smile went through my heart. I
saw at once how silly I was, and what a wrong road my companion was on.
From that day I could no longer endure my 'flame.' The separation was
absolute; I courageously bore bites and insults, even scratches on my
face, followed by long complaints and complete prostration. I thought it
would be mean to accuse her, but I invented a pretext for having the
number of my bed changed. This was because she would dress quietly and
come to pass hours by my bed, resting her head on the pillow. She said she
wished to smell the perfume of my health and freshness. This continual
turbulent desire had now nauseated me, and I wished to avoid it
altogether. Later I heard that she had formed a relationship which was not
blessed by any sacred rite."
Notwithstanding the Platonic character of the correspondences, Obici and
Marchesini remark, there is really a substratum of emotional sexuality
beneath it, and it is this which finds its expression in the indecorous
conversations already referred to. The "flame" is a _love-fiction, a play
of sexual love_. This characteristic comes out in the frequently romantic
names, of men and women, invented to sign the letters.
Even in the letters themselves, however, the element of sexual
impressionability may be traced. "On Friday we went to a service at San
B.," writes one who was in an institution directed by nuns, "but
unfortunately I saw M.L. at a window when I thought she was at A. and I
was in a nervous state the whole time. Imagine that that dear woman was at
the window with bare arms, and, as it seemed to me, in her chemise." No
doubt a similar impression might have been made on a girl living in her
own family. But it is certain that the imaginative coloring tends to be
more lively in those living in colleges and shut off from that varied and
innocent observation which renders those outside colleges freer and more
unprejudiced. On a boy who is free to see as many women as he chooses a
woman's face cannot make such an impression as on a boy who lives in a
college and who is liable to be, as it were, electrified if he sees any
object belonging to a woman, especially if he sees it by stealth or during
a mood of erotism. Such an object calls out a whole series of wanton
imaginations, which it could not do in one who, by his environment, was
already armed against any tendencies to erotic fetichism. The attraction
exerted by that which we see but seldom, and around which fancy
assiduously plays, the attraction of forbidden fruit, produces tendencies
and habits which could scarcely develop in freedom. Curiosity is acute,
and is augmented by the obstacles which stand in the way of its
satisfaction. "Flame" attraction is the beginning of such a morbid
fetichism. A sentiment which under other conditions would never have gone
beyond ordinary friendship may thus become a "flame," and even a "flame"
of markedly sexual character. Under these influences boys and girls feel
the purest and simplest sentiments in a hyperesthetic manner. The girls
here studied have lost an exact conception of the simple manifestations of
friendship, and think they are giving evidence of exquisite sensibility
and true friendship by loving a companion to madness; friendship in them
has become a passion. That this intense desire to love a companion
passionately is the result of the college environments may be seen by the
following extract from a letter: "You know, dear, much better than I do
how acutely girls living away from their own homes, and far from all those
who are dearest to them on earth, feel the need of loving and being loved.
You can understand how hard it is to be obliged to live without anyone to
surround you with affection;" and the writer goes on to say how all her
love turns to her correspondent.
While there is an unquestionable sexual element in the "flame"
relationship, this cannot be regarded as an absolute expression of real
congenital perversion of the sex-instinct. The frequency of the phenomena,
as well as the fact that, on leaving college to enter social life, the
girl usually ceases to feel these emotions, are sufficient to show the
absence of congenital abnormality. The estimate of the frequency of
"flames" in Normal schools, given to Obici and Marchesini by several lady
collaborators, was about 60 per cent., but there is no reason to suppose
that women teachers furnish a larger contingent of perverted individuals
than other women. The root is organic, but the manifestations are ideal
and Platonic, in contrast with some other manifestations found in
college-life. No inquiry was made as to the details of solitary sexual
manifestations in the colleges, the fact that they exist to more or less
extent being sufficiently recognized. The conversations already referred
to are a measure of the excitations of sexuality existing in these college
inmates and multiplied in energy by communication. Such discourse was,
wrote one collaborator, the order of the day, and it took place chiefly at
the time when letter-writing also was easiest. It may well be that sensual
excitations, transformed into ethereal sentiments, serve to increase the
intensity of the "flames."
Taken altogether, Obici and Marchesini conclude, the flame may be regarded
as a _provisional synthesis_. We find here, in solution together, the
physiological element of incipient sexuality, the psychical element of the
tenderness natural to this age and sex, the element of occasion offered by
the environment, and the social element with its nascent altruism.
II.
That the phenomena described in minute detail by Obici and Marchesini
closely resemble the phenomena as they exist in English girls' schools is
indicated by the following communication, for which I am indebted to a
lady who is familiar with an English girls' college of very modern type:--
"From inquiries made in various quarters and through personal observation
and experience I have come to the conclusion that the romantic and
emotional attachments formed by girls for their female friends and
companions, attachments which take a great hold of their minds for the
time being, are far commoner than is generally supposed among English
girls, more especially at school or college, or wherever a number of girls
or young women live together in one institution, and are much secluded.
"As far as I have been able to find out, these attachments--which have
their own local names, e.g., 'raves,' 'spoons,' etc.--are comparatively
rare in the smaller private schools, and totally absent among girls of the
poorer class attending Board and National schools, perhaps because they
mix more freely with the opposite sex.
"I can say from personal experience that in one of the largest and best
English colleges, where I spent some years, 'raving' is especially common
in spite of arrangements which one would have thought would have abolished
most unhealthy feelings. The arrangements there are very similar to a
large boys' college. There are numerous boarding-houses, which have, on an
average, forty to fifty students. Each house is under the management of a
well-educated house-mistress assisted by house-governesses (quite separate
from college-teachers). Each house has a large garden with tennis-courts,
etc.; and cricket, hockey, and other games are carried on to a large
extent, games being not only much encouraged, but much enjoyed. Each girl
has a separate cubicle, or bedroom, and no junior (under 17 years of age)
is allowed to enter the cubicle, or bedroom, of another without asking
permission, or to go to the bedrooms during the day. In fact, everything
is done to discourage any morbid feelings. But all the same, as far as my
experience goes, the friendships there seem more violent and more
emotional than in most places, and sex subjects form one of the chief
topics of conversation.
"In such large schools and colleges these 'raves' are not only numerous,
but seem to be perennial among the girls of all ages, from 13 years
upward. Girls under that age may be fond of some other student or teacher,
but in quite a different way. These 'raves' are not mere friendships in
the ordinary sense of the word, nor are they incompatible with ordinary
friendships. A girl with a 'rave' often has several intimate friends for
whom affection is felt without the emotional feelings and pleasurable
excitement which characterize a 'rave.'
"From what I have been told by those who have experienced these 'raves'
and have since been in love with men, the emotions called forth in both
cases were similar, although in the case of the 'rave' this fact was not
recognized at the time. This appears to point to a sexual basis, but, on
the other hand, there are many cases where the feeling seems to be more
spiritual, a sort of uplifting of the whole soul with an intense desire to
lead a very good life--the feeling being one of reverence more than
anything else for the loved one, with no desire to become too intimate and
no desire for physical contact.
"'Raves,' as a rule, begin quite suddenly. They may be mutual or all on
one side. In the case of school-girls the mutual 'rave' is generally found
between two companions, or the girls may have a 'rave' for one of their
teachers or some grown-up acquaintance, who does not necessarily enter
into the school-life. In this case there may or may not be a feeling of
affection for the girl by her 'rave,' though minus all the emotional
feelings.
"Occasionally a senior student will have a 'rave' on a little girl, but
these cases are rare and not very active in their symptoms, girls over 18
having fewer 'raves' and generally condemning them.
"In the large school already referred to, of which I have personal
knowledge, 'raving' was very general, hardly anyone being free from it.
Any fresh student would soon fall a victim to the fashion, which rather
points to the fact that it is infectious. Sometimes there might be a lull
in the general raving, only to reappear after an interval in more or less
of an epidemic form. Sometimes nearly all the 'raves' were felt by
students for their teachers; at other times it was more apparent between
the girls themselves.
"Sometimes one teacher was raved on by several girls. In many cases, the
girls raving on a teacher would have a very great friendship with one of
their companions--talking with each other constantly of their respective
'raves,' describing their feelings and generally letting off steam to one
another, indulging sometimes in the active demonstrations of affection
which they were debarred from showing the teacher herself, and in some
cases having no desire to do so even if they could.
"As far as I have been able to judge, there is not necessarily any
attraction for physical characteristics, as beauty, elegance, etc.; the
two participants are probably both of strong character or a weak character
raves on a stronger, but rarely _vice versâ_.
"I have often noticed that the same person may be raved on at different
times by several people of different characters and of all ages: say, up
to 30 years of age. It is hard to say why some persons more than others
should inspire this feeling. Often they are reserved, without any
particular physical attraction, and often despising raving and emotional
friendships, and give no encouragement to them. That the majority of
'raves' have a sexual basis may be true, but I am sure that in the
majority of cases where young girls are concerned this is not in the least
recognized, and no impurity is indulged in or wished for. The majority of
the girls are entirely ignorant of all sexual matters, and understand
nothing whatever about them. But they do wonder about them and talk about
them constantly, more especially when they have a 'rave,' which seems to
point to some subtle connection between the two. That this ignorance
exists is largely to be deplored. The subject, if once thought of, is
always thought of and talked of, and information is at length generally
gained in a regrettable manner. From personal experience I know the evil
results that this ignorance and constant endeavoring to find out
everything has on the mind and bodies of school-girls. If children had the
natural and simple laws of creation carefully explained to them by their
parents, much harm would be prevented, and the conversation would not
always turn on sexual matters. The Bible is often consulted for the
discovery of hidden mysteries.
"'Raves' on teachers are far commoner than between two girls. In this case
the girl makes no secret of her attachment, constantly talking of it and
describing her feelings to any who care to listen and writing long letters
to her friends about the same. In the case of two girls there is more
likely to be a sexual element, great pleasure being taken in close contact
with one another and frequent kissing and hugging. When parted, long
letters are written, often daily; they are full of affectionate
expressions of love, etc., but there is also a frequent reference to the
happiness and desire to do well that their love has inspired them with,
while often very deeply religious feelings appear to be generated and many
good resolutions are made. Their various emotional feelings are described
in every minute detail to each other.
"The duration of 'raves' varies. I have known them to last three or four
years, more often only a few months. Occasionally what began as a 'rave'
will turn, into a sensible firm friendship. I imagine that there is seldom
any actual inversion, and on growing up the 'raves' generally cease. That
the 'ravers' feel and act like a pair of lovers there is no doubt, and the
majority put down these romantic friendships for their own sex as due, in
a great extent, in the case of girls at schools, to being without the
society of the opposite sex. This may be true in some cases, but
personally I think the question open to discussion. These friendships are
often found among girls who have left school and have every liberty, even
among girls who have had numerous flirtations with the opposite sex, who
cannot be accused of inversion, and who have all the feminine and domestic
characteristics.
"In illustration of these points I may bring forward the following case:
A. and B. were two girls at the same college. They belonged to different
cliques, or sets; occupied different bedrooms; never met in their
school-work, and were practically only known to one another by name. One
day they chanced to sit next to one another at some meal. They both
already had 'raves,' A. on an actor she had lately seen, B. on a married
woman at her home. The conversation happened to turn on 'raves,' and
mutual attraction was _suddenly_ felt. From that moment a new interest
came into their lives. They lived for one another. At the time A. was 14,
B. a year older. Both were somewhat precocious for their age, were
practical, with plenty of common sense, very keen on games, interested in
their lessons, and very independent, but at the same time with marked
feminine characteristics and popular with the opposite sex. After the
first feeling of interest there was a subtle excitement and desire to
meet again. All their thoughts were occupied with the subject. Each day
they managed as many private meetings as possible. They met in the
passages in order to say good-night with many embraces. As far as possible
they hid their feelings from the rest of their world. They became
inseparable, and a very lasting and real, but somewhat emotional,
affection, in which the sexual element was certainly marked, sprang up
between them. Although at the time they were both quite ignorant of sexual
matters, yet they indulged their sexual instincts to some extent. They
felt surcharged with hitherto unexperienced feelings and emotions,
instinct urged them to let these have play, but instinctively they also
had a feeling that to do so would be wrong. This feeling they endeavored
to argue out and find reasons for. When parted for any length of time they
felt very miserable and wrote pages to one another every day, pouring
forth in writing their feelings for one another. In this time of active
attraction they both became deeply religious for a time. The active part
of the affection continued for three or four years, and now, after an
interval of ten years, they are both exceedingly fond of one another,
although their paths in life are divided and each has since experienced
love for a man. Both look back upon the sexual element in their friendship
with some interest. It may be remarked in passing that A. and B. are both
attractive girls to men and women, and B. especially appears always to
have roused 'rave' feelings in her own sex, without the slightest
encouragement on her part. The duration of this 'rave' was exceptionally
long, the majority only lasting a few months, while some girls have one
'rave' after another or two or three together.
"I may mention one other case, where I believe that if it a sexual basis
this was not recognized by the parties concerned or their friends. Two
girls, over 20 years of age, passed in a corridor. A few words were
exchanged: the beginning of a very warm and fast friendship. They said it
was _not_ a 'rave.' They were absolutely devoted to one another, but from
what I know of them and what they have since told me, their feelings were
quite free from any sexual desires, though their love for one another was
great. When parted they exchanged letters daily, but were always
endeavoring to urge one another on in all the virtues, and as far as I can
gather they never gave way to any feeling they thought was not for the
good of their souls.
"Letters and presents are exchanged, vows of eternal love are made,
quarrels are engaged in for the mere pleasure of reconciliation, and
jealousy is easily manifested. Although 'raves' are chiefly found among
school-girls, they are by no means confined to them, but are common among
any community of women of any age, say, under 30, and are not unknown
among married women when there is no inversion. In these oases there is
usually, of course, no ignorance of sexual matters.
"Whether there is any direct harm in these friendships I have not been
able to make up my mind. In the case of school-girls, if there is not too
much emotion generated and if the sexual feelings are not indulged in, I
think they may do more good than harm. Later on in life, when all one's
desires and feelings are at their strongest, it is more doubtful."
III.
That the phenomena as found in the girls' colleges of America are exactly
similar to those in Italy and England is shown, among other evidence, by
some communications sent to Mr. E.G. Lancaster, of Clark University,
Worcester, Mass., a few years ago.
Mr. E.G. Lancaster sent out a _questionnaire_ to over 800 teachers and
older pupils dealing with various points connected with adolescence, and
received answers from 91 persons containing information which bore on the
present question.[279] Of this number, 28 male and 41 female had been in
love before the age of 25, while 11 of each sex had had no love
experiences, this indicating, since the women were in a majority, that the
absence of love experience is more common in men than in women. These
answers were from young people between 16 and 25 years of age. Two males
and 7 females have loved imaginary characters, while 3 males and not less
than 46 females speak of passionate love for the same sex. Love of the
same sex, Lancaster remarks, though not generally known, is very common;
it is not mere friendship; the love is strong, real, and passionate. It
may be remarked that these 49 cases were reported without solicitation,
since there was no reference to homosexual love in the _questionnaire_.
Many of the answers to the syllabus are so beautiful, Lancaster observes,
that if they could be printed in full no comment would be necessary. He
quotes a few of the answers. Thus a woman of 33 writes: "At 14 I had my
first case of love, but it was with a girl. It was insane, intense love,
but had the same quality and sensations as my first love with a man at 18.
In neither case was the object idealized. I was perfectly aware of their
faults; nevertheless my whole being was lost, immersed in their existence.
The first lasted two years, the second seven years. No love has since been
so intense, but now these persons, though living, are no more to me than
the veriest stranger." Another woman of 35 writes: "Girls between the ages
of 14 and 18 at college or girls' schools often fall in love with the same
sex. This is not friendship. The loved one is older, more advanced, more
charming or beautiful. When I was a freshman in college I knew at least
thirty girls who were in love with a senior. Some sought her because it
was the fashion, but I knew that my own homage and that of many others was
sincere and passionate. I loved her because she was brilliant and utterly
indifferent to the love shown her. She was not pretty, though at the time
we thought her beautiful. One of her adorers, on being slighted, was ill
for two weeks. On her return she was speaking to me when the object of our
admiration came into the room. The shock was too great and she fainted.
When I reached the senior year I was the recipient of languishing glances,
original verses, roses, and passionate letters written at midnight and
three in the morning." No similar confessions are recorded from men.
IV.
In South America corresponding phenomena have been found in schools and
colleges of the same class. There they have been especially studied by
Mercante in the convent High Schools of Buenos Aires where the students
are girls between the ages of 10 and 22.[280] Mercante found that
homosexuality here is not clearly defined or explicit and usually it is
combined with a predisposition to romanticism and mysticism. It is usually
of a passive kind, but in this form so widespread as to constitute a kind
of epidemic. It was most manifest in institutions where the greatest
stress was placed on religious instruction.
The recreations of the school in question were quiet and enervating;
active or boisterous sports were prohibited to the end that good manners
might be cultivated. In the play-rooms, the girls observed the strictest
etiquette, and discipline was maintained independent of oversight by
teachers. Mercante could hardly believe, however, that the decorum was
more than external.
Later, when the girls broke up, they were found in pairs or small groups,
in corners, on benches, beside the pillars, arm in arm or holding hands.
What they were speaking of could be surmised. "Their conversation and
confidences came to me indirectly. They were sweethearts talking about
their affairs. In spite of the spiritual and feminine character of these
unions, one element was active, the other passive, thus confirming the
authorities on this matter, Gamier, Régis, Lombroso, Bonfigli."
Mercante found the points of view of the two members of each pair to be
quite different in moral aspect. "One takes the initiative, she commands,
she cares for, she offers, she gives, she makes decisions, she considers
the present, she imagines the future, she smoothes over difficulties,
gives encouragement and initiative, she commands, she cares for, she
offers, she gives, she docile, gives way in matters of dispute, and
expresses her affection with sweet words and promises of love and
submission. The atmosphere, silent and quiet, was, however, charged with
jealousy, squabble, desires, illusions, dreams, and lamentations."
Mercante's informant assured him that practically every girl had her
affinity, and that there were at least twenty well-defined love affairs.
The active party starts the conquest by making eyes, next she becomes more
intimate, and finally proposes. Women being highly adaptable, the
neophyte, unless she is rebellious, gets into the spirit of it all. If she
is not complaisant, she must prepare for conflict, because the prey
becomes more desirable the more the resistance encountered.
Opportunity was offered to Mercante to observe some of the correspondence
between the girls. Though of indifferent training and ability in other
respects, the girls speak and write regarding their affairs with most
admirable diction and style. No data are given regarding the actual
intimate relations between the girls.
FOOTNOTES:
[279] E.G. Lancaster, "The Psychology and Pedagogy of Adolescence,"
_Pedagogical Seminary_, July, 1897, p. 88.
[280] Victor Mercante, "Fetiquismo y Uranismo feminino en los internados
educativos," _Archivos de Psiquiatria y Criminologia_, 1905, pp. 22-30;
abstracted by D.C. McMurtrie, _Urologic Review_, August, 1914.
INDEX OF AUTHORS.
Abraham
Adler, A.
Adler Bey
Alain de Lille
Aletrino
Ammon
Angell, J.R.
Anselm
Arber
Ariosto
Aristophanes
Aristotle
Aschoff
Aubrey
Bacchaumont
Bailly-Maitre
Ballantyne
Balzac
Bartels, Max
Bascoul
Baumann
Bazalgette
Beardmore
Bell, Clark
Bell, Blair
Benkert
Benson, A. C
Berkman
Berrichon
Bertz
Besenval
Bethe
Biervliet
Binet
Binet-Valmer
Birnbaum
Bleuler
Bloch, Iwan
Blyth, J.
Body
Bombarda
Bond, C.J.
Borel
Bouchard
Brandt, P.
Brehm
Brill
Brown, H.
Brouardel
Brun, C.
Buchanan
Bucke
Buffon
Burchard
Burckhardt
Burton, Sir R.
Calesia
Campanella
Carlier
Carpenter, Edward
Carretto
Casanova
Casper
Castle
Cazanova
Charcot
Chevalier
Claiborne
Clarke, A.W.
Clayton
Coelius Aurelianus
Coleridge
Coriat
Corre
Croiset, A.
Crusius
Cust, R.H.H.
Dante
Darwin
Daville
Davitt, M.
Davray
Dejob
Descaves
Dessoir
D'Ewes
Diaz, B.
Diderot
Dostoieffsky
Dubois
Duflos
Dukes, O.
Dupré
Duviquet
Edmonds, J.M.
Eekhoud
Ellis, Havelock
Engelmann
Escoube
Essebac
Eulenburg
Ewart, C.T.
Féré
Ferenczi
Fernan
Ferrero
Flatau
Fliess
Flournoy
Flynt, Josiah
Foley
Forel
Frazer, Sir J.G.
Freimark
Freud
Frey, L.
Fuchs, A.
Galton
Gandavo
Garrod, A.B.
Gasparini
Gaudenzi
Gautier, A.
Gautier, T.
Gide
Gilford, H.
Gillen
Gleichen-Russwurm
Gley
Godard
Goldschwend
Gomperz
Gurlitt
Haddon, A.C.
Haeckel
Hahn
Halban
Hammer
Hamon
Hardman
Harris-Liston
Hart, Berry
Heape
Hegar
Heim
Herman
Herondas
Hirschfeld
Hoche
Hochstetter, S.
Holder
Holmberg
Holmes, W.G.
Homer
Home, H.
Horneffer
Hössli
Hughes, C.H.
Ingegnieros
Jacobs
James, W.
Jastrow
Jekels
John of Salisbury
Johnston, J.
Jones, Ernest
Jones, W.
Juliusburger
Justi
Karsch
Kiefer
Kiernan
Klaatsch
Knapp
Kocher
Konradin
Krafft-Ebing
Krauss, F.S.
Kupffer, E. von
Kurella
Laborde
Lacassagne
Lancaster, E.G.
Langsdorff
Lapointe
Lasnet
Laupts, _see_ Saint-Paul, G.
Laurent
Laycock
Lefroy, E.C.
Legludic
Lepelletier
Leppmann
L'Estoile, P. de
Letamendi
Levetzow
Lévi
Libert
Licht
Lisiansky
Lombroso
Lorion
Löwenfeld
Lowie
Lydston
Macdonald, A.
Magnan
Maitland
Mantegazza
Marchesini
Marie de France
Marro
Marshall, F.H.R.
Martineau
Martius
Mason
Matignon
Mayne, Xavier
McMurtrie
Meige
Meissner, B.
Mercante
Merzbach
Meynert
Middleton
Möbius
Moerenhout
Moffat, D.
Moll
Monk of Evesham
Montaigne
Morache
Moreau
Morel
Moskowski
Moyer
Muccioli
Müller, F.C.
Mure, W.
Näcke
Neugebauer
Niceforo
Nicholson, J.G.
Nicklin
Norman, Conolly
Nortal
Obici
Oefele
Olano
Oppenheim
Ordericus Vitalis
Ortvay
Otis, M.
Parent-Duchâtelet
Parish
Parlagreco
Pavia
Petronius
Pfister
Plant
Platen
Plato
Platt, J.A.
Ploss
Plutarch
Pocock, R.
Poisson
Pollock
Praetorius, Numa
Preuss, J.
Prynne
Queringhi
Rachilde
Raffalovich
Rank, O.
Ransome
Reclus, Elie
Reid, Forrest
Ribot
Ritti
Rivers, W.C.
Rode, Léon de
Rohleder
Römer
Rosenstein, G.
Roth
Roubinovitch
Roux
Rowley
Rüling, A.
Rutherford
Sadger
Saint-Paul, G.
Sainte-Claire, Deville
Salillas
Savage, Sir G.
Scheffler
Schmid, A.
Schopenhauer
Schouten
Schrenck-Notzing
Schultz
Schur
Scott, Colin
Seitz
Seligmann
Selous, E.
Sérieux
Shattock
Shufeldt
Smith, Theodate
Smollett
Spranger
Steinach
Stekel
Stephanus
Strauch
Stubbes
Sturgis, H.O.
Sutton, Sir J. Bland
Symonds, J.A.
Talbot
Tamassia
Tarde
Tardieu
Tarnowsky
Tennyson
Thoinot
Tilly
Traubel
Turnbull
Ulrichs
Vanbrugh
Virchow
Vivien, Renée
Weeks
Weigand
Weismann
Weissenberg
Westermarck
Wey, H.D.
Weysse
Wheeler
Whitman, Walt.
Wilamowitz-Moellendorff
Wilhelm, E.
Willy
Wilson, J.M.
Wise
Witry
Wright, T.
Zola
Zuccarelli
INDEX OF SUBJECTS.
Abnormalities,
physical
Abnormality and disease,
difference between
Acquired inversion
Actors and homosexuality
Actresses,
homosexuality among
Adaptation therapy
Advertisements,
homosexual
Africa,
homosexuality in
Albanians,
homosexuality among
Aleuts,
homosexuality among
Ambisexuality
Anal eroticism
Anglo-Saxons
Animals,
homosexuality in
Arabs,
homosexuality among
Artistic aptitudes of inverts
Association therapy
Australia
Austrian law
Autobiographies,
homosexual
Auto-erotism
Bacon, Lord
Bali,
homosexuality among women in
Barnfield
Bastille,
inverts in the
Bazzi
Bearded women
Berlin
Birds,
homosexuality among
Bisexual, the term
Bisexuality
Blackmailing
Blavatsky, Madame
Bonheur, Rosa
_Boté_
Brazil,
homosexuality in
Buggery,
the term
_Burdash_
Byron
Castration
Cellini
Charke, Charlotte
Chastity,
the ideal of
Christina of Sweden
Classification of the homosexual
Clitoris in inverted women
Clothes,
inverted women in men's
_Code Napoléon_
Coeducation
Color-blindness compared to inversion
Congenital inversion
Contrary sexual feeling, the term
Convents,
homosexuality in
Costume
Creoles,
homosexuality among
Criminals,
homosexuality among
Cross-dressing
_Cudinas_
_Cunnilinctus_
Dadon
Degeneration and inversion
Disease and abnormality, difference between
Dolben
Dorians
Dramatic aptitude and inversion
Dreams,
erotic
Duquesnoy
Egypt,
homosexuality in ancient
modern
England,
homosexuality in
English law and homosexuality
Eonism
Erasmus
Erotic dreams
Eskimo
Eunuchoidism
Factories,
homosexuality among women in
_Fellatio_
Feminine characteristics of inverts
Fetichism,
erotic
Fitzgerald, Edward
France,
homosexuality in
Freudianism
Friendship
Frith, Mary
Genital organs and inversion
Genius,
homosexuality among men of
Germany,
homosexuality in
law in relation to homosexuality in
Gleim
Goethe
Greece,
homosexuality in ancient
Green,
inverts, preference for
Gynandromorphism
Gynecomasty
Hair on body
Hall, Murray
Handwriting
Harems,
homosexuality in
Hatschepsu, Queen
Health of inverts, general
Heliogabalus
Heredity in inversion
Heresy and homosexuality
Hermaphroditism
Hobart, Miss
Homogenic,
the term
Homosexuality,
the term
Hormones
_Horror feminæ_
Hössli
Humboldt, A. and W., von
Hygiene of homosexuality
Hyperesthesia of inverts, sexual
Hypertrichosis
Hypnotism in treatment of homosexuality
India,
homosexuality in
Indians,
homosexuality among American
Infantilism in inverts
Insanity and inversion
Insects,
homosexuality among
Internal secretions
Inversion,
the term
Italy,
homosexuality in
law in
James I
Julius Cæsar
Justinian's enactments
Kleist
Krupp, F.A.
Larynx in inverted women
Law in relation to homosexuality
Lefthandedness
Lesbianism
Lincken, Catharina
London,
homosexuality in
Madagascar,
homosexuality in
_Mahoos_
Marlowe
Marriage of inverts
Masculine protest
Masochism in inverted women
Masturbation
Maupin, Madame
Medico-legal aspects of homosexuality
Michel, Louise
Michelangelo
Mihiri
_Mika_ operation
Mitchell, Alice
Molly houses
Monkeys,
homosexuality among
Moral attitude of inverts
Moral leaders,
inversion in
_Mujerados_
Muret
Musculature
Music
Narcissism
Neurasthenia and inversion
New Caledonia,
homosexuality in
New Guinea,
homosexuality in
New Zealand,
homosexuality among women in
Normans
Nosology and pathology
Novels,
homosexual
Oedipus complex
Oligotrichosis
Ovaries
_Paiderastia_
Partridges,
homosexuality in
Pathology and nosology
_Pedicatio_
Persia
Phallus,
use of artificial
Physical abnormalities
Pigeons,
inversion in
Platen
Precocity of inverts
Prevalence of homosexuality
Prevention of homosexuality
Priests and inversion
Prisons,
homosexuality in
Prostitutes,
homosexuality among
Prostitution,
male
Pseudo-homosexuality
Pseudo-sexual attraction
Psycho-analysis
Psycho-sexual hermaphroditism
_and see_ Bisexuality.
Psycho-therapeutics
Race and inversion
Rats,
homosexuality among
Raylan, N. de
Red,
invert's preference for
Renaissance and inversion, the
Retarded inversion
Rome,
homosexuality in ancient
Russian law
Sadism in inverted women
Sakaltaves,
homosexuality among
Sappho
Sapphism
Savages,
homosexuality among
Schools and homosexuality
_Schopans_
_Seoatra_
Secondary sexual-characters and inversion
Seduction and inversion
Senile homosexuality
Sex,
the theory of
Sexo-esthetic inversion
Sexual organs
Sexual precocity of inverts
Shakespeare
Society and inversion
Sodoma
Sodomy,
the term
Soldiers,
homosexuality among
Sotadic zone,
Burton's
Spain,
homosexuality among women in
Spurious homosexuality
Suicide and inversion
Suggestion as an exciting cause of inversion
Switzerland,
law in
Tahiti
Tarn, Pauline
Tasso
Templars
Theaters and homosexuality
Tramps,
homosexuality among
Transvestism
Treatment of inversion
Tribadism
Turkey,
homosexuality in
Udall
Ulrichs
Undifferentiated sex stage in youth
United States,
homosexuality in
Uranism,
the term
Urning,
the term
Vanity of inverts
Vasectomy
Vay, Sarolta
Verlaine
Vinci, L. da
Virgil
Vivien, Renée
Voice in inversion
War and homosexuality
Whisky and inversion
Whitman, Walt
Wilde, Oscar
William III
William Rufus
Winkelmann
Women movement and homosexuality
Working classes,
homosexuality in
Zanzibar,
homosexuality in
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