(Messius was sprung of the renowned race of the Oscans, Sarmentus’mistress is yet living; from these ancestors derived, they came to the fray. First begins Sarmentus: “I declare you are just like an unbroken horse.” At this sally we laugh, and Messius himself says: “I accept the likeness,” and tosses his head. “Oh! if your horn had not been amputated from your brow,” says he then, “what would you do, since you threaten us so fiercely, mutilated as you are?” Now an ugly scar disfigured the left side of his shaggy brow. After making a number of jibes at his Campanian disease, and his face, he asked him to dance the shepherd Cyclops; saying there needed no mask and tragic buskins. Many jests Cicirrus added as well).
Messius who is chiefly spoken of in the above passage, is in the first place represented as an Oscan by birth. Now the whole race of the Oscans was, as Festus informs us, notorious for its unnatural excesses in matters of Love; we read in him, p. 191: “Obscum duas diversas et contrarias significationes habet. Nam Cloatius putat eo vocabulo significari sacrum, quo etiam leges sacrae Oscae dicuntur, et in omnibus fere antiquis commentariis scribitur Opicum pro Obsco, ut in Titini fabula quinta: Qui Obsce et Volsce fabulantur, nam Latine nesciunt. A quo etiam verba impudentia, et elata appellantur obscena, quia frequentissimus fuit usus Oscis libidinum spurcarum.” (Obscum has two different and contrary meanings. For Cloatius considers sacred to be signified by the word, in which sense sacred laws are spoken of as leges Oscae (Oscan laws), and in almost all the old commentaries Opicum is written for Obscum, as in the fifth Fable of Titinius: “Who converse in Obscan and Volscian, because they know not how in Latin.” Whence also indecent words, and swelling ones, are called obscene, because the practice of unclean lusts was most frequent among the Oscans120.)
Again on p. 194., “Oscos, quos dicimus, ait Verrius Opscos ante dictos, teste Ennio, cum dicat: De muris res gerit Opscus. Adiicit etiam, quod stupra inconcessae libidinis obscena dicantur, ab eius gentis consuetudine inducta. Quod verum esse non satis adducor, cum apud antiquos omnes fere obscena dicta sint, quae mali ominis habebantur.” (The Oscans, as we call them, Verrius says were formerly called Opscans, on the evidence of Ennius, for he says: “The Opscan directs his attack upon the walls.” He adds further that debaucheries of lawless love are called “obscene”, as taking this name from the habits of the nation in question. But I am not sufficiently convinced of the truth of this, inasmuch as in nearly all the ancient writers things are called obscene that were held to be of evil omen). However what the spurca libido (unclean lust) consisted in may be readily conjectured from the following explanations of Festus: Oscines aves Appius Claudius esse ait, quae ore canentes faciant auspicium, ut corvus121, cornix, noctua, (Divinatory birds—Oscines aves—are, says Appius Claudius, such as give an augury by singing with the mouth, as the raven, the crow, the owl); if only we remember how the fellator, as was shown on a previous page, was nicknamed corvus (raven). Again in an Epigram of Ausonius already quoted a cunnilingue is called Opicus magister; so that we cannot doubt the question is here of that vice which is practised with the mouth.
In another Epigram of Ausonius quoted and explained above, where the different forms of the obscoena Venus (obscene Love) are specified, Crispa there mentioned practises,
(That vice too which headlong wantonness branded on the men of Nola), and this capitalis luxus122 of the men of Nola, as the general sense of the whole passage clearly shows, is nothing else but fellation. But the town of Nola was in Campania, and the inhabitants of Campania again consisted for the most part of Oscans; so whatever is true of the latter, must needs also apply to the Campanians. The Nolans and Oscans or Opicans being fellators and cunnilingues, the Campanians must be so too; and as a matter of fact Plautus (Trinum. II. 4. 144.) tells us: Campas genus multo Syrorum antidit patientia, (The Campanian race far outdoes that of the Syrians in passivity).
Now Messius being represented as an Oscan, and this by way of mockery, as all expounders admit, the point of the jest must evidently refer to this luxus capitalis, and Messius accordingly be regarded as a fellator. Now let us look if this view finds any confirmation in what follows123. First of all Sarmentus says Messius is equi feri similis (like an unbroken horse). Wherein precisely the satire of this consists is indeed somewhat doubtful, the commentators maintaining an obstinate silence on the point; but there must be some allusion of some sort intended. We can scarcely suppose this to be to the Hectoreus equus (the Hectorean stallion) of Ovid124 or the equus supinus (the stallion lying supine) of Horace,—Sat. II. 7. 50.125. The unbroken horse is noticeable as galloping with head down between the fore-feet, a position taken, as we have already pointed out, by the cunnilingue, but which in accordance with the passage of Lucian quoted above can equally well be that of the fellator126. Messius must have understood the allusion, for he says, “Accipio”,—caput et movet, (“I accept”,—and moves his head). Sarmentus takes the movement as a threat, for he in his turn understands the equus ferus (wild horse) in yet another sense as aries (a ram)127, and adds: If only your horn had not been amputated! What should make you threaten to butt, mutilus (mutilated)128 as you are?
Now in explanation of what it was led Sarmentus to indulge in this jest, Horace goes on to say that Messius carried on the left side of his brow a hideous scar. At this Sarmentus directs his wit, making allusion to the Campanus morbus (Campanian disease) and Messius’disfigured face, finishing up by asking the latter pastorem saltaret uti Cyclopa (to dance the shepherd Cyclops), adding that for this he would need neither mask nor tragic buskins. But the Campanus morbus129 is indeed nothing else but the capitalis luxus (headlong wantonness) of the Nolans, the peculiar vice of the Oscans, fellation in fact, which Messius practised, and to which he owed his foeda cicatrix (hideous scar), his disfigured face; and on both these points Sarmentus proceeds to rally him at great length (permulta iocatus,—indulging in very many jests), without Horace however recording his wit any further. In the pastorem Cyclopa saltare (to dance the shepherd Cyclops) again is contained an allusion that has hitherto been quite misunderstood, one which Lucian in his Pseudologistae (ch. 27.) will best explain for us. He says to Timarchus: “But in Italy, great gods! you acquired the heroic nickname of ὁ Κύκλωψ (the Cyclops), because at one time you wanted to practise your vice in imitation of the old legend, as it is found in Homer, and actually, as you lay there drunk, held the κισσύβιον (wassail-bowl) in your hand like a wanton Polyphemus; and the young man hired for the purpose with outstretched hasta (spear), that was well sharpened, threw himself upon you like another Odysseus, to thrust out your eye130.
Thus it is by no means unreasonable to speak of you as using “cold-mouthed phrases” (Ψυχρολογεῖν). But you, Cyclops, opening your mouth, and gaping as wide as mortal man can, had your cheeks plugged by him, or better you longed, as Charybdis with the ships was fain to swallow down helm and sail and all, you longed to absorb the whole Οὖτις (No-man).”
Finally the nickname Messius bears, Cicirrus or Cicerrus, would seem to embody a jesting allusion, as it was no doubt given him on account of his throaty, croaking voice. It signifies the same thing as κερκίδες (hawks) in Dio Chrysostom, and like that word is to be derived from κέρχω (to croak)131.
The Morbus Phoeniceus (Phoenician disease) was not, as we have seen, elephantiasis at all, and neither was the Morbus Campanus (Campanian disease) mentagra. But just as elephantiasis might supervene as a consequence of Morbus Phoeniceus, so the foeda cicatrix (hideous scar), a mark left behind it by a previous malady, was a consequence of the Morbus Campanus. Now what was the nature of this malady that the mark it left behind showed as a foeda cicatrix, is precisely what we would wish to determine. The Commentators all take the cornu exsectum (a horn amputated) as giving the explanation, though this is by no means absolutely necessary according to the general drift of the passage as explained; and Sarmentus might perfectly well under these circumstances, arguing from the presence of a scar, assume or at any rate profess to assume as the cause from which this had originated, the previous existence of a horny excrescence, without the latter as an actual matter of fact having ever had any previous existence. To us at any rate the cornu exsectum appears to stand in only a remote connection with the foeda cicatrix, which was no doubt later on made the subject of manifold further witticisms; only Horace has given us no more details about the matter, either because they had entirely escaped his memory, or possibly because he had not perfectly grasped the point of these jokes. Certainly the conspicuously placed at (but) seems to point to a distinction of what follows from what precedes—unless indeed it is so placed merely to mark the transition from the oratio directa to the oratio indirecta.
However, granted there actually was an excrescence previously existing, which had been removed by the knife, of what nature was the said excrescence? It is scarcely possible, with Heindorf, to suppose the Satyriasis of Aristotle132 to be intended here; with much greater probability Schneider in his Greek Dictionary, under the word διονυσιακὸς (Dionysiac, connected with Dionysus) drew attention to the definition of Galen (edit. Kühn XIX. p. 443.): διονυσίσκοι εἰσὶν ὀστώδεις ὑπεροχαὶ ἐγγὺς κροτάφων γιγνόμεναι. λέγονται δὲ κέρατα ἀπὸ τῶν κερασφορούντων ζάων κεκλημένα. (διονυσίσκοι are bony excrescences growing near the temples, and they are called horns, so named from the animals that carry horns). A passage of Heliodorus (Cocchi Ant., Graecorum chirurgici libri, e collect. Nicetae Florent. 1754. fol., p. 125.) which Oribasius, De fracturis, has preserved, gives a slightly different account; it reads: Ὀστώδης ἐπίφυσις ἐν παντὶ μὲν γίγνεται μέρει τοῦ σώματος, πλεοναζόντως δὲ ἐν τῇ κεφαλῇ, μάλιστα δὲ πλησίον τῶν κροτάφων· Ὅταν δὲ δύο ἐπιφύσεις γένωνται πλησιάζουσαι τοῖς κροτάφοις, κέρατα ταῦτα τινες εἴωθασιν ὀνομάζειν, ἔνιοι δὲ διονυσιακοὺς τοὺς οὕτω πεπονθότας ἀνθρώπους προσηγόρευσαν. (Bony outgrowth may occur in every part of the body, but pre-eminently on the head, and particularly near the temples. But when there are two such growths in the neighbourhood of the temples, some are wont to call them horns, but others name the patients so afflicted διονυσιακοὶ). Then follows the description of the outgrowth, and the method of its removal by excision. On this passage Cocchi found an old marginal gloss from the hand of Nicotas (?), κέρατα μὲν λέγεται ἀπὸ τῆς τῶν κεράτων ἐκφύσεως, τῶν γιγνομένων τοῖς ἀλόγοις ζώοις. Διονυσιακοὺς δὲ αὐτοὺς προσαγορεύουσιν, ἀπὸ τῆς πρὸς τὸν θεὸν ἐμφερείας ὡς αὐτός φησιν ἐν τοῖς χειρουργουμένοις,—(they are called horns from the growth of the horns that appear on the lower animals. And they name them διονυσιακοὶ from the likeness to the god Dionysus, as he says himself, in the carved figures),—which on the whole confirms the statement of Heliodorus, though he (Cocchi) prefers, following this indication, to emend the passage of Galen also so as to read, διονυσιακοί, οἷς ὀστώδεις ὑπεροχαὶ ἐγγὺς κροτάφων γίγνονται, (Dionysiaci, so they are called, i.e. those in whom bony excrescences grow near the temples). This much, that we should read διονυσιακοὶ for διονυσίσκοι, is evident, but whether the rest of the emendations are to be accepted may well be open to doubt, as the second clause of the sentence, “and they are called κέρατα (horns), so named from the animals that carry horns”, obviously implies that the term διονυσιακοὶ is used in reference not to the individual, but to the outgrowth. Schneider indeed agrees with the emendation of Cocchi, but has in error put Sarmentus in the place of Messius.
Now supposing the latter has actually had an earlier bony outgrowth, it is not exactly evident why after its skilful removal a foeda cicatrix (hideous scar) should have remained,—if indeed we do not prefer to regard the foedus (hideous, foul) as perhaps pointing to the cause that had occasioned the outgrowth in question. In that case it would certainly be interesting to see thus referred to the vice of the fellator affections of the bones carrying the same meaning as our own tophi (concretions on the bone in gouty affections). But in all probability it was merely cutaneous tubercles that had been removed by surgical means, the actual cautery or the knife, and these, as is invariably their nature to do, had left behind an ugly scar. Thus Messius would seem to have resembled Calvus tuberossimae frontis (with brow most thickly covered with tubercles) in Petronius (ch. 15.) and the face represented on a gem, of which a delineation is said to be found in Corius’ Museum Etruriae Plate II. fig. 3.,—a work we have been unable to procure. But enough of the Morbus Campanus133!
Sodomy, or Bestiality.
§ 27.
In the various forms of vice hitherto considered we have seen mankind approximating more and more closely to the animal and putting himself to a greater or less degree on the same footing; now we behold him in Sodomy134 sinking finally far below the level of the animal, renouncing not merely the human but even the animal nature, in virtue of which he has been able so far to call himself at lowest a member of the species. So it is with complete justice that Plutarch135 says: “At gallus si gallum conscendat absente gallina, vivus comburitur, aruspice aliquo pronuntiante grave atroxque id esse ostentum. Ita ipsi homines hoc confessi sunt, castitate a brutis se superari, eaque naturae vim non facere voluptatum percipiendarum causa. Vestras libidines natura, quamquam legis auxilio fulta, tamen intra suos non potest coercere fines: quin eae instar fluvii exundantes atrocem foeditatem, tumultum confusionemque naturae gignant in re venerea. Nam et capras, porcas, equas iniverunt viri, et feminae insano mascularum bestiarum amore exarserunt. Ex huiusmodi enim coitibus vobis sunt Minotauri, Silvani seu Aegipanes atque (ut mea fert sententia) etiam Sphinges et Centauri nati[136]. Enimvero fame coactus canis aut avis aliquando cadavere humano vescitur; ad coitum nullus unquam est homo a bestia sollicitatus, bestias vero cum ad hanc, tum ad alias voluptates vos vi trahitis ac contra jus usurpatis.” (But if the cock tread the cock in the absence of the hen, he is burned alive, any augur pronouncing this to be a serious and sinister prodigy. Thus men have themselves admitted that they are surpassed by brutes in chastity, and that the latter do not do violence to nature with a view to the gratification of their desires. Whereas your lusts nature cannot, though seconded by the aid of law, restrain within their due bounds, or stay them from overflowing like a river in flood and producing horrid abominations, a wild cataclysm and confusion of nature in matters of love. For men have had intercourse with she-goats and sows and mares, while women have been inflamed with mad love of male beasts. Indeed it is from such unions that your Minotaurs have been engendered, and Silvani or Aegipans, and—as I suppose,—the Sphinxes too and Centaurs136. True under compulsion of hunger, dog and bird sometimes feed on a human corpse; but no man has ever been invited to coition by any beast, though you constrain beasts by force to this as well as to other shameful pleasures, and use them contrary to all right).
Like all other forms of vicious lust, Sodomy too was an outcome of Asiatic137 and Egyptian luxury, and already in quite early times familiar in those regions,—in fact, as is the case with sexual excesses generally, this vice appears to have developed from the religious cult of the countries named. Among the Egyptians138 at any rate we meet with Mendes, the sacred Goat or Pan, worshipped by means of Sodomy on the part of his female devotees, who were shut up along with him.
Boettiger139 goes so far as to conjecture that the tame snakes in the temple of Aesculapius, which were also kept in private houses140 as a plaything of the women, were trained and employed by them for purposes of Sodomy. In confirmation a passage is brought forward in this connection by Forberg, loco citato, p. 368, from Suetonius141, in which the mother of Augustus, Atia, is spoken of: “In Asclepiadis Mendetis Θεολογουμένων libris lego, Atiam cum ad sollemne Apollinis sacrum media nocte venisset, posita in templo lectica, dum ceterae matronae dormirent, obdormisse; draconem repente irrepsisse ad eam paulloque post egressum: illamque expergefactam quasi a concubitu mariti purificasse se et statim in corpore eius exstitisse maculam, velut depicti draconis, nec potuisse unquam eximi, adeo ut mox publicis balneis perpetuo abstinuerit”142. (In the books of the Theologoumena (sacred writings) of the Asclepiad Mendes I read how Atia, who had come to the wonted festival of Apollo at midnight, when her litter had been set down in the Temple, and the other matrons were sleeping, herself fell asleep; how a snake suddenly crept in to her, and presently emerged again; and how on waking she purified herself as after intercourse with her husband, and immediately there appeared a mark on her body, representing the likeness of a snake, which could never be got rid of, so much so that soon she left off ever after frequenting the public baths).
However the Roman women seem to have especially made use of the ass143 for the satisfaction of their nymphomania, an animal that was famed in Antiquity for its salaciousness.
That under such circumstances the women’s genitals, and the men’s no less, were exposed to many sorts of injury, may be readily supposed; though we have sought in vain so far for any direct evidence of the fact. So we may perhaps be allowed to quote here an observation originating with Abu Oseibah, De vitis medicorum illustrium, (On the Lives of Famous Physicians), according to Reiske144. This properly speaking belongs to a later period chronologically, but it is pertinent in the present connection. Reiske says: “Caput XIII. habet observationem—2. de ingenti penis inflammatione, quae nata fuerat ex impuro cum bestia concubitu, cum coruncula urethram obstruente, sanata modo prorsum empirico atque crudeli. Impositum glabro lapidi penem medicus subito praeter aegri expectationem, qua poterat vi percutiebat manu in pugnum coacta, ut obturaculum et ulcus dissiliret. Sapit hic casus luem veneream; et posset inservire illis pro argumento, qui morbum hunc etiam veteribus cognitum fuisse contendunt. Cadit autem is casus circa annum Christi 940.” (Chapter XIII contains the following observation,—2. Of a violent inflammation of the penis, which had originated in unclean intercourse with a beast, with a coruncle, or knot, constricting the urethra, cured in a manner to the last degree empirical and cruel. The penis being laid on a rough stone, the Physician suddenly when the patient was not expecting it, struck it as heavily as ever he could with his doubled fist, so that the stoppage and ulcer might burst. This case has a smack of the Venereal disease about it; and might serve as an argument for those who hold that this disease was known to the Ancients as well. But the case falls about the year of Our Lord 940.)
Climate.
§ 28.
Now that we have made ourselves acquainted with the various use to which the Ancients put the genital organs, we are confronted inevitably with the question,—how were the genitals themselves affected by it all? Impossible to suppose they can have preserved their integrity absolutely intact, while at the same time such parts as were substituted in use for the one or the other form of them, were exposed,—as is abundantly proved by the different diseases described, diseases affecting the pathic, the fellator and the cunnilingue respectively,—to manifold complaints, and very often had to pay severely for the misuse to which they were put. Granting that the unnatural use of the mouth and the rectum must necessarily have endangered those parts specifically more than the penis, an organ particularly adapted and intended for friction, still this will by no means imply the entire immunity of the latter from ill effects. Indeed the fact of such immunity is sufficiently disproved by the passages quoted specifically under paederastia, without taking into account at all the large number of actual maladies of the genitals that are mentioned by professional and non-professional writers of Antiquity. With some of these we have already made acquaintance,—maladies which no one would for a moment think of ascribing exclusively to the practice of the vice of paederastia.
Accordingly we must look for other factors, which being in part unconnected with the use of the genitals, are not like this to be regarded as an immediately efficient cause, but rather as predisposing circumstances, exercising from the first an independent influence on the normal condition of those organs. For mere use or misuse cannot possibly be taken as in itself a sufficient reason to account for disease, even though the Ancients may have looked upon complaints of the genitals partly as a direct consequence of illicita Venus (unlawful Love), or in other words as it were a result of the vengeance of outraged Nature. The genitals, like all organs of the human body, exhibit over and above their functional activity on behalf of the general organism and its reproduction, evidences also of an independent activity directed towards the maintenance of their own integrity and individual existence,—and these are bound to differ more or less according to difference of locality and difference of time, as indeed may be predicated of the organism as a whole, if we trust the indications it gives.
Now this differentiation according to locality is conditioned above all else by climate; hence the question we have now first of all to answer is this: what influence did climate manifest in Ancient times on the activity of the genital organs in general and in particular? and, to what extent may a factor favourable to the rise of affections of the genitals be deduced from it? True, direct information on the point has so far reached us only sparingly, still such as we have is enough to justify a general view on the whole question, especially if we reinforce it with the results of more recent observation,—always provided this be done with proper precaution, for we sometimes find the Ancients commending the climate of a particular country as being exceedingly healthy, whereas in more modern times exactly the opposite is noted. As the evidence extant and available extends only to Asia, and in particular Syria, Palestine and Asia Minor, to Egypt, Greece and Italy, there can for the present be no question except as to the climate of these countries.
Next as to the influence of sexual activity in general, Hippocrates145 himself tells us, after discussing the climate of Asia: “But ἡδονή (pleasure) must necessarily predominate (among them), and this is why among animals so many varieties are found; and I suppose this to be equally true in the case of the Egyptians and Lydians also.” Of course ἡδονή in this passage signifies concupiscence in particular;—no special proof is needed of this. As a matter of fact we observe at the present day how in hot climates, where the whole vegetative life presents a luxuriant character, and all Nature appears to feel the procreative impulse unceasingly, man too falls in with the universal stress and strain of each species to maintain its foothold. Yet as this must inevitably be done at the expense of the individual life, we see the effort very frequently resulting in the production of barren or sexless blossoms, and not fruit at all. The son of the South is like a tree growing in rich, rank soil; he ripens betimes to the sexual life, but equally early is constrained to abandon it again. The youthful imagination springs up in its fresh quick activity, while the body withers concurrently, and stung by lust,—lust that is yet further exaggerated by the misuse of aphrodisiacs, at last has nothing left but to drag out an invalid existence, finding a morbid gratification in the artificial ways and means whereby imagination, sickened and debauched by its own extravagances, seeks to supply from extraneous sources the failing titillation of desire the organ craves. No better confirmation of all this can be found than what is supplied already in our investigations as so far conducted.
We saw how in Asia lust and its abominable brood arose and extended thence over neighbouring lands, and how the rhythmic rites of the Venus ebria (drunken Venus) could indeed refine, but hardly increase their excesses. Babylon, Syria and Egypt were the nurseries of licentiousness, finding only at Rome a really self-taught and competent rival. The clear sky of Greece could cover only inhabitants of corresponding character in body and mind, and none but a Greek was capable of setting up the ideal, and verifying it in practice, of a fair soul in a fair body. Deep as the Greek may have sunk in degradation after the fall of national liberty and under foreign influence, and though unbridled lust may have often mastered individuals, it never dominated the nation as a whole, it was artificially brought into existence and was never dependent on climate. Even at Rome, colossal as was the scale on which vice manifested itself, it ever remained but a foreign importation, for which foreign wantons had first paved the way at a period when the climate of Asia exerted a more immediate influence there than that of Greece.
Like licentiousness in general, Polygamy also, in part owing its existence to it as it does, was a consequence of the Asiatic climate; but how far it may be fairly held to have influenced the rise of Venereal disease, we do not as yet venture to decide; we feel constrained to keep this point over for later investigations. The same applies to Polyandry,—in its strict sense, when we regard it as a form of marriage; though of course over and above this it comes into connection with vice, inasmuch as every prostitute lives in a state of Polyandry, as does every amateur of the sex in one of Polygamy. Under these circumstances affections of the genitals cannot but arise among persons otherwise healthy, as every Physician of large practice can verify by examples, and as experiments on animals have sufficiently demonstrated to be the case146. Nevertheless these hints, for we cannot and ought not to look upon them as anything more than hints, as any more complete discussion would carry us too far a-field for our present purpose,—may very well suffice to recall to the reader’s memory the influence exerted by climate on the genital functions, especially as adequate proofs in confirmation of all this are comprised in our preceding Sections.
§ 29.
Far more important in view of our immediate object is the influence exerted by Climate on the individual activity of the genital organs, and here again we have in the first place to fix our eyes on Asia and Egypt. The burning rays of the sun to which these regions and their inhabitants are exposed, increase in a marked way the activity of the skin, and of course in the same proportion do the secretions from the mucous surfaces become less in quantity, but their product more highly charged in quality. Then, this being the case, a certain acridity or corroding quality of the secretion is readily set up, often making itself noticeable by a characteristic smell. This same influence must equally manifest itself in the mucous membrane of the inner parts of the genitals, and vaginal mucus accordingly acquire an acrid quality147, if it is not removed pretty frequently from the surface of the membrane, and becoming as it were rancid, exert a corrosive effect on everything it comes in contact with148.
Now shortly before as well as shortly after the commencement of menstruation the secretion of mucus in the genitals is increased, and thus the menstrual blood, having in any case a tendency to decomposition, will mingle with this acrid, strong-smelling mucous discharge, and in this way assume a foul, acrid character itself149. This is the origin of the ill repute into which menstrual blood, and this especially in hot climates, has fallen from the earliest times onwards, for no doubt the virulent qualities alleged against it really belong to it solely and entirely as a result of the admixture with it of this vaginal mucus. Sea-water and fresh river-water are each of them separately innocuous for health, but mix them together so as to make brackish water, and the exhalations given off become highly detrimental!
A similar state of things exists also in connection with the male genital organs. The surface of the glans penis, where it lies contiguous to the external skin, exhibits along with the latter an increased secretion from the sebaceous follicles150, the discharge from which, if it is allowed to remain any length of time between the prepuce and the glans151, likewise acquires an acrid quality; then re-acting on these parts, sets up an inflammatory condition of the aforesaid sebaceous follicles. “In fact”, says Niebuhr152 “the Medical Officer of the English at Haleb (Russel) ascertained that in hot countries more copious humours collect about the glans penis than in cold; and a friend of mine in India, who in that hot climate had employed only the ordinary European precautions to ensure cleanliness, got a sort of ulcers on the glans, an inconvenience he would have been much more likely to escape, had he been circumcised. Subsequently he always washed this part of his person very carefully, and from that time forth experienced no trace of a recurrence of the trouble. Washing the whole body and particularly the privates is an absolute necessity in hot countries; and it is perhaps for this reason that the religious founders of the Jews, the Mohammedans, the Fire-Worshippers, the Heathen in India, etc., have commanded the observation of this practice.”
In close accord with this is the story Flavius Josephus153 relates of Apion the Egyptian: “Wherefore it appears to me Apion deservedly paid a fitting penalty for his scorn of ancestral customs; for only when forced by necessity was he circumcised, ulceration having been set up about his privates (his glans penis); and as a matter of fact the circumcision proved vain, for gangrene supervened, and he died in terrible pain.” Again the passage just quoted will also afford a clear understanding of the following from Philo154:
“Therefore were it more becoming, quitting childish and frivolous mockery altogether, intelligently and earnestly to investigate the causes in which this custom (Circumcision) originated, rather than to accuse whole nations of folly in a spirit of mere prejudice. It certainly does not seem probable to an intelligent enquirer, approaching the question in this mood, that so many thousands of folk in every age should have been circumcised without a sufficient cause, submitting to great pain merely to mutilate their own and their children’s bodies. On the other hand there are many inducements to adopt outright and follow up the custom of our forefathers; and in an especial degree the four following. First, the prevention of a virulent disease and one very difficult to cure. This is known as Anthrax,—a denomination derived, as I suppose, from the ardent (fierce) burning (ἀπὸ τοῦ καίειν ἐντυφόμενον) that accompanies it, and readily arises in such as have the foreskin intact. Secondly, to secure that purity of the whole person obligatory upon the Priestly caste. Whence it comes that the Priests in Egypt also scrupulously shave the whole body; for there is something collects and is deposited underneath the hair as well as under the foreskin, that must be removed.”
From a comparison of these two passages from Niebuhr and from Philo respectively it may be gathered that the anthrax disease above mentioned did not in any way owe its rise to a specifically syphilitic origin, as has been now and again assumed by different enquirers. What we really learn from them is to recognize the liability of the sebaceous follicles of the glans penis to lapse into a condition of ulceration. True this tendency can be minimised to some extent by circumcision, as well as by unremitting care to secure cleanliness; yet it can never be completely removed, conditioned as it really is by climatic influences that do not admit of elimination. When once the corroding vaginal mucus of the woman, particularly in combination with the menstrual blood with its readiness to undergo putrefaction155 re-acting on the mucous membrane, has set up sores and ulcers, then follows as a necessary consequence a still more dangerous mixture of matter and mucus. Next when under these conditions the man’s glans, possessing as it does an equally great liability in its cutaneous glands to be attacked by ulceration, enters in coition a vagina in this state, it cannot occasion much surprise if blennorhoea of the urethra or ulceration of the glans penis supervene156, especially if we consider the fact that the act of coition sets the organs concerned in enhanced activity, making them more susceptible than ever to external injurious irritations. This is yet more likely to be the case, as concurrently a large amount of secretion is yielded by the morbidly affected mucous surface of the vagina, and very possibly this secretion undergoes under the influence of nervous excitation (as the saliva does under the influence of anger) some vital-chemical, contagious alteration of composition. Again supposing the woman to be at the time of coition actually in menstruation, a period when her genital organs are ipso facto roused to a condition of exaggerated activity, the disturbance must be yet greater, and the mischief resulting even more manifest.
This will in part account for the fact that ulcers on the genitals, brought about by coition, are so ready in Asia to assume a putrid character, and show that the Ancients had good reason to designate them by the name ἄνθραξ (anthrax, malignant pustule). For that ἄνθραξ was actually a consequence of coition we may see from a passage, already cited by Hensler and Simon, from Bishop Palladius157, who relates of a certain Hero, how the Demon led him to Alexandria, how he there visited theatres and horse-races, and roamed round the taverns. “And thus, being by this time a glutton and a drunkard, he fell moreover into the mire of lust after women; and being now set upon sinning, he lived with a certain actress, (and had carnal intercourse with her?). Then when he had done all this, by a (Divine) providence he got an “anthrax” on the glans penis; and was so sick for six months that his (private) parts rotted away and dropped off of themselves. But subsequently recovering and getting off with the loss of these members, coming to a knowledge of God and a remembrance of the heavenly kingdom, and after confessing all that had befallen him, he fell asleep a few days afterwards, without having had the time to manifest works (of repentance).” In spite of the difficulties some of the expressions in the text exhibit, the main fact is perfectly plain, and admits of no doubt whatever, viz. that Hero had brought the ἄνθραξ on himself by carnal intercourse with an actress, and the moral reflections Palladius tags on to it cannot invalidate the fact. The objections Astruc raises against the conclusiveness of the passage have already been refuted by Hensler (Geschichte der Lustseuche,—History of Venereal Disease, I. pp. 317 sqq.), who while citing as parallel instances the passages adduced by Becket from the early XVth Century, very justly remarks: “What proof would they have, if this is not conclusive?”
Did the female genitals perhaps receive the names ἐσχάρα (scab) and ἄνθραξ (malignant pustule), because they very often made men a present of these things?!
In any case it is an interesting fact that to this day in India anthrax and chancrous ulcers are looked upon as akin, and both according to Sir William Jones (Asiatic Researches Vol. II.) are known by the name Nar Farsi or Ateshi Farsi (Ignis Persicus—Persian Fire) to the Cabirajas or Indian physicians. Now if we think of the great care taken by the Jews to ensure the multiplication of their race, the readiness with which various forms of ulceration pass over into mortification in hot localities,—as is shown by the examples of Apion and Hero,—and consequently the serious liability of the organs of generation to be destroyed, it will occasion less surprise when we read among the laws of Moses158 the following injunction: “And if a man shall lie with a woman having her sickness, and shall uncover her nakedness; he hath discovered her fountain, and she hath uncovered the fountain of her blood; and both of them shall be cut off from among their people.” Surely great and serious resulting injuries must in no inconsiderable number of instances have been before his eyes for a Lawgiver to feel himself constrained to assign the death penalty to the act of coition with women during menstruation,—and this in spite of the fact that he had already in a general way declared the woman at this time, as well as everything she touched, to be unclean. Again on the other hand coition with women in this condition must with the Jews have been amongst things practised with more than ordinary frequency, if only such an extreme punishment availed to check it; and so we cannot really be surprised to find that the Holy Books of that Nation perhaps earlier than the writings of any other People were acquainted only too well with diseases of the genital organs acquired by coition. The particular disease that broke out in consequence of the worship of Baal-Peor has been discussed above in §§ 8 and 9; while the fact that the Mosaic books contain the first traces of a knowledge of Gonorrhoea has long been regarded as proved beyond a doubt159.
If the Climate already exerted such an influence on the aboriginal inhabitants, how much greater must this have been where foreigners were concerned, on whom all endemic excitants of disease in a country notoriously work with augmented virulence. In Antiquity this fact must have been even more conspicuously true, inasmuch as at that period the Nations still remained much more unmixed than they subsequently became. It is a thing which always hitherto, speaking generally, has been far too little taken account of by Pathologists, but which is surely of vast importance in connection with the rise and spread of Venereal disease,—without its being in any way implied that we must necessarily therefore adopt the theory of its American origin160. If we are not much mistaken, this factor was operative also in the case of the Plague of Baal-Peor. Now what holds good for the Jews, must equally hold good for the other peoples of Asia and of Egypt, and even in an enhanced degree, since these, as we have seen above, gave way to vicious indulgence to a yet more excessive degree.
Nevertheless, then as now distinctions no doubt existed, and probably in Antiquity as at the present day there were districts, whose physical conditions of climate might be regarded as actually forming a counteracting factor, and where in spite of excesses the genital organs seldom became diseased. The evidence for this must be given by later investigations, for we must of necessity first possess a geographical Nosology of Venereal disease at the present day, if we are ever to succeed in finding and utilizing the materials for the same in Antiquity. What has been so far collected by the meritorious Schnurrer in his Geographical Nosology is too incomplete to justify us at present in drawing any certain conclusions, more particularly as the greatest part of the material contributed by him is drawn from the communications of non-medical enquirers.
The climate of Greece neither exercised any pre-eminently stimulating effect on the sexual activity of the genitals, nor yet did it afford a ground for the enhancement of their individual activity. Thus enjoying as it did in consequence of that happy combination of its seasons justly celebrated by ancient Writers161 the advantages, without the disadvantages, of the Tropics, and its inhabitants possessing all functions in a more vigorous proportion, the climate could not possibly have been directly favourable to the rise of affections of the genitals; and for this reason made unnecessary all precautionary measures aimed at them, such as were required in Asia. Italy exhibits but little analogy with the Greek climate; still it cannot certainly without considerable qualification be reckoned among factors favourable to maladies of the genital organs. From this we may at any rate partly explain why the physicians of Greece and Rome give so little satisfactory information on the diseases in question, though indeed, as we shall see presently, in this case other and quite distinct factors were at work.
§ 30.
We have now seen that Climate is ipso facto an important factor favourable to the rise of affections of the genital organs. How much more powerful an influence must it exert on such affections when already in existence. Thus the question, what influence did Climate manifest in Antiquity on the character and course of affections of the genitals, is one of the utmost moment in connection with a History of Venereal disease,—the more so as on a correct answer being given to it depends the correctness of our views as to the form taken in such cases by the morbid process in Ancient times. True such a question presupposes the existence of these affections, and ought therefore, strictly speaking, only to be raised after the conclusion of our present investigations. However we think enough evidence has already been adduced in the preceding pages to remove all possible doubt from the mind of an attentive reader as to such being the case. Besides, this appears to us the more convenient course,—to survey in its entirety the influence exerted by Climate, rather than to take up our investigation of the subject afresh in different places, and thus to a greater or less extent mangle the discussion of it.
Preponderance of the vegetative principle combined with a certain slackness of tissue is the character of all organisms coming under the influence of the climate of Southern lands. In these countries an extra-ordinary stimulus acts on the mucous membrane of the genitals, and the character described will find its expression here also. Reaction will proceed not so much from the arterial side, or show itself under the guise of sthenic inflammation, but rather take the form merely of intensified secretion. What this increased secretion aims at is the removal of the abnormal stimulus, and the flow of mucus so originating manifests itself as simple, so to speak merely catarrhal, blennorrhoea. This, where the atmosphere is not impregnated with moist vapours, readily disappears, if only somewhat greater care is bestowed on the maintenance of cleanliness,—and all the more so, as re-absorption, which in hot climates acts vigorously on all the mucous membranes generally, very soon gets the upper hand again in the case of that of the genital organs, seconded as it is by the activity of the external skin. The latter is always in a condition of enhanced action at the same time, while the extent of its surface of course markedly exceeds that of the mucous membrane of the genitals. On the other hand where the atmosphere is especially moist, the activity of the skin, as well as the process of re-absorption internally, appears to be less; and so under these circumstances the mucous flow will assume more of a chronic character, but at the same time to an even greater degree be free from inflammatory reaction.
All the more recent observations agree in one thing, viz. that in Southern countries the gonorrhoeal forms predominate, and speaking generally, almost always run a mild course that hardly calls for medical interference. There is no doubt Climatic conditions in Antiquity differed but little from those of to-day; so that we may safely assume that equally in Ancient times blennorrhoea showed the same general characteristics, a fact which existing traditions moreover prove beyond question. The frequency of blennorrhoea of the genital organs in Antiquity is shown at once by the just quoted passage from the Mosaic Books, while its mildness of character may be gathered amongst other things from the remedies employed by the old Physicians, who almost without exception followed the principle laid down by Celsus (VI. 18.), to treat gonorrhoea levibus medicamentis (with gentle remedial measures), if they were called upon to apply treatment at all. At least this is true of acute blennorrhoea; the chronic form of the complaint, with which alone as a general rule they had to do, of course required astringents. No doubt each failure of arterial reaction afforded yet another reason for the belief on the part of the Ancients that gonorrhoea was a result of weakness of the seed-secreting vessels, and their idea that the discharge was merely badly prepared semen. Supposing, as must have happened, that marks of increased activity appeared, these proceeded not so much from the circulatory system at all as from the nerves, and Galen162 was correct in referring Priapism under these conditions to spasmodic convulsion.
So much for mucous discharge. It was the same also with the various forms of ulceration of the genitals. The conditions to be enumerated presently in the next Section were already present to counteract their rise in any considerable proportion. Further, if they did appear in the high lands of Asia and in Upper Egypt more frequently than did blennorhoea,—this much is shown plainly at any rate by present-day experience,—still they lasted but a short time, as the preponderant activity of vegetative growth, seconded by extraneous assistance, soon mastered the disease, and quickly restored again the loss of tissue. The course of events was otherwise indeed on lower levels, as in Syria and Lower Egypt, districts which besides their high temperature also showed a considerable degree of moisture in the atmosphere and soil. Here accordingly the different forms of ulceration, unless careful precautions were taken, assumed a malignant character, and readily passed over into gangrene (ἄνθραξ), as we saw a little above happened in the cases of Apion and Hero. By this means it is true every specific characteristic of the morbid alteration was annihilated; but this only made the risk to the individual so much the greater, the patient being at best only too apt to lose the organ attacked
Again, though sometimes the part escaped destruction by gangrene, even then its cure was often difficult owing to the fact that, where the malady had been neglected, worms made their appearance in the ulcers163, and set up so profuse and so far spreading a suppuration that the patient eventually succumbed to it. Of this we have an example in the Emperor Galerius Maximianus, mentioned by Eusebius164, and to which allusion is made as early as in the Book of Ecclesiasticus (XIX. 2, 3.), when the Author, Jesus the son of Sirach, says: “Wine and women will make men of understanding to fall away: and he that cleaveth to harlots will become impudent. Moths (otherwise165—Rottenness and worms) shall have him to heritage, and a bold man shall be taken away.” The use of knife and actual cautery must naturally have played an important part under these circumstances in the treatment adopted; but these the patient often dreaded more than the malady itself, and chose suicide rather than submit to them, like the “Municeps” whose story Pliny tells in the passage quoted in a previous chapter. But now supposing suchlike ulcers to be situated in the mouth of a fellator or cunnilingue, then their course must have been all the more rapid, and the danger involved all the greater, if the patient lived in such a climate as described; and it was in this way the Αἰγύπτια καὶ Συριακὰ and Βουβαστικὰ ἕλκεα (Egyptian and Syrian sores, Bubastic sores) mentioned above acquired their evil repute. Still in the majority of cases these climatic influences could be counteracted by appropriate medical aid and dietetic measures, or at any rate their effect considerably reduced. Hence it was that cases of the sort only very rarely appeared in Antiquity, and for this very reason were noted by the Historians, when they did occur.
The human organism possessed in Southern lands yet another way of combating the enemy’s attacks, one which would seem to have escaped the notice of the Physicians of Antiquity, and which, though recognized in modern times, has yet never been at all adequately appreciated and utilized in the history of Venereal disease, viz. the reaction exhibited by the skin in diseases of the genital organs in hot climates. So long as authorities thought of the external skin as merely compacted of separate and distinct layers of tissue, there could not really be any question of an accurate knowledge of its functions whether under healthy or under morbid conditions. The investigations of Breschet and Roussel de Vauzène166 as confirmed and reinforced by Gurlt167, have now taught us to understand that the skin, over and above these layers, possesses as a matter of fact,—a fact formerly only conjectured,—special organs belonging to the same class as the glands, to wit the skin, hair and sweat glands. These share amongst them the function hitherto ascribed to the skin generally, and especially bring into correlation the sympathies of the different parts, so much so that they may be said to be almost the sole and only seat of the manifold forms of skin-diseases. All this we endeavoured first to demonstrate in the series of Articles on Skin-diseases in “Blasius’ Handwörterbuch der Chirurgie und Augenheilkunde” (Manual of Surgery and Ophthalmology), and so pave the way for a compendious Survey of our knowledge of the Skin-diseases up to the present time.
Now while the sweat-glands stand in a special connection of sympathy and antagonism with the lungs, the same correlation exists in a peculiar degree between the glands of the mucous membrane of the intestinal canal and of the genital organs on the one hand and the cutaneous glands on the other which secrete the sebum or sebaceous humour. It would take us too far a-field, if we undertook in this place to enter upon a detailed explanation of this circumstance, which however is still in sore need of further clearing up. We shall content ourselves with recalling the fact that Onanists (Masturbators) not only often betray themselves by having a nose with a shiny, tallowy looking surface that comes from excessive secretion of sebum, but also not less frequently by their face being covered with acne pustulus. One more fact we must mention is that the outbreak of acne very often with girls heralds the approach of each period of menstruation, and accompanies it168. These are signs clearly pointing to the conclusion that stimulations of the genitals are reflected back on the glands of the skin, for acne is nothing else but an affection of these glands, as we have demonstrated in the Work just mentioned.
But indeed there are proofs of this antagonism still nearer to hand. How frequently have our physicians observed an eruption169 resembling roseola or urticaria in character, at the—very often sudden—appearance of which the gonorrhoeal symptoms have much decreased in severity or disappeared altogether! These skin affections have been ascribed to the balsam of Copaiva or the Cubebs pepper administered in these cases, which are supposed to have stimulated the intestinal mucous membrane and so sympathetically excited the skin. This may very possibly sometimes be the case; but it could not but occur much more frequently, if the remedial agents mentioned are to bear the sole and entire blame. No doubt in some patients a particular idiosyncrasy may have given rise to sympathetic action stimulative of the intestinal canal, but in the majority the reaction of the mucous membrane of the genitals on the cutaneous glands has undoubtedly been a chief contributory factor under epidemic influences, while the drugs exhibited have played only a subordinate part in producing the result. There are cases where the gonorrhœa has been treated simply and solely by mere antiphlogistic methods, and yet such an eruption has been observed.
But it is not in gonorrhœa only that these phænomena appear; they have been noted as well in chancre, being then ascribed to the sublimate of mercury and looked upon as affording a criterion that the drug had exercised its full effect on the original complaint. In most cases this was without doubt a mistake, for Biett, Rayer and other authorities have noted the most widely divergent forms of skin-disease to appear concurrently with the existence of chancre, and in consequence have come to regard them as primitive symptoms. In fact cases have actually been observed, where these were the sole primary symptoms of contagion after indulgence in unclean coition. At the same time it is only fair to say that this has been doubted in many quarters, observers trying to explain the fact of the absence of other symptoms by saying the ulcers, which are frequently very minute, may have been overlooked. At least experience has sufficiently taught us this much, that the so-called secondary symptoms, and therefore the skin-affections as well, appear the more readily in proportion as the ulcers of the genitals are smaller and more superficial; and we ourselves believe that never without local reaction on the genital organs from coition do so-called secondary appearances arise,—only it is not invariably ulcers that are to looked for.
Now when even in our temperate climate the cutaneous glands play a not unimportant part in the morbid processes of Venereal disease, how much more must this be the case in Asia and Egypt, where the activity of the skin generally and that of the cutaneous glands in particular is even under normal conditions far more conspicuously energetic, as may be seen from the constant oily state of the skin, more particularly in Negroes. This oily grease on the skin is in fact nothing more nor less than the product of the action of the cutaneous glands. These glands are peculiarly apt to become morbidly affected in travellers visiting the South during their acclimatisation; though natives too are yearly attacked in the Summer months by complaints of the skin-glands.170 The fact has long been recognized171 that in Southern countries not only the greater number of skin-diseases, but even Venereal disease itself in an especial degree, appear as an exanthema of the skin, and for this reason it there displays far less destructive effects; but as a rule enquirers have contented themselves with the general habit, without (as pointed out before) adequately turning the fact to advantage in connection with the History and Theory of Venereal disease.
This preponderating bias towards the external skin must obviously manifest itself equally in other diseases of the mucous membranes, and so too in those of the genital organs. Reabsorption in particular, acting with increased vigour on the mucous surfaces, will prove its beneficial presence also in the diseases affecting them. The foreign matter that comes in contact with these surfaces is assimilated to a less degree by the mucous glands and by those of the glans penis, and no time is allowed it to exert a destructive influence on the small surface receiving it; on the other hand it is quickly thrown back on the much more extensive surface of the external skin, and there dealt with by the cutaneous glands with their powerful secretive and assimilatory action, being either assimilated or expelled externally.
In particular localities this quickly happens without any striking symptoms being locally perceptible in the skin, as e.g. in Numidia, Libya172 and the Northern part of Peru173, where the disease is said to cure itself without extraneous medical aid, and among the inhabitants generally to be practically non-existent(?). Though this is not the case in other countries, still the cutaneous glands become involved in the morbid process of the disease, and secrete with augmented copiousness, and the secretion being simultaneously altered in character, it fails to be driven out externally, inasmuch as external elimination is at once stopped owing to the fact that the cutaneous glands, like the uterus in pregnancy, close their orifice, so as to be enabled to carry out their function in their recesses. For this reason the glands swell, and manifest themselves in the form of papillae or tubercles (very often as little bladders, or blebs), changing later either into pustules, if the morbid products are eventually expelled174, or else gradually disappear, if the process of assimilation and re-absorption has been sufficiently vigorous. Supposing damp, cold or other unfavourable influences to be at work, suppuration may very well supervene, or degenerative processes commence, and so on, and the disease pass over into leprosy and elephantiasis. This is above all the case in Egypt, where from the first, chancres on the genitals would seem to possess a marked tendency towards scurfy and scabby formations175.
If these are the facts at the present day,—and no one doubts they are,—there only remains the question: were they so in Ancient times as well? Here we come face to face with the difficult problem as to the relation of leprosy with Venereal disease,—a problem which for Centuries has been the subject of dispute, and in spite of the very careful enquiries of a Hensler and of other investigators, cannot by any means be regarded as solved. Our own investigations on the Leprosy of the Ancients are as yet too incomplete, and the nature of the subject demands such far-reaching inquisition into the most widely different individual phænomena, that we are compelled, in order to economise our space, to renounce all idea of submitting the subject to any more detailed examination in the present Work. Besides, in our Second Part we shall be coming back to it again, when we have under investigation the question as to whether or no the Venereal disease of the XVth Century was developed from leprosy.
For our present purpose the following statement must suffice: The Climate of Asia and Egypt was in Antiquity, as mentioned already, undoubtedly but little different from what it is to-day, and the influence it exerted therefore must have shared in this resemblance176.
As to mentagra, we have already proved a little above that it was a consequence of the vice of the cunnilingue, and as according to Pliny’s report the latter claimed Egypt for its fatherland, obviously the climate of that country must have been in part responsible for its origination. Now affections of the genital organs being found in Antiquity as the result of sexual intercourse, it follows that in this direction also Climate must have exerted its influence, and that in the very same way as we have just above seen it do,—in other words manifold affections of the skin must have originated in consequence of irritation and other morbid effects on the genital organs. True the Ancient physicians say not a word of this; but then they derive the greater proportion of the skin-diseases, which they mass all together in the most admired confusion, from internal mischief of various sorts, and regard them all as apostases (suppurative inflammations carrying off the effect of fevers, etc.),—at any rate a proof they were not entirely unacquainted with the antagonistic relations existing between the skin and other organs.
So far as the genitals are concerned, they seem to have adequately realized only the consensus between the uterus and the skin177, whereas in male subjects they appear to have put down most of the effects observed to the liver. But on these points we shall have something further to say later on. Still the assertion to the effect that Eunuchs are not attacked by calvities (baldness) (Hippocrates, I. 400; Galen, XVIII. A. 40., also p. 42., where mention is made of the excesses in Baccho et Venere—in Wine and Love—peculiarly prevalent at his epoch), which was a frequent consequence of vice in Antiquity178, points to the consensus between genitals and skin having been already noted. Even more is the fact, vouched for by Archigenes179, that castration was recommended by some Physicians as a cure for elephantiasis, such as to arouse the suspicion that the physicians of Antiquity knew perfectly well what influence affections of the genital organs exerted on diseases of the skin. This is made all the more likely by Archigenes (ch. 120.) not only speaking of the disease as being contagious, but also describing the skin-affection as secondary in character. He further declares its cause to be unknown, puts on record the extreme lubricity of the patients (Satyriasis pp. 74, 133, 269.), and even says in so many words that such as were castrated did not contract elephantiasis!