[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] Κρυπτάδια, 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.
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.