Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 1: The Evolution of Modesty; The Phenomena of Sexual Periodicity; Auto-ErotismEllis, Havelock
Science
Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 1: The Evolution of Modesty; The Phenomena of Sexual Periodicity; Auto-Erotism
Ellis, Havelock
Sex; Sex (Psychology)
OBSERVATION VI.--Unmarried, actively engaged in the practice of
her profession. Well-developed, feminine in contour, but boyish
in manner and movements; strong, though muscles small, and
healthy, with sound nervous system; never had anæmia. Thick brown
hair; pubic hair thick, and hair on toes and legs up to
umbilicus; it began to appear at the age of 10 (before pubic
hair) and continued until 18. A few stray hairs round nipples,
and much dark down on upper lip, as well as light down on arms
and hands. Hips, normal; nates, small; labia minora, large; and
clitoris, deeply hooded. Hymen thick, vagina, probably small.
Considerable pigmentation of parts. Menstruation began at 15, but
not regular till 17; is painless and scanty; the better the state
of health, the less it is. No change of sexual or other feelings
connected with it; it lasts one to three days.
"I believe," she writes, "my first experience of physical sex
sensations was when I was about 16, and in sleep. But I did not
then recognize it, and seldom, indeed, gave the subject of sex a
thought. I was a child far beyond the age of childhood. The
accompanying dreams were disagreeable, but I cannot remember what
they were about. It was not until I was nearly 19 that I knew the
sexual orgasm in my waking state. It surprised me completely,
but I knew that I had known it before in my sleep.
"The knowledge came one summer when I was leading a rather
isolated life, and my mind was far from sex subjects, being deep
in books, Carlyle, Ruskin, Huxley, Darwin, Scott, etc. I noticed
that when I got up in the morning I felt very hot and
uncomfortable. The clitoris and the parts around were swollen and
erect, and often tender and painful. I had no idea what it was,
but found I was unable to pass my water for an hour or two. One
day, when I was straining a little to pass water, the full orgasm
occurred. The next time it happened, I tried to check it by
holding myself firmly, of course, with the opposite result. I do
not know that I found it highly pleasurable, but it was a very
great relief. I allowed myself a good many experiments, to come
to a conclusion in the matter, and I thought about it. I was much
too shy to speak to any one, and thought it was probably a sin. I
tried not to do it, and not to think about it, saying to myself
that surely I was lord of my body. But I found that the matter
was not entirely under my control. However unwilling or passive I
might be, there were times when the involuntary discomfort was
not in my keeping. My touching myself or not did not save me from
it. Because it sometimes gave me pleasure, I thought it might be
a form of self-indulgence, and did not do it until it could
scarcely be helped. Soon the orgasm began to occur fairly
frequently in my sleep, perhaps once or twice a week.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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