[96]
It is curious, however, that the European physicians of the seventeenth and even eighteenth centuries were doubtful of its value as a sign of virginity and considered it often absent.
[97]
For a summary of the beliefs and practices of various peoples with regard to the hymen and virginity see Ploss and Bartels, Das Weib, vol. i, Chapter XVI.
II
The Object of Detumescence-Erogenous Zones-The Lips-The Vascular Characters of Detumescence-Erectile Tissue-Erection in Woman-Mucous Emission in Women-s.e.xual Connection-The Human Mode of Intercourse-Normal Variations-The Motor Characters of Detumescence-e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n-The Virile Reflex-The General Phenomena of Detumescence-The Circulatory and Respiratory Phenomena-Blood Pressure-Cardiac Disturbance-Glandular Activity-Distillatio-The Essentially Motor Character of Detumescence-Involuntary Muscular Irradiation to Bladder, etc.-Erotic Intoxication-a.n.a.logy of s.e.xual Detumescence and Vesical Tension-The Specifically s.e.xual Movements of Detumescence in Man-In Woman-The Spontaneous Movements of the Genital Ca.n.a.l in Woman-Their Function in Conception-Part Played by Active Movement of the Spermatozoa-The Artificial Injection of s.e.m.e.n-The Facial Expression During Detumescence-The Expression of Joy-The Occasional Serious Effects of Coitus.
We have seen what the object of detumescence is, and we have briefly considered the organs and structures which are chiefly concerned in the process. We have now to inquire what are the actual phenomena which take place during the act of detumescence.
Detumescence is normally linked closely to tumescence. Tumescence is the piling on of the fuel; detumescence is the leaping out of the devouring flame whence is lighted the torch of life to be handed on from generation to generation. The whole process is double and yet single; it is exactly a.n.a.logous to that by which a pile is driven into the earth by the raising and then the letting go of a heavy weight which falls on to the head of the pile. In tumescence the organism is slowly wound up and force acc.u.mulated; in the act of detumescence the acc.u.mulated force is let go and by its liberation the sperm-bearing instrument is driven home. Courtship, as we commonly term the process of tumescence which takes place when a woman is first s.e.xually approached by a man, is usually a highly prolonged process. But it is always necessary to remember that every repet.i.tion of the act of coitus, to be normally and effectively carried out on both sides, demands a similar double process; detumescence must be preceded by an abbreviated courtship.
This abbreviated courtship by which tumescence is secured or heightened in the repet.i.tion of acts of coitus which have become familiar, is mainly tactile.[98] Since the part of the man in coitus is more active and that of the woman more pa.s.sive, the s.e.xual sensitivity of the skin seems to be more p.r.o.nounced in women. There are, moreover, regions of the surface of a woman"s body where contact, when sympathetic, seems specially liable to arouse erotic excitement. Such erogenous zones are often specially marked in the b.r.e.a.s.t.s, occasionally in the palm of the hand, the nape of the neck, the lobule of the ear, the little finger; there is, indeed, perhaps no part of the surface of the body which may not, in some individuals at some time, become normally an erogenous zone. In hysteria the erotic excitability of these zones is sometimes very intense. The lips are, however, without doubt, the most persistently and poignantly sensitive region of the whole body outside the sphere of the s.e.xual organs themselves. Hence the significance of the kiss as a preliminary of detumescence.[99]
The importance of the lips as a normal erogenous zone is shown by the experiments of Gualino. He applied a thread, folded on itself several times, to the lips, thus stimulating them in a simple mechanical manner. Of 20 women, between the ages of 18 and 35, only 8 felt this as a merely mechanical operation, 4 felt a vaguely erotic element in the proceeding, 3 experienced a desire for coitus and in 5 there was actual s.e.xual excitement with emission of mucus. Of 25 men, between the ages of 20 and 30, in 15 all s.e.xual feeling was absent, in 7 erotic ideas were suggested with congestion of the s.e.xual organs without erection, and in 3 there was the beginning of erection. It should be added that both the women and the men in whom this s.e.xual reflex was more especially marked were of somewhat nervous temperament; in such persons erotic reactions of all kinds generally occur most easily. (Gualino, "Il Rifflesso Sessuale nell" eccitamento alle labbre," Archivio di Psichiatria, 1904, p. 341.)
As tumescence, under the influence of sensory stimulation, proceeds toward the climax when it gives place to detumescence, the physical phenomena become more and more acutely localized in the s.e.xual organs. The process which was at first predominantly nervous and psychic now becomes more prominently vascular. The ancient s.e.xual relationship of the skin a.s.serts itself; there is marked surface congestion showing itself in various ways. The face tends to become red, and exactly the same phenomenon is taking place in the genital organs; "an erection," it has been said, "is a blushing of the p.e.n.i.s." The difference is that in the genital organs this heightened vascularity has a definite and specific function to accomplish-the erection of the male organ which fits it to enter the female parts-and that consequently there has been developed in the p.e.n.i.s that special kind of vascular mechanism, consisting of veins in connective tissue with unstriped muscular fibers, termed erectile tissue.[100]
It is not only the man who is supplied with erectile tissue which in the process of tumescence becomes congested and swollen. The woman also, in the corresponding external genital region, is likewise supplied with erectile tissue now also charged with blood, and exhibits the same changes as have taken place in her partner, though less conspicuously visible. In the anthropoid apes, as the gorilla, the large c.l.i.toris and the nymphae become prominent in s.e.xual excitement, but the less development of the c.l.i.toris in women, together with the specifically human evolution of the mons veneris and larger lips, renders this s.e.xual turgescence practically invisible, though it is perceptible to touch in an increased degree of spongy and elastic tension. The whole feminine genital ca.n.a.l, including the uterus, indeed, is richly supplied with blood-vessels, and is capable during s.e.xual excitement of a very high degree of turgescence, a kind of erection.
The process of erection in woman is accompanied by the pouring out of fluid which copiously bathes all parts of the v.u.l.v.a around the entrance to the v.a.g.i.n.a. This is a bland, more or less odorless mucus which, under ordinary circ.u.mstances, slowly and imperceptibly suffuses the parts. When, however, the entrance to the v.a.g.i.n.a is exposed and extended, as during a gynaecological examination which occasionally produces s.e.xual excitement, there may be seen a real e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n of the fluid which, as usually described, comes largely from the glands of Bartholin, situated at the mouth of the v.a.g.i.n.a. Under these circ.u.mstances it is sometimes described as being emitted in a jet which is thrown to a distance.[101] This mucous e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n was in former days regarded as a.n.a.logous to the seminal e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n in man, and hence essential to conception. Although this belief was erroneous the fluid poured out in this manner whenever a high degree of tumescence is attained, and before the onset of detumescence, certainly performs an important function in lubricating the entrance to the genital ca.n.a.l and so facilitating the intromission of the male organ.[102] Menstruation has a similar influence in facilitating coitus, as Schurig long since pointed out.[103] A like process takes place during parturition when the same parts are being lubricated and stretched in preparation for the protrusion of the ftal head. The occurrence of the mucous flow in tumescence always indicates that that process is actively affecting the central s.e.xual organs, and that voluptuous emotions are present.[104]
The secretions of the genital ca.n.a.l and outlet in women are somewhat numerous. We have the odoriferous glands of sebaceous origin, and with them the prepuce of the c.l.i.toris which has been described as a kind of gigantic sebaceous follicle with the c.l.i.toris occupying its interior. (Hyrtl.) There is the secretion from the glands of Bartholin. There is again the v.a.g.i.n.al secretion, opaque and alb.u.minous, which appears to be alkaline when secreted, but becomes acid under the decomposing influence of bacteria, which are, however, harmless and not pathogenic. (Gow, Obstetrical Society of London, January 3, 1894.) There is, finally, the mucous uterine secretion, which is alkaline, and, being poured out during o.r.g.a.s.m, is believed to protect the spermatozoa from destruction by the acid v.a.g.i.n.al secretion.
The belief that the mucus poured out in women during s.e.xual excitement is feminine s.e.m.e.n and therefore essential to conception had many remarkable consequences and was widespread until the seventeenth century. Thus, in the chapter "De Modo coeundi et de regimine eorum qui coeunt" of De Secretis Mulierum, there is insistence on the importance of the proper mixture of the male s.e.m.e.n with the female s.e.m.e.n and of arranging that it shall not escape from the v.a.g.i.n.a. The woman must lie quiet for several hours at least, not rising even to urinate, and when she gets up, be very temperate in eating and drinking, and not run or jump, pretending that she has a headache. It was the belief in feminine s.e.m.e.n which led some theologians to lay down that a woman might m.a.s.t.u.r.b.a.t.e if she had not experienced o.r.g.a.s.m in coitus. Schurig in his Muliebria (1729, pp. 159, et seq.) discusses the opinions of old authors regarding the nature, source, and uses of the female genital secretions, and quotes authorities against the old view that it was female s.e.m.e.n. In a subsequent work (Syllepsilogia, 1731, pp. 3, et seq.) he returns to the same question, quotes authors who accept a feminine s.e.m.e.n, shows that Harvey denied it any significance, and himself decides against it. It has not seriously been brought forward since.
When erection is completed in both the man and the woman the conditions necessary for conjugation have at last been fulfilled. In all animals, even those most nearly allied to man, coitus is effected by the male approaching the female posteriorly. In man the normal method of male approach is anteriorly, face to face. Leonardo da Vinci, in a well-known drawing representing a sagittal section of a man and a woman connected in this position of so-called Venus obversa; has shown how well adapted the position is to the normal position of the organs in the human species.[105]
Among monkeys, it is stated, congress is sometimes performed when the female is on all fours; at other times the male brings the female between his thighs when he is sitting, holding her with his forepaws. Froriep informed Lawrence that the male sometimes supported his feet on the female"s calves. (Sir W. Lawrence, Lectures on Physiology, 1823, p. 186.) A summary of the methods of congress practiced by the various animals below mammals will be found in the article "Copulation" by H. de Varigny in Richet"s Dictionnaire de Physiologie, vol. iv.
The anterior position in coitus, with the female partner lying supine, is so widespread throughout the world that it may fairly be termed the most typically human att.i.tude in s.e.xual congress. It is found represented in Egyptian graves at Beniha.s.san, belonging to the Twelfth Dynasty; it is regarded by Mohammedans as the normal position, although other positions are permitted by the Prophet: "Your wives are your tillage: go in unto your tillage in what manner soever you will;" it is that adopted in Malacca; it appears, from Peruvian antiquities, to have been the position generally, though not exclusively, adopted in ancient Peru; it is found in many parts of Africa, and seems also to have been the most usual position among the American aborigines.
Various modifications of this position are, however, found. Thus, in some parts of the world, as among the Suahelis in Zanzibar, the male partner adopts the supine position. In Loango, according to Pechuel-Loesche, coitus is performed lying on the side. Sometimes, as on the west coast of Africa, the woman is supine and the man more or less erect; or, as among the Queenslanders (as described by Roth) the woman is supine and the man squats on his heels with her thighs clasping his flanks, while he raises her b.u.t.tocks with his hands.
The position of coitus in which the man is supine is without doubt a natural and frequent variation of the specifically human obverse method of coitus. It was evidently familiar to the Romans. Ovid mentions it (Ars Amatoria, III, 777-8), recommending it to little women, and saying that Andromache was too tall to practice it with Hector. Aristophanes refers to it, and there are Greek epigrams in which women boast of their skill in riding their lovers. It has sometimes been viewed with a certain disfavor because it seems to confer a superiority on the woman. "Cursed be he," according to a Mohammedan saying, "who maketh woman heaven and man earth."
Of special interest is the wide prevalence of an att.i.tude in coitus recalling that which prevails among quadrupeds. The frequency with which on the walls of Pompeii coitus is represented with the woman bending forward and her partner approaching her posteriorly has led to the belief that this att.i.tude was formerly very common in Southern Italy. However that may be, it is certainly normal at the present day among various more or less primitive peoples in whom the v.u.l.v.a is often placed somewhat posteriorly. It is thus among the Soudanese, as also, in an altogether different part of the world, among the Eskimo Innuit and Koniags. The New Caledonians, according to Foley, cohabit in the quadrupedal manner, and so also the Papuans of New Guinea (Bongu), according to Vahness. The same custom is also found in Australia, where, however other postures are also adopted. In Europe the quadrupedal posture would seem to prevail among some of the South Slavs, notably the Dalmatians. (The different methods of coitus practiced by the South Slavs are described in ???pt?d?a vol. vi, pp. 220, et seq.)
This method of coitus was recommended by Lucretius (lib. iv) and also advised by Paulus aeginetus as favorable to conception. (The opinions of various early physicians are quoted by Schurig, Spermatologia, 1720, pp. 232, et seq.). It seems to be a position that is not infrequently agreeable to women, a fact which may be brought into connection with the remarks of Adler already quoted (p. 131) concerning the comparative lack of adjustment of the feminine organs to the obverse position. It is noteworthy that in the days of witchcraft hysterical women constantly believed that they had had intercourse with the Devil in this manner. This circ.u.mstance, indeed, probably aided in the very marked disfavor in which coitus a posteriori fell after the decay of cla.s.sic influences. The mediaeval physicians described it as mos diabolicus and mistakenly supposed that it produced abortion (Hyrtl, op. cit., vol. ii, p. 87). The theologians, needless to say, were opposed to the mos diabolicus, and already in the Anglo-Saxon Penitential of Theodore, at the end of the seventh century, 40 days" penance is prescribed for this method of coitus.
From the frequency with which they have been adopted by various peoples as national customs, most of the postures in coitus here referred to must be said to come within the normal range of variation. It is a mistake to regard them as vicious perversions.
Up to the point to which we have so far considered it, the process of detumescence has been mainly nervous and vascular in character; it has, in fact, been but the more acute stage of a process which has been going on throughout tumescence. But now we reach the point at which a new element comes in: muscular action. With the onset of muscular action, which is mainly involuntary, even when it affects the voluntary muscles, detumescence proper begins to take place. Henceforward purposeful psychic action, except by an effort, is virtually abolished. The individual, as a separate person, tends to disappear. He has become one with another person, as nearly one as the conditions of existence ever permit; he and she are now merely an instrument in the hands of a higher power-by whatever name we may choose to call that Power-which is using them for an end not themselves.
The decisive moment in the production of the instinctive and involuntary o.r.g.a.s.m occurs when, under the influence of the stimulus applied to the p.e.n.i.s by friction with the v.a.g.i.n.a, the tension of the seminal fluid poured into the urethra arouses the ejaculatory center in the spinal cord and the bulbo-cavernosus muscle surrounding the urethra responsively contracts in rhythmic spasms. Then it is that e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n occurs.[106]
"The circulation quickens, the arteries beat strongly," wrote Roubaud in a description of the physical state during coitus which may almost be termed cla.s.sic; "the venous blood, arrested by muscular contraction, increases the general heat, and this stagnation, more p.r.o.nounced in the brain by the contraction of the muscles of the neck and the throwing of the head backward, causes a momentary cerebral congestion, during which intelligence is lost and the faculties abolished. The eyes, violently injected, become haggard, and the look uncertain, or, in the majority of cases, the eyes are closed spasmodically to avoid the contact of the light. The respiration is hurried, sometimes interrupted, and may be suspended by the spasmodic contraction of the larynx, and the air, for a time compressed, is at last emitted in broken and meaningless words. The congested nervous centers only communicate confused sensations and volitions; mobility and sensation show extreme disorder; the limbs are seized by convulsions and sometimes by cramps, or are thrown wildly about or become stiff like iron bars. The jaws, tightly pressed, grind the teeth, and in some persons the delirium is carried so far that they bite to bleeding the shoulders their companions have imprudently abandoned to them. This frantic state of epilepsy lasts but a short time, but it suffices to exhaust the forces of the organism, especially in man. It is, I believe, Galen, who said: "Omne animal post coitum triste praeter mulierem gallumque.""[107] Most of the elements that make up this typical picture of the state of coitus are not absolutely essential to that state, but they all come within the normal range of variation. There can be no doubt that this range is considerable. There would appear to be not only individual, but also racial, differences; there is a remarkable pa.s.sage in Vatsyayana"s Kama Sutra describing the varying behavior of the women of different races in India under the stress of s.e.xual excitement-Dravidian women with difficulty attaining erethism, women of the Punjaub fond of being caressed with the tongue, women of Oude with impetuous desire and profuse flow of mucus, etc.-and it is highly probable, Ploss and Bartels remark, that these characterizations are founded on exact observations.[108]
The various phenomena included in Roubaud"s description of the condition during coitus may all be directly or indirectly reduced to two groups: the first circulatory and respiratory, the second motor. It is necessary to consider both these aspects of the process of detumescence in somewhat greater detail, although while it is most convenient to discuss them separately, it must be borne in mind that they are not really separable; the circulatory phenomena are in large measure a by-product of the involuntary motor process.
With the approach of detumescence the respiration becomes shallow, rapid, and to some extent arrested. This characteristic of the breathing during s.e.xual excitement is well recognized; so that in, for instance, the Arabian Nights, it is commonly noted of women when gazing at beautiful youths whose love they desired, that they ceased breathing.[109] It may be added that exactly the same tendency to superficial and arrested respiration takes place whenever there is any intense mental concentration, as in severe intellectual work.[110]
The arrest of respiration tends to render the blood venous, and thus aids in stimulating the vasomotor centers, raising the blood-pressure in the body generally, and especially in the erectile tissues. High blood-pressure is one of the most marked features of the state of detumescence. The heart beats are stronger and quicker, the surface arteries are more visible, the conjunctivae become red. The precise degree of blood-pressure attained during coitus has been most accurately ascertained in the dog. In Bechterew"s laboratory in St. Petersburg a manometer was introduced into the central end of the carotid artery of a b.i.t.c.h; a male dog was then introduced, and during coitus observations were made on the blood-pressure at the peripheral and central ends of the artery. It was found that there was a great general elevation of blood-pressure, intense hyperaemia of the brain, rapid alternations, during the act, of vasoconstriction and vasodilatation of the brain, with increase and diminution of the general arterial tension in relation with the various phases of the act, the greatest cerebral vasodilatation and hyperaemia coinciding with the moment following the intromission of the p.e.n.i.s; the end of the act is followed by a considerable fall in the blood-pressure.[111] I am not acquainted with any precise observations on the blood-pressure in human subjects during detumescence, and there are obvious difficulties in the way of such observations. It is probable, however, that the conditions found would be substantially the same. This is indicated, so far as the very marked increase of blood-pressure is concerned, by some observations made by Vaschide and Vurpas with the sphygmanometer on a lady under the influence of s.e.xual excitement. In this case there was a relationship of sympathy and friendly tenderness between the experimenter and the subject, Madame X, aged 25. Experimenter and subject talked sympathetically, and finally, we are told, while the latter still had her hands in the sphygmanometer, the former almost made a declaration of love. Madame X was greatly impressed, and afterward admitted that her emotions had been genuine and strong. The blood-pressure, which was in this subject habitually 65 millimeters, rose to 150 and even 160, indicating a very high pressure, which rarely occurs; at the same time Madame X looked very emotional and troubled.[112]
Some authorities are of opinion that irregularities in the accomplishment of the s.e.xual act are specially liable to cause disturbances in the circulation. Thus Kisch, of Prague, refers to the case of a couple practising coitus interruptus-the husband withdrawing before e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n-in which the wife, a vigorous woman, became liable after some years to attacks termed by Kisch neurasthenia cordis vasomotoria, in which there was at daily or longer intervals palpitation, with feelings of anxiety, headache, dizziness, muscular weakness and tendency to faint. He regards coitus as a cause of various heart troubles in women: (1) Attacks of tachycardia in very excitable and s.e.xually inclined women; (2) attacks of tachycardia with dyspna in young women, with vaginismus; (3) cardiac symptoms with lowered vascular tone in women who for a long time have practised coitus interruptus without complete s.e.xual gratification (Kisch, "Herzbeschwerden der Frauen verursacht durch den Cohabitationsact," Munchener Medizinisches Wochenschrift, 1897, p. 617). In this connection, also, reference may probably be made to those attacks of anxiety which Freud a.s.sociates with psychic s.e.xual lesions of an emotional character.
a.s.sociated with this vascular activity in detumescence we find a general tendency to glandular activity. Various secretions are formed abundantly. Perspiration is copious, and the ancient relationship between the cutaneous and s.e.xual systems seems to evoke a general activity of the skin and its odoriferous secretions. Salivation, which also occurs, is very conspicuous in many lower animals, as for instance in the donkey, notably the female, who just before coitus stands with mouth open, jaws moving, and saliva dribbling. In men, corresponding to the more copious secretion in women, there is, during the latter stages of tumescence, a slight secretion of mucus-Furbringer"s urethrorrha ex libidine-which appears in drops at the urethral orifice. It comes from the small glands of Littre and Cowper which open into the urethra. This phenomenon was well known to the old theologians, who called it distillatio, and realized its significance as at once distinct from s.e.m.e.n and an indication that the mind was dwelling on voluptuous images; it was also known in cla.s.sic times[113]; more recently it has often been confused with s.e.m.e.n and has thus sometimes caused needless anxiety to nervous persons. There is also an increased secretion of urine, and it is probable that if the viscera were more accessible to observation we might be able to demonstrate that the glands throughout the body share in this increased activity.
The phenomena of detumescence culminate, however, and have their most obvious manifestation in motor activity. The genital act, as Vaschide and Vurpas remark, consists essentially in "a more and more marked tension of the motor state which, reaching its maximum, presents a short tonic phase, followed by a clonic phase, and terminates in a period of adynamia and repose." This motor activity is of the essence of the impulse of detumescence, because without it the sperm cells could not be brought into the neighborhood of the germ cell and be propelled into the organic nest which is a.s.signed for their conjunction and incubation.
The motor activity is general as well as specifically s.e.xual. There is a general tendency to more or less involuntary movement, without any increase of voluntary muscular power, which is, indeed, decreased, and Vaschide and Vurpas state that dynamometric results are somewhat lower than normal during s.e.xual excitement, and the variations greater.[114] The tendency to diffused activity of involuntary muscle is well ill.u.s.trated by the contraction of the bladder a.s.sociated with detumescence. While this occurs in both s.e.xes, in men erection produces a mechanical impediment to any evacuation of the bladder. In women there is not only a desire to urinate but, occasionally, actual urination. Many quite healthy and normal women have, as a rare accident supervening on the coincidence of an unusually full bladder with an unusual degree of s.e.xual excitement, experienced a powerful and quite involuntary evacuation of the bladder at the moment of o.r.g.a.s.m. In women with less normal nervous systems this has, more rarely, been almost habitual. Brantome has perhaps recorded the earliest case of this kind in referring to a lady he knew who "quand on lui faisait cela elle se comp.i.s.sait a bon escient."[115] The tendency to trembling, constriction of throat, sneezing, emission of internal gas, and the other similar phenomena occasionally a.s.sociated with detumescence, are likewise due to diffusion of the motor disturbance. Even in infancy the motor signs of s.e.xual excitement are the most obvious indications of o.r.g.a.s.m; thus West, describing masturbation in a child of six or nine months who practiced thigh-rubbing, states that when sitting in her high chair she would grasp the handles, stiffen herself, and stare, rubbing her thighs quickly together several times, and then come to herself with a sigh, tired, relaxed, and sweating, these seizures, which lasted one or two minutes, being mistaken by the relations for epileptic fits.[116]
The essentially motor character of detumescence is well shown by the extreme forms of erotic intoxication which sometimes appear as the result of s.e.xual excitement. Fere, who has especially called attention to the various manifestations of this condition, presents an instructive case of a man of neurotic heredity and antecedents, in whom it occasionally happened that s.e.xual excitement, instead of culminating in the normal o.r.g.a.s.m, attained its climax in a fit of uncontrollable muscular excitement. He would then sing, dance, gesticulate, roughly treat his partner, break the objects around him, and finally sink down exhausted and stupefied. (Fere, L"Instinct s.e.xuel, Chapter X.) In such a case a diffused and general detumescence has taken the place of the normal detumescence which has its main focus in the s.e.xual sphere.
The same relationship is shown in a case of impotence accompanied by cramps in the calves and elsewhere, which has been recorded by Brugelmann ("Zur Lehre vom Perversen s.e.xualismus," Zeitschrift fur Hypnotismus, 1900, Heft I). These muscular conditions ceased for several days whenever coitus was effected.
An instructive a.n.a.logy to the motor irradiations preceding the moment of s.e.xual detumescence may be found in the somewhat similar motor irradiations which follow the delayed expulsion of a highly distended bladder. These sometimes become very marked in a child or young woman unable to control the motor system absolutely. The legs are crossed, the foot swung, the thighs tightly pressed together, the toes curled. The fingers are flexed in rhythmic succession. The whole body slowly twists as though the seat had become uncomfortable. It is difficult to concentrate the mind; the same remark may be automatically repeated; the eyes search restlessly, and there is a tendency to count surrounding objects or patterns. When the extreme degree of tension is reached it is only by executing a kind of dance that the explosive contraction of the bladder is restrained.
The picture of muscular irradiation presented under these circ.u.mstances differs but slightly from that of the onset of detumescence. In one case the explosion is sought, in the other case it is dreaded; but in both cases there is a r.e.t.a.r.ded muscular tension,-in the one case involuntary, in the other case voluntary-maintained at a point of acute intensity, and in both cases the muscular irradiations of this tension spread over the whole body.
The increased motor irritability of the state of detumescence somewhat resembles the conditions produced by a weak anaesthetic and there is some interest in noting the s.e.xual excitement liable to occur in anaesthesia. I am indebted to Dr. J. F. W. Silk for some remarks on this point:-
"I. s.e.xual emotions may apparently be aroused during the stage of excitement preceding or following the administration of any anaesthetic; these emotions may take the form of mere delirious utterances, or may be a.s.sociated with what is apparently a s.e.xual o.r.g.a.s.m. Or reflex phenomena connected with the s.e.xual organs may occasionally be observed under special circ.u.mstances; or, to put it in another way, such reflex possibilities are not always abolished by the condition of narcosis or anaesthesia.
"II. Of the particular anaesthetics employed I am inclined to think that the possibility of such conditions arising is inversely proportionate to their strength, e.g., they are more frequently observed with a weak anaesthetic like nitrous oxide than with chloroform.
"III. s.e.xual emotions I believe to be rarely observable in men, and this is remarkable, or, I should say, particularly noticeable, for the presence of nurses, female students, etc., might almost have led one to expect that the contrary would have been the case. On the other hand, it is among men that I have frequently observed a reflex phenomenon which has usually taken the shape of an erection of the p.e.n.i.s when the structures in the neighborhood of the spermatic cord have been handled.
"IV. Among females the emotional s.e.xual phenomena most frequently obtrude themselves, and I believe that if it were possible to induce people to relate their dreams they would very often be found to be of a s.e.xual character."
Much more important than the general motor phenomena, more purposive though involuntary, are the specifically s.e.xual muscular movements. From the very beginning of detumescence, indeed, muscular activity makes itself felt, and the peripheral muscles of s.e.x act, according to Kobelt"s expression, as a peripheral s.e.xual heart. In the male these movements are fairly obvious and fairly simple. It is required that the s.e.m.e.n should be expressed from the vesiculae seminales, propelled along the urethra, in combination with the prostatic fluid which is equally essential, and finally ejected with a certain amount of force from the urethral orifice. Under the influence of the stimulation furnished by the contact and friction of the v.a.g.i.n.a, this process is effectively carried out, mainly by the rhythmic contractions of the bulbo-cavernosus muscle, and the s.e.m.e.n is emitted in a jet which may be e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed to a distance varying from a few centimeters to a meter or more.
With regard to the details of the psychic sides of this process a correspondent, a psychologist, writes as follows:-
"I have never noticed in my reading any attempt to a.n.a.lyze the sensations which accompany the o.r.g.a.s.m, and, as I have made a good many attempts to make such an a.n.a.lysis myself, I will append the results on the chance that they may be of some value. I have checked my results so far as possible by comparing them with the experience of such of my friends as had coitus frequently and were willing to tell me as much as they could of the psychology of the process.
"The first fact that I hit upon was the importance of pressure. As one of my informants picturesquely phrases it-"the tighter the fit the greater the pleasure." This agrees, too, with their unanimous testimony that the pleasurable sensations were much greater when the o.r.g.a.s.m occurred simultaneously in the man and woman. Their a.n.a.lysis seldom went further than this, but a few remarked that the distinctive sensations accompanying the o.r.g.a.s.m seem to begin near the root of the p.e.n.i.s or in the testes, and that they are qualitatively different from the tickling sensations which precede them.
"These tickling sensations are caused, I think, by the friction of the glands against the v.a.g.i.n.al walls, and are supplemented by other sensations from the urethra, whose nerves are stimulated by pressure of the v.a.g.i.n.al walls and sphincter. The specific sensation of the o.r.g.a.s.m begins, I believe, with a strong contraction of the muscles of the urethral walls along the entire length of the ca.n.a.l, and is felt as a peculiar ache starting from the base of the p.e.n.i.s and quickly becoming diffused through the whole organ. This sensation reaches its climax with the expulsion of the s.e.m.e.n into the urethra and the consequent feeling of distention, which is instantly followed by the rhythmic peristaltic contractions of the urethral muscles which mark the climax of the o.r.g.a.s.m.
"The most careful introspection possible under the circ.u.mstances seems to show that these sensations arise almost wholly from the urethra and in a far less degree from the corona. During periods of great s.e.xual excitement the nerves of the urethra and corona seem to possess a peculiar sensitivity and are powerfully stimulated by the violent peristaltic contractions of the muscles in the urethral walls during e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n. It seems possible that the intensity and volume of sensation felt at the glans may be due in part to the greater area of sensitive surface presented in the fossa as well as to the sensitivity of the corona, and in part to the fact that during the o.r.g.a.s.m the glans is more highly congested than at any other time, and the nerve endings thus subjected to additional pressure.
"If the foregoing statements are true, it is easy to see why the pleasure of the man is much increased when the o.r.g.a.s.m occurs at the same time in his partner and himself, for the contractions of the v.a.g.i.n.a upon the p.e.n.i.s would increase the stimulation of all the nerve endings in that organ for which a mechanical stimulus is adequate, and the prominence of the corpus spongiosum and corona would ensure them the greatest stimulation. It seems not improbable that the specific sensation of o.r.g.a.s.m rises from the stimulation of the peculiar form of nerve end-bulbs which Krause found in the corpus spongiosum and in the glans.
"The characteristic ma.s.siveness of the experience is probably due largely to the great number of sensations of strain and pressure caused by the powerful reflex contraction of so many of the voluntary muscles.
"Of course, the foregoing a.n.a.lysis is purely tentative, and I offer it only on the chance that it may suggest some line of inquiry which may lead to results of value to the student of s.e.xual psychology."