Krafft-Ebing and Albert Eulenburg classify metatropic men with masochists (see Chapter XX) and metatropic women with sadists (see Chapter XIX).
Dr. Steinach's Experiments show the close relationship between homosexualism and the secretions of the interstitial cells of the genital glands.
After castrating young rats which, after the operation, remained in an infantile stage of development, Steinach transplanted into their inguinal region male or female gonads.
Males into which female gonads had been implanted, developed all the physical characteristics and all the mannerisms of the female, paid no attention to females at mating time and, on the contrary, attracted the rutting males and were attracted to them.
Castrated females in whose body he implanted testicles, showed the hardier hair growth of males, tried to mate with females and remained indifferent to males.
Prof. Brandes, director of the Zoological Garden in Darmstadt, has repeated those experiments on deer with identical results. The female in which testicles were implanted behaved like a male and grew antlers. The male's mammary glands grew very fast after the implantation of female gonads.
It is said that Steinach has successfully transformed homosexuals into normal men but the last statement of his on the "Histology of the Gonads in homosexual Men," (Vol. 46, No. 1, Archiv für Entwickelungsmechanismus der Organismen) contains no mention of such results.
Perverse Birds. If we now turn to experiments reported by William Craig in the Journal of Animal Behavior, we see an apparently different process at work. Young male birds kept for a year in a cage with females and away from all males, will at mating time ignore entirely the females, and offer themselves to males in the mating position of the female.
The same process is observable in females brought up with males exclusively.
Imitation in this case seems to give exactly the same results which Steinach obtained thru castration and transplantation of gonads.