Fiaux, in his report to the municipal council of Paris in 1887, made special mention of such a house in the rue de Chabanais, where society women and rich demi-mondaines frequented for the sole purpose of satisfying libidinem cum puellis.
Chevalier says that the kind of meretrices who exploit women may be met with in all streets and boulevards of Paris, in the theatres and at balls, at the races and exhibitions of every kind. The little girls, between the ages of ten and fifteen, who may be seen selling flowers in the restaurants and cafés of Paris, are also, to a large extent, in the service of lesbianism.
All these males and females who offer their bodies to homosexual inverts for hire, are seldom inverts themselves. With them it is only a vice or a perversity.
Homosexual perversion.—The perversion of homosexuality has, as a rule, the force of a congenital phenomenon and is characterized by precocity. In normal individuals the sexual instinct, except induced by seduction, does not manifest itself before puberty. The sexual life of the individuals afflicted with homosexual perversion, on the other hand, appears abnormally early in life. The impulse appears at the tender age of five to eight years, and ab initio in a perverted form, without having been brought about from the outside by bad examples or other influences.
The child shows its anomaly in its tastes, sentiments, and occupations. The boy avoids the company of other boys. He shuns their games and plays. He is found playing with dolls, ribbons, miniature housekeeping, etc., in company with girls. He is more particular about his dress, in fact, he loves to be dressed like a girl as long as possible. He likes to occupy himself with girls’ work, such as knitting, sewing or crochet-work. The homosexual girl is found in the haunts of boys and competes with them in their games. She neglects her dress and assumes and affects boyish manners. She is in pursuit of boys' sports. She plays with horses, balls and arms. She gives manifestations of courage and bravado, is noisy and loves vagabondage.
Toward puberty the boy finds his sexual inclinations and impulses directed toward men, and the girl hers toward women. The boy feels himself a girl and attracted to men. He forms passionate attachments to boys and idealizes his friends. When he has found a manly friend, he is captivated by his strength and prowess, by his love of adventure, by his courage and by his manly grace and beauty. The passion finds expression in stupro mutuo. The girl, on the other hand, forms passionate friendships with girls, as a rule, older than herself. She idealizes and deifies the beloved friend, and praises her beauty, grace and kindness. Her thoughts are full of the beloved one. She sends her invitations to come and call on her, she writes her poetry, offers her flowers and presents and is capable of every sacrifice for her friend’s sake. She delights in the bodily contact with the beloved friend. This passion finds expression in kissing, close embraces and in sleeping together in one bed. She experiences then the powerful feeling of lustful pleasure, which may be so intense that it suggests magnetic currents through her body. Alteri super alteram jacenti tactus corporeus delectationis tremorem inducit. The orgasm is induced quibusdam contrectationibus.
The homosexual pervert suffers from disloyalty and is tortured by jealousy. Tears, despair and anger are as common as in normal love if the friend forms any other friendship, no matter whether with males or females. If the pervert’s love be unrequited, he or she suffers the greatest pangs. As a rule, the inverted individuals are fastidious in their choice of friends. Their inclinations favor a certain type of men or women respectively. Once the choice is made they act like passionate lovers. The pervert’s modesty finds expression towards individuals of the same sex. The boy is embarrassed in company of young men and likes to show off in their presence, while the most attractive young women leave him cold and indifferent. Their presence is simply ignored by him. The perverted girl becomes shy and confused in the presence of an attractive individual of her own sex, but shows nothing of shyness and the engaging air of weakness and dependence which are the unconscious invitations to them in the presence of men. She feels a pronounced indifference to men.
The erotic dreams of the male pervert turn around males. The autoerotic fantasies are all of men and virilia, while normal individuals in their imagery never think of their lovers' pudibilia. The lustful dreams of the perverted girl contain only visions of females, with corresponding situations. These dreams where only women appear on the scene cause her great pleasure and sometimes even pollutions. In her day-dreams, her fancy pictures muliebria of her own sex.
The homosexual man finds delight in contrectando virilia alterius that is simply incomprehensible to the normal individual. The value he or she lays in contrectando et conspiciendo virilia aut muliebria shows at once the diseased condition. The inverted boy and girl are constantly on the alert for the opportunity to see nude men, respectively nude women. They frequent bathing establishments. They find pleasure in looking at statutes of nude males, respectively females, and are frequent visitors of museums. The sight of nude men, respectively women, awakens in them lustful feelings, while in the presence of nude women the perverted man remains indifferent, and the same is the case with the invert woman in the presence of nude men.
The perverted man has a profound longing for female clothes. He takes the greatest pleasure in the sight of female attire. He tries to dress as a woman at every opportunity. He likes to frequent masquerade balls where he can dress up as a woman and dance with women. In short, the patient has all the feelings and longings of a woman. The inverted woman, on the other hand, likes to imitate male fashions in general attire and in dressing her hair. It gives her the greatest satisfaction if she is able to dress herself entirely in men’s attire and disguise her identity. She further prefers the occupations of men and loves at every occasion to play a man’s rôle. When at a ball she likes to dance with women, and when in a hotel, she loves to discuss politics with men. In short, she feels herself a man.