He does not consider that he is doing anything wrong, and regards his acts as quite natural. His only regret is the absorbing nature of his passions, which obtrude themselves in season and out of season, seldom or never leaving him quiet, and sometimes making his life a hell. Yet he doubts whether he would change himself, even if he had the power.
HISTORY XVII.—Age 25; is employed in an ordinary workshop, and lives in the back alley of a large town in which he was born and bred. Fair, slight, and refined in appearance. The sexual organs are normal and well developed, and the sexual passions strong. His mother is a big masculine woman, and he is much attached to her. Father is slight and weakly. He has seven brothers and one sister. Homosexual desires began at an early age, though he does not seem to have come under any perverse influences. He is not inclined to masturbation. Erotic dreams are always of males. He declares he never cared for any woman except his mother, and that he could not endure to sleep with a woman.
He says he generally falls in love with a man at first sight—as a rule, some one older than himself and of higher class—and longs to sleep and be with him. In one case he fell in love with a man twice his own age, and would not rest until he had won his affection. He does not much care what form the sexual relation takes. He is sensitive and feminine by nature, gentle, and affectionate. He is neat and orderly in his habits, and fond of housework; helps his mother in washing, etc. He appears to think that male attachments are perfectly natural.
HISTORY XVIII.—Englishman, born in Paris; aged 26; an actor. He belongs to an old English family; his father, so far as he is aware, had no homosexual inclinations, nor had any of his ancestors on the paternal side; but he believes that his mother's family, and especially a maternal uncle who had a strong feeling for beauty of form, were more akin to him in this respect.
His earliest recollections show an attraction for males. At children's parties he incurred his father's anger by kissing other small boys, and his feelings grew in intensity with years. He has never practised self-abuse, and seldom had erotic dreams; when they do occur they are about males.
His physical feeling for women is one of absolute indifference. He admires beautiful women in the same way as one admires beautiful scenery. At the same time he likes to talk with clever women, and has formed many friendships with frank, pure, and cultivated English girls, for whom he has the utmost admiration and respect. Marriage is impossible, because physical pleasure with women is impossible; he has tried, but cannot obtain, the slightest sexual feeling or excitement.
He especially admires youths (though they must not be immature) from 16 or 17 to about 25. The type which physically appeals to him most, and to which he appeals, is fair, smooth-skinned, gentle, rather girlish and effeminate, with the effeminacy of the ingénue, not the cocotte. His favorite to attract him must be submissive and womanly; he likes to be the man and the master. On this point he adds: "The great passion of my life is an exception, and stands on an utterly different level. It realizes an ideal of marriage in which neither is master, but both share a joint empire, and in which tyranny would be equally painful to both. But this friendship and love is for an equal, a year younger than myself, and does not preclude other and less creditable liaisons, physical constancy being impossible to men of our caliber."
Pedicatio is the satisfaction he prefers, provided he takes the active, never the passive, rôle. He is handsome, with broad shoulders, good figure, and somewhat classic type of face, with fine blue eyes. He likes boating and skating, though not cricket or football, and is usually ready for fun, but has, at the same time, a taste for reading.
He has no moral feelings on these matters; he regards them as outside ethics, mere matters of temperament and social feeling. If England were underpopulated he thinks he might possibly feel some slight pangs of remorse; but, as things are, he feels that in prostituting males rather than females he is doing a meritorious action.
HISTORY XIX.—T. N. His history is given in his own words.