[70]. In this story the writer describes a man whose greatest pleasure lies in being treated like a slave by a beautiful woman, whom he loves. Besides numerous scenes in which the man is whipped by the woman, there are others in which he is trod upon by her. It is this act that forms the principal means of excitement in the case above described.
[71]. In Continental hotels the guests are accustomed to put their shoes in the corridors at night, to be cleaned.
[72]. However, against the theory that foot- and shoe-fetichism is a manifestation of (latent) masochism, Dr. Moll (op. cit., p. 136) raises the objection that it is still unexplained why the fetichist so often prefers boots with high heels, then boots and shoes of a particular kind—buttoned or laced. To this objection it may be remarked that, in the first place, the high heels characterize the shoes as feminine; and, in the second place, that in spite of the sexual character of his inclination, the fetichist demands all kinds of æsthetic qualities in his fetich (comp. Case 90).
[73]. There is apparently a connection between foot-fetichism and the fact that certain persons of this kind, whom coitus does not satisfy, or who are unable to perform it, find a substitute for it in tritus membri inter pedes mulieris.
[74]. Analogy with the excesses of religious enthusiasm is found even here. The religious enthusiast, Antoinette Bouvignon de la Porte, mixed her food with fæces to punish herself (Zimmermann, op. cit., p. 124). The beatified Marie Alacoque, to “mortify” herself, licked up with her tongue the dejections of patients, and sucked their toes covered with sores.
[75]. The laws of the early Middle Ages gave the husband the right to kill the wife; those of the later Middle Ages, the right to beat her. The latter right was used freely, even by those of high standing (comp. Schultze, Das höfische Leben zur Zeit des Minnesangs, Bd. i, p. 163 et seq.). Yet, by the side of this, the paradoxical chivalry of the Middle Ages stands unexplained.
[76]. Comp. Lady Milford’s words in Schiller’s “Kabale und Liebe”: “We women can only choose between ruling and serving; but the highest pleasure power affords is but a miserable substitute, if the greater joy of being the slaves of a man we love is denied us!”
[77]. Anthony and Cleopatra, v. 2.
[78]. Comp. the author’s article, “über geschlechtliche Hörigkeit und Masochismus,” in the Psychiatrischen Jahrbücher, Bd. x, p. 169 et seq., where this subject is treated in detail, and particularly from the forensic stand-point.
[79]. The expressions “slave” and “slavery,” though often used metaphorically under such circumstances, are avoided here because they are the favorite expressions of masochism, from which this “bondage” must be strictly differentiated.