I have now reached a period of my life lasting over two years during which it was my luck to serve as private secretary to a millionaire septuagenarian living in the suburbs of the metropolis. Though surrounded with all the comforts of wealth, and having every opportunity for intellectual growth and enjoyment, the “procreative” instinct allowed me no rest. At times I would wish for a life of poverty in the slums with a mate to living in my refined and elegant surroundings without any opportunity for gratification of this instinct. I found it absolutely necessary to spend one night out of fourteen in the city’s slums. The curative value of a good environment is evident from the fact that I was fully satisfied with that frequency.
The Why of a Double Life.
The Why of a double life has already been sufficiently indicated—namely, at least in my own case, mental peculiarity, a constitution different from the normal. Does the reader suppose the author led a double life because he wanted to? Not at all, but simply because Nature and society forced it upon him. Many could remain celibate all their days with no sense of a great void in their life, and with no suffering to themselves; but the author, remaining celibate much beyond a month, would ordinarily rave, as a drug-victim raves when unable to obtain his anodyne. It is a confession that I shrink from making, but I feel that medical science should know it. At this period of my life I had to escape to the slums to find opportunity for fellatio in order to save myself from fellatio cum cani magno. The involuntary desire for fellatio was irresistible and I would have sacrificed everything for it. I trust all my readers are broadminded enough to see that I was irresponsible for this condition, and that it was entirely counter to my own wishes.
Secondly, the author was not at all to be blamed for having recourse to the slums. For me it was the only way then open to satisfy the most exacting demands of Nature. To frequent the forts had not yet been seriously considered. How easy it is, comparatively, for the normal man to gratify the procreative instinct! The man of high moral ideals can in most cases marry, and possess his beloved every day and night, not for only a few hours each month, as was the case with me during nearly all my career. The rake obtains all the companions he wishes with no risk of suffering violence. But an androgyne, if having any regard for his reputation, has often, as already seen, to run the gauntlet of assault, robbery, imprisonment, and even death, when he seeks his counterpart. To no respectable young man of my acquaintance did I dare make known my dreadful secret, which I believed would alienate from me every respectable member of society who should learn it. Because of society’s misunderstanding and prejudging my peculiarity, I was compelled to run the risks of the slums. Mankind would ostracize me for it, but instead they should pity me as one with whom the Almighty has dealt very bitterly.
Some Eminent Men Are Inverts.
Some eminent men in all callings are numbered among the inverts. Their terrible secret is hidden from the world. If it should become known, they are irretrievably lost, and would be ostracized with the greatest possible disgust and repugnance, although these emotions have no basis in reason. These inverts, who were brought up in refinement and hold honorable positions in society, deplore their lot in life. They greatly regret that they have to resort to such shameful and lamentable means as they do. By reason of the universal hatred of mankind for those of the race who are built on a different plan from the vast majority, these inverts, well educated, holding an honorable position in the world, and possessing a good income, are necessarily driven to subterfuges, artifices, and deceptions of which the world, which now holds them in honor, would believe them incapable. But they suffer from a craving which must be satisfied, even at the risk of the loss of property, reputation, life itself. This craving, which medical writers like Krafft-Ebing, who have made a study of the phenomenon, say is, in its intensity, often immeasurably beyond the normal procreative instinct in man, drives these unfortunates to “pick up” a poor young man whom they come across in a part of the city remote from where they are known. But everywhere there are traps set for these unfortunates—truly unfortunates, since their repulsive instincts are no fault of their own, being congenital—and in their search for the mate which is necessary for their contented existence, they sometimes come to grief. Not only does the blackmailer spread his net for these stepchildren of nature. The civil authorities have also their detectives out after them.
Melancholy as Spree Approached.
The How of a double life during this period of my career will now be described. On the eve of one of my fortnightly female-impersonation sprees, the reader probably supposes that I would be happy in anticipation. On the contrary, a great weight of sorrow and anxiety always oppressed me. There was of course an attraction which drew me to the city, but it was more than counterbalanced by the realization of the risks of my losing my then enviable position in life, and the dread of the danger I had to put myself in, in order to obtain the satisfaction of my instincts. A peculiar phenomenon was vivid images of violent blows in the face, since I had been the victim of such a number of times. But even apart from the dread of the real dangers, even if there were no such dangers, an overwhelming feeling of sadness and anxiety always came over me as the time to go forth on my peculiar quest approached. On the eve of a female-impersonation spree during this period, I always felt like a soldier on entering a great battle from which he realized he might never come back alive, or like a murderer on the eve of his electrocution. On such occasions I habitually sang to myself:
“Why oh why should we be melancholy, boys,
Whose business ’tis to die?”