fer according as the specimen
under examination has been taken from a child or from an adult. As
regards the other glands considered to form part of the genital organs,
some of these secrete even in childhood. This matter will be
subsequently discussed in some detail.

In the female sex, also, there are notable differences in the condition
of the genital organs between the adult and the child. In the first
place, the relative sizes of the various organs differ greatly. But
other differences are also noticeable, not dependent, however, on
differences in age, but on whether there has or has not been experience
of sexual intercourse, and on whether pregnancy and parturition have
occurred. When we compare a female child with an adult woman, the first
obvious difference is in the shape of the external genital organs. In
the child, the vulva is placed much higher and more to the front, so
that it is distinctly visible even when the thighs are in close
apposition. In the child, also, the labia majora are less developed, for
as womanhood approaches a great deposit of fat takes place in these
structures. Again, in the child, the outer surfaces of the labia majora
and that part of the skin of the abdomen just in front of the labia (the
_mons veneris_) are as hairless as the rest of the body, whereas in the
adult woman these regions are covered with the pubic hair. According to
Marthe Francillon,[10] to whom we are indebted for an elaborate study of
puberty in the female sex, during the puberal development changes occur
also in the clitoris. The genital corpuscles of Krause and the
corpuscles of Finger (_Wollustkoerperchen_), the terminals of the nerves
passing to the erectile tissue of the clitoris, undergo at this time a
marked increase in size. The clitoris itself, hitherto comparatively
small, now attains a length of three to four centimetres (1.2 to 1.6
inch), in the quiescent state, and of four and a half to five
centimetres (1.8 to 2 inches) when erect. In the virgin also, as
previously mentioned, the hymen is present, a structure of very variable
form. After defloration its remnants persist in the form of small
prominences around the margin of the vaginal inlet (_carunculae
myrtiformes_). But, quite independently of defloration, in the child the
vaginal orifice is much smaller than in the riper girl. The uterus
undergoes remarkable changes. In the foetus, during the latter part of
intra-uterine life, this organ grows very