Bartels, _Das Weib_, vol. i). It is here customary for a man to
place a piece of fish between the labia, while he stimulates the
latter by his tongue and teeth until under stress of sexual
excitement the woman urinates; this is regarded as an indication
that the proper moment for intercourse has arrived. Such a
practice rests on physiologically sound facts whatever may be
thought of it from an aesthetic standpoint.

The contrast between the normal aesthetic standpoint in this
matter and the lover's is well illustrated by the following
quotations: Dr. A.B. Holder, in the course of his description of
the American Indian _bote_, remarks, concerning _fellatio_: "Of
all the many varieties of sexual perversion, this, it seems to
me, is the most debased that could be conceived of." On the other
hand, in a communication from a writer and scholar of high
intellectual distinction occurs the statement: "I affirm that, of
all sexual acts, _fellatio_ is most an affair of imagination and
sympathy." It must be pointed out that there is no contradiction
in these two statements, and that each is justified, according as
we take the point of view of the ordinary onlooker or of the
impassioned lover eager to give a final proof of his or her
devotion. It must be added that from a scientific point of view
we are not entitled to take either side.

Of the whole of this group of phenomena, the most typical and the most
widespread example is certainly the kiss. We have in the lips a highly
sensitive frontier region between skin and mucous membrane, in many
respects analogous to the vulvo-vaginal orifice, and reinforcible,
moreover, by the active movements of the still more highly sensitive
tongue. Close and prolonged contact of these regions, therefore, under
conditions favorable to tumescence sets up a powerful current of nervous
stimulation. After those contacts in which the sexual regions themselves
take a direct part, there is certainly no such channel for directing
nervous force into the sexual sphere as the kiss. This is nowhere so well
recognized as in France, where a young girl's lips are religiously kept
for her lover, to such an extent, indeed, that young girls sometimes come
to believe that the whole physical side of love is comprehended in a kiss
on the mouth; so highly intelligent a woman as Madam Adam has described
the agony she felt as a girl