cases are, of course, abnormal. But, _for the most part_, it is true
that women are _much slower_ in making ready for the sexual act than
men are.

Again, as the organs become ready for the act, nature has provided a
most wonderful means for bringing about their easy and happy union.
Both the male and female organs secrete and emit, or pour out, a sort
of lubricating fluid which covers and sometimes almost floods the
parts. This is a clear and limpid substance, that looks much like the
white of an egg, and is much like the saliva that is secreted in
the mouth, only it is a thicker substance. Chemically, it is almost
identical with saliva. That generated by the man is called "prostatic
flow;" that produced by the woman "pre-coital secretion."

Now, if time is given for this fluid to be secreted and exuded, all
the parts become covered or saturated with it, and they are admirably
equipped for easy union. The glans penis is then covered with the
slippery fluid, and the vulva and all the walls of the vagina are
laved with the substance. At the same time, the vaginal walls have
widened and grown soft, and all the parts of the vulva (which are yet
to be named and described in detail) are in like condition. The result
is that, though the penis be what might at first seem of such size as
to make its entrance into the vagina impossible, as a matter of fact,
such entrance is perfectly easy, when the parts are fully ready to be
joined. _But not before or otherwise!_

So here is where the trouble comes. If the husband is in haste, if he
does not wait for the wife to become ready to meet him; if he forces
his large, hard penis into the vagina before either is fully ready
for such union--when there is no prostatic fluid on its glans, and the
vagina is shrunken and its walls are dry--if coitus is engaged in in
this way, it is perfectly easy to see that _only disaster can result_!
The woman is hurt, sometimes most cruelly, and the man in reality gets
only a beastly gratification from the act. _Of all bad things in all
the world, such manner of coition is the worst_!

And so, in this _first_ part of the act, the one foremost thought to
remember and observe is, _take plenty of time!_

There is another reason why, on the part of woman, this time should
be extended, especially when she is a bride and inexperienced in these
matters, and that is, that her "innocence," and all her education,
make her feel that she is _doing wrong_, or