stance in
which, provided that sexual appetite existed before the removal
of the appendages, it was abolished by that operation. A Medical
Inquiry Committee appointed by the Liverpool Medical Institute
(ibid., p. 617) had previously reported that a considerable
number of patients stated that they had suffered a distinct loss
of sexual feeling. Lawson Tait, however, throws doubts on the
reliability of the Committee's results, which were based on the
statements of unintelligent hospital patients.

I may quote the following remarks from a communication sent to me
by an experienced physician in Australia: "No rule can be laid
down in cases in which both ovaries have been extirpated. Some
women say that, though formerly passionate, they have since
become quite indifferent, but I am of opinion that the majority
of women who have had prior sexual experience retain desire and
gratification in an equal degree to that they had before
operation. I know one case in which a young girl hardly 19 years
old, who had been accustomed to congress for some twelve months,
had trouble which necessitated the removal of the ovaries and
tubes on both sides. Far from losing all her desire or
gratification, both were very materially increased in intensity.
Menstruation has entirely ceased, without loss of femininity in
either disposition or appearance. During intercourse, I am told,
there is continuous spasmodic contraction of various parts of the
vagina and vulva."

The independence of the sexual impulse from the distention of the sexual
glands is further indicated by the great frequency with which sexual
sensations, in a faint or even strong degree, are experienced in childhood
and sometimes in infancy, and by the fact that they often persist in women
long after the sexual glands have ceased their functions.

In the study of auto-erotism in another volume of these _Studies_
I have brought together some of the evidence showing that even in
very young children spontaneous self-induced sexual excitement,
with orgasm, may occur. Indeed, from an early age sexual
differences pervade the whole nervous tissue. I may here quote
the remarks of an experienced gynecologist: "I venture to think,"
Braxton Hicks said many years ago, "that those who have much
attended to children will agree with me in saying that, almost
from