MASOCHISM.
133
Case 66. Minister, aged 50. From time to time he goes to houses of prostitution and asks to rent a room. He enters it with a girl. Then he lustfully regards her shoes, takes one off and kisses and bites it. Finally, he puts it ad genitalia and ejaculat semen semineque ejaculato axillas pectusque terit; then he comes out of his sensual ecstasy. He begs the woman to allow him to keep the shoe for a few days, and always, at the appointed time, returns it with thanks (Cantarano, La Psichiatria, v, p. 205).
Case 67. Student, Z., aged 23; comes of a tainted family. Sister was insane; brother suffered with hysteria virilis. The patient, peculiar from childhood, has frequent attacks of hypochondriacal depression, tædium vitæ, and feels that he is persecuted. In a consultation on account of mental trouble, I find him a very perverse, hereditarily predisposed man, with neurasthenic and hypochondriacal symptoms. A suspicion of masturbation is confirmed. Patient makes interesting disclosures concerning his vita sexualis. At the age of ten he was powerfully attracted by the foot of one of his comrades. At twelve he became an enthusiast for ladies’ feet. It gave him a delightful sensation to revel in the sight of them. At fourteen he began to masturbate, thinking, at the same time, of the beautiful foot of a lady. From this time on he was taken with the feet of his three-year-old sister. The feet of other females that attracted him induced sexual excitement. Only women’s feet—no other part of them—interested him. The thought of sexual intercourse with women excited his disgust. He had never attempted coitus. After his twelfth year he had no interest in the feet of male individuals. The style of covering of the female foot is indifferent to him; it is only necessary that the person seem to be sympathetic. The thought of enjoying the feet of prostitutes was disgusting to him. For years he had been in love with his sister’s feet. If he could but obtain her shoes, the sight of them powerfully excited his sensuality. Kissing or embracing his sister did not have this effect. His greatest delight was to embrace and kiss the foot of a sympathetic woman, when ejaculation would result with a lively pleasurable sensation. Often he was impelled to touch his genitals with one of his sister’s shoes; but he had been able, thus far, to master this impulse, especially for the reason that for two years (owing to progressive irritable weakness of the genitals) the simple sight of the foot had induced ejaculation. From his relatives it is ascertained that the patient has a silly admiration for the feet of his sister; so that she avoids him and seeks to hide her feet from him. The patient looks upon his perverse sexual impulse as pathological, and is painfully affected by the fact that his vile fancy has for its object his sister’s foot. He avoided opportunity as much as he could, and sought to help the matter by masturbation when, as in dreams accompanied by pollution, ladies’ feet filled his imagination. However, when the impulse became too powerful he could not avoid gaining a partial sight of his