CHAPTER XL 



Sexual Hormones and Morphogenesis. 



The important bearings of the morphogenetic influence 

 of the sexual glands on the development of the organism may 

 be again discussed here from a more general point of view. 



A. THE ASEXUAL EMBRYONIC SOMA. 



The well known facts concerning castration in men and 

 mammals seemed to render it very probable that the organism 

 after removal of the sex gland assumes a type common to both 

 sexes, though this was not always equally clear for all animals. 

 The pelvis of the sheep castrated at an early age, the skull of 

 the ox and of the castrated cow, the plumage and the spurs of 

 the castrated hen and cock, may be recalled in this connection. 

 An ''asexual" type (Tandler and co-workers, 1910, 1913) or 

 a "neutral" form (Pezavd, 1915, 1918) is the result of the 

 operation in each case. 



It has often been said that the mammal becomes transformed 

 into the type of the opposite sex. The accumulation of fat, 

 and loss of beard in the eunuch, and the hair on the chin of the 

 woman at the menopause seemed to prove this. But as 

 Tandler and Gross have pointed out, the accumulation of fat 

 in the eunuch is very different from what is characteristic of 

 the normal woman, the localization of the fat in the former 

 being different from that of the latter. Lately, Koch (192 1), 

 who again examined the Skopecs in Rumania, came to the 

 same conclusion as Tandler in regard to this question. As to 

 the beard of the old woman, it may be mentioned that the 

 number of individuals having this character is relatively 

 extremely small and absolutely insufficient to admit of such 

 important conclusions being drawn as has been done. Besides 

 this, Tandler and Gross report that a similar growth of hair 

 on the chin may be observed also in the eunuch. Further, 

 assumption of certain characters of the opposite sex does not 

 prove that there is a transformation into the type of the latter. 



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