256 Human Physiology. 



As a rule boys are more boisterous, girls more gentle: wtine 

 the girl chooses a doll for her plaything, the boy prefers a drum, 

 a sword, or whip. But at puberty the sexual instincts become 

 stronger, and there is in each a more pronounced development 

 of masculine or feminine appearances and qualities. In the 

 boy the voice deepens in tone, and the face begins to be 



covered with a beard. Where the testes have been removed, 

 \ 



destroyed, or imperfectly developed, the voice remains treble, 

 and the beard light or wanting. There is an enlargement of 

 the throat, the "Adam's apple" corresponding to the full de- 

 velopment of the masculine organs. On the other hand the 

 girl becomes at puberty more decidedly feminine, by the en- 

 largement of the pelvis, the broadening of the hips, and the 

 development of the mammary or milk-forming glands in the 

 bosom. There is no beard to mar the delicacy and feminine 

 beauty of the face, but in both sexes alike, at this period, hair 

 appears upon the pubes. The most striking difference, how- 

 ever, is that already mentioned the occurrence of the monthly 

 period, marking the ripening and expulsion of germs capable of 

 becoming living men and women. 



Woman differs from man in her entire organisation mental, 

 emotional, physical. She is more rounded, graceful, soft, sensi- 

 tive, mobile. Her nervous system is finer and more delicate ; 

 she has quicker sensibilities and finer powers of instinct and in- 

 tuition. Even the bony skeleton of a woman can be distin- 

 guished at a glance from that of a man by its longer head and 

 broader pelvis, and generally by its smaller hands and feet. 

 Richerand has, perhaps, exaggerated in saying that "the repro- 

 duction of the species is, in woman, the most important object 

 in life almost the only destination to which nature has called 

 her, and the only duty she has to fulfil in human society;" but 

 Madame de Stael went nearly as far in saying, " Love is but an 

 episode in the life of man; it is the whole history of the life of 

 woman." Lord Byron has said, almost in the same words, 



