090 



HERMAPHRODITISM. 



tlie case of a calf which Gurlt* believes to 

 belong to the present head. Neither testicles 

 nor scrotum were observed externally, and the 

 penis or enlarged clitoris, which occupied its 

 normal situation, was apparently perforated by 

 the urethra, and crooked upwards so as to 

 throw the urine in that direction. Meryf 

 shewed by dissection the true sex of a monkey, 

 the length of whose clitoris had deceived some 

 observers with regard to the true sex of the 

 animal. The enlarged clitoris was furrowed 

 on its inferior surface. The clitoris of the 

 female Quadrumana is, as shall be afterwards 

 more particularly mentioned, relatively larger 

 than in the human subject, and retains in a 

 greater degree the size and type of structure of 

 this organ in the embryo. 



We may here further mention that, as pointed 

 out by Blumenbach,J the clitoris and orifice of 

 the urethra are placed at some distance from 

 the vagina and in front of it, in the rat, mouse, 

 hamster, &c. This normal structure has some- 

 times been mistaken for an hermaphroditic mal- 

 formation. 



2. From prolapsus i>f the uterus. It may 

 at first appear strange that this occurrence 

 should ever lead to any difficulty in ascertain- 

 ing the sex of the individual, though not only 

 non-professional observers but even the most 

 intelligent medical men have occasionally been 

 so far misled by the similarity of the protruded 

 organ to the male penis, as to mistake a female 

 for a male. Of this circumstance some curious 

 illustrations are on record. 



M. Veay, physician at Toulouse, has inserted 

 in the Philosophical Transactions of London, 

 vol. xvi. p. 282, a brief account of the case of 

 Marguerite Malause or Malaure, who was 

 entered as a female patient in the Toulouse 

 Hospital in 1686. Her trunk, face, &c. pre- 

 sented the general configuration of a female, 

 but in the situation of the vulva there was a 

 body eight inches in length when on its fullest 

 stretch, and resembling a perfectly formed male 

 penis in all respects, except in not being pro- 

 vided with a prepuce. Through the canal 

 perforating this body she was alleged to eva- 

 cuate her urine, and from its orifice M. Veay 

 had himself an opportunity of seeing the men- 

 strual fluid flow. After being examined by 

 several physicians she was pronounced to be 

 more male than female, and ordered by the 

 civil authorities to exchange the name of Mar- 

 guerite for that of Arnaud, and to wear male 

 attire. In 1693 she visited Paris in her male 

 habiliments, and reputed herself endowed with 

 the powers of both sexes. The Parisian phy- 

 sicians and surgeons who examined her seem all 

 to have accorded in opinion with the faculty of 

 Toulouse, until M. Saviard|| saw her and de- 

 tected the supposed penis to be merely the 

 prolapsed uterus. He reduced the protruded 

 organ, and cured the patient. Upon the enigma 



* Lehrbuch der Pathol. Anal. Ed. ii. . 193. 

 t Hist, de 1'Acad. (1686) torn. i. p. 345. 

 $ Comp. Anal. p. 335. 



<S Doebel, ia Nov. Liter. Maria BaUhici (1698), 

 p. 238. 

 || Kccueil d'Observations Chirur^icalcs, p. 150. 



of her hermaphroditism being thus solved, she 

 was permitted by the king, at her own request, 

 to assume again her female name and dress. 



Sir K. Home* detected a case of reputed 

 hermaphroditism of the same description as the 

 last, in a French woman of twenty-five years of 

 age, who exhibited herself in London, and 

 pretended to have the powers of a male. The 

 cervix uteri was uncommonly narrow, and pro- 

 jected several inches beyond the external open- 

 ing of the vagina. The everted mucous surface 

 of the vagina had, from constant exposure, lost 

 its natural appearance and resembled the ex- 

 ternal skin of the penis. The orifice of the os 

 tincz had been mistaken for the orifice of the 

 urethra. The prolapsus had been observed at 

 an early age, and had increased as the woman 

 grew up. 



Valentinf mentions another analogous in- 

 stance of sexual ambiguity produced by a 

 prolapsus of the uterus. In this case the 

 husband mistook the displaced organ for the 

 penis, and accused his wife of having " cum 

 sexu virili necquicquam commune." 



A case quoted at great length by Arnaud I 

 from Duval, of reputed hermaphroditism in a 

 person that was brought up as a woman, and 

 married at twenty-one years of age as a male, 

 but who was shortly afterwards divorced and 

 imprisoned, and ordered again by the Court 

 of Bouen to assume the dress of a woman, 

 appears to us to belong very probably to the 

 present division of our subject, the reputed 

 penis being described as placed within the 

 vagina. The recorded details of the case, 

 however, are not so precise as to leave us with- 

 out doubt in regard to its real nature. 



In cases such as those now mentioned, in 

 which the prolapsed uterus, or, more properly 

 speaking, the prolapsed uterus and vagina have 

 been mistaken for the penis, it appears proba- 

 ble that the neck of the uterus must have been 

 preternaturally long and narrow, otherwise it 

 would be difficult to account for the apparent 

 small diameter and great length of the prolapsed 

 organ. Among Professor Thomson's collection 

 of anatomical drawings of diseased structures 

 there is one of an uterus containing in its body 

 a fibro-calcareous tumour, and having a neck 

 of three inches in length. M. Cruveilhier 

 has represented a similarly diseased uterus with 

 a neck of between five and six inches. An 

 organ shaped in this manner, whether from 

 congenital malformation or acquired disease, 

 would, when prolapsed for some time, repre- 

 sent, we conceive, a body resembling in form 

 and size those observed in Saviard's and Home's 

 cases. The prolapsus arising from a protrusion 

 of an ordinary shaped uterus is generally of a 

 greater diameter and roundness. 



This second species of spurious female her- 

 maphroditism is not observed among the lower 

 animals. 



B. Spurious hermaphroditism in the male. 



* Comp, Anat. vol. iii. p. 318. 

 t; Pandecta; Medico- Legates, t. i. p. 38,C8U3 xii. 

 i 4 Mem. sur les Herrnaphr. p. 314-18. 

 t. Pathol. liv, xiii._Pl. iv. 



