HERMAPHRODITISM. 



709 



small size, and, near the diminutive penis, some 

 traces of a prostate gland. 



c. The observation of M. Petit,* of Namur, 

 is still more complete. On the body of a sol- 

 dier, aged twenty-two, who died of his wounds, 

 and whose external organs appear to have 

 presented no deviation from the male type 

 except in the absence of the testicles from the 

 scrotum, these bodies, with male vasa defe- 

 rentia, vesiculae seminales, and a prostate, were 

 found to co-exist with female Fallopian tubes, 

 and an uterus that was attached to the neck 

 of the urinary bladder, and opened into the 

 urethra between this neck and the prostate. 

 The form of this imperfect uterus, M. Petit 

 remarks, merited for it rather the name of a 

 vuuina than of an uterus, and it resembled 

 more this organ in the female quadruped than 

 in women. From the body of the uterus, at 

 three inches from its entrance into the urethra, 

 two Fallopian tubes arose. These tubes were 

 perforated, and were three inches and a half 

 long; their abdominal extremities were not 

 loose and provided with fimbriae, but were at- 

 tached to a small soft body on each side, 

 occupying nearly the natural situation of the 

 ovaries, but having the substance or structure 

 of the testicles, and provided with an epidi- 

 dymis and vas deferens. The vasa deferentia 

 were each seven inches and a half long, and 

 were attached to two long and rather slender 

 vesiculae seminales placed alongside of the 

 uterus. The vesiculae opened into the urethra 

 by two ducts. 



In a note appended to this case, M. Petit 

 states that he had been consulted by a man 

 who rendered blood by the penis regularly 

 every month, without pain or any troublesome 

 symptom. Perhaps, adds M. Petit, this man 

 had also a concealed uterus. \Ve have been 

 informed, on credible authority, of two similar 

 cases, the one in a young unmarried man of 

 seventeen years of age, and the other in a per- 

 son who had been married for several years 

 without his wife having had any children.* In 

 both of these cases the discharge was in very 

 considerable quantity, and perfectly regular in 

 its monthly occurrence. Did it consist in a 

 periodical haemorrhage from the urinary blad- 

 der or passages only ? or was it as M. Petit 

 seems to suppose in his instance, of a true 

 menstrual character, and produced by the re- 

 productive organs of the female existing inter- 

 nally, and communicating with the bladder or 

 urethra ? 



d. Professor Ackermann,f of Jena, pub- 

 lished in 1805 the following interesting case of 

 the present variety of hermaphroditic malfor- 

 mation. It occurred in an infant that lived 

 about six weeks after birth. On dissection, 

 two testicles were found; one of them had 

 descended into the scrotum or labium ; the 

 other had advanced no further than the groin. 

 Both were perfectly formed, and had their usual 

 appendages complete. In the natural situa- 



* Hist, de 1'Acad. Roy. des Sc. for 1720, p. 38. 

 ^ t lufantis androgym historia ct iconographia, 

 Ediub. Mod. and Surg. Journ. vol. iii. p. 202. 



tion of the female uterus, there was found a 

 hollow pyriform organ, which, from its locality 

 and connections, was supposed to be an ute- 

 rus, though its coats were finer and thinner, 

 and its cavity greater than naturally belongs to 

 that viscus. Duplicatures of peritonaeum, re- 

 sembling theligamenta lata, connected this im- 

 perfect uterus with the sides of the pelvis, and 

 its cavity opened into a kind of short vagina, 

 which soon united with the urethra, and formed 

 one common canal with it (vagina urethruhs). 

 The vasa deferentia ran from the testicles 

 towards the superior angles of the uterus, and 

 penetrated into its substance at the points 

 where the Fallopian tubes are usually placed. 

 Without opening here, however, they passed 

 onwards under the internal mucous-like mem- 

 brane of the uterus and vagina, and at length 

 terminated, by very small orifices, in the va- 

 gina urethralis. Immediately previous to en- 

 tering the ligamenta lata, each vas deferens 

 formed a number of convolutions, conglome- 

 rated into a mass resembling a vesicula semi- 



e. Steghlener* has described at great length 

 the case of an infant that survived only for 

 half an hour after birth, and upon whose body 

 he found perfect external male organs {fig. 

 301, a 6), and internally two small elon- 

 gated testicles (c c), with their epididymes (g g\ 

 the convolutions of their vasa deferentia (6 b) 



m 



9 De Hcrmaphr. Nut. p. 104. 



