THE NATURAL 



organ of mammifers is the penis, usually completed 

 exteriority by the testicles. The penis is, at once, the 

 excreting conductor of urine and sperm; an analogous 

 relation exists in the female, and it is with exactitude 

 that these mingled organs have been called genito-urinary 

 or more recently, uro-genital; it is the same in all the 

 animal series, the urethra opens exteriority or it ends, 

 as in birds, in a cloaca, vestibule, for all the excretions. 

 The penis of two-handed (bimanous) creatures de- 

 scends freely, it hangs before the pubis in quadrumanes, 

 and in chiroptera (bats). The bat is strangely like 

 man, and like primates in general: five fingers to the 

 hand, one a thumb, five fingers on the foot, pectoral 

 teats, mensual flux, free penis; it is a little caricature 

 of man, abrupt and frightened in its evening flight about 

 houses. Among flesh-eaters, ruminants, pachyderms, 

 solipedes and several other families of mammals, the 

 penis is sheathed in a scabbard which stretches along the 

 belly; thus preserved against accidents and insect stings, 

 while its sensibility is maintained intact. Voyagers, ac- 

 cording to Buffon, have seen Patagonians trying to get 

 like results by tying the -foreskin above the gland, like 

 a bag with a cord. Thus man's hand permits him to 

 improve or mutilate his body. Mutilation and sexual 

 deformations, circumcision among Semites and savages, 

 excision of Russian illuminati, transversal perforation of 

 the gland, surgical flattening of the prong, are very 

 frequent. The hand of the chiroptera is shackled, that 

 of quadrumanes has only one sexual role, masturbation. 

 It may also serve as a shield against external danger; 

 many quadrumanes, better protected, make the same use 

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