72 THE GENETIC AND THE OPERATIVE EVIDENCE 



The two most obvious changes in the eunuch are the absence ot the 

 beard and mustache and the small larynx, which produces a high- 

 pitched voice. In both these respects man differs from woman; in 

 both, however, the eunuch is like the boy as much as he is hke the 

 woman. It is not evident, therefore, whether the eunuch has retained 

 the juvenile condition or has become more hke the female. Moreover, 

 there is the possibility that there is no difference in the present case 

 between these two conditions. The distribution of hair on the pubis 

 of the eunuch is often said to be more like that in the woman than that 

 in the man, but there is apparently no sufficient evidence to show that 

 this is more than the juvenile condition or an undeveloped condition 

 of the male. As to the voice, there is no way of determining whether 

 the voice of the eunuch is feminine or juvenile. The development of 

 the mammae in the eunuch would be a better test, but it does not appear 

 from theliterature on the subject that the mammary glands and the 

 nipples of the eunuch are changed toward the female type. On the 

 contary, it appears rather that there is no such change. It is true that 

 the tendency toward the accumulation of fat may give the eunuch a 

 somewhat feminine appearance (since one of the foci of fat accumula- 

 tion is in the region of the breasts), but this in itself can scarcely be 

 claimed to be feminization, but due rather to the more slothful habit of 

 the eunuch that tends to obesity. 



A more suggestive resemblance is found in the narrowness of the 

 shoulder girdle and broadness of the hips in the eunuch, but even these 

 rsemblances to the female should be regarded skeptically, since other 

 changes in the bones that result from castration are certainly not a 

 development toward the female type, but a peculiar specific effect of 

 the absence of testes on the growth of the bones. For instance, the 

 bones of the arms and legs are much longer in the eunuch than in 

 either the normal man or woman, in fact, more in the direction of the 

 male, who has longer legs than the female. The explanation usually 

 given is that the ossification at the ends of the bones and of the epiphyses 

 does not take place so soon as in normal men and women. The con- 

 dition here is that characteristic of the juvenile state that is carried 

 over into the adult, but whether the narrowness of the chest and 

 shoulder girdle of the eunuch is correlated in some way with the more 

 prolonged growth of the other bones has not, so far as I know, been 

 determined. That there is no apparent connection between the 

 shortness of the one and the greater length of the other does not 

 necessarily lead to the conclusion that there is no such connection. 

 For the present I think we must hold this point in reserve. 



Steinach's evidence for the feminized rats, if it may be extended to 

 man, indicates that some of the female characteristics are due to the 

 presence of the ovary holding in check the genetic possibilities of the 

 female, as well as leading to the development of such characteristic 



