Anomalies And Curiosities Of Medicine Part 58

In an excellent article on the evolution of ceremonial inst.i.tutions Herbert Spencer mentions the Fuegians, Veddahs, Andamanese, Dyaks, Todas, Gonds, Santals, Bodos, and Dhimals, Mishmis, Kamchadales, and Snake Indians, as among people who form societies to practice simple mutilations in slight forms. Mutilations in somewhat graver forms, but still in moderation, are practiced by the Tasmanians, Tamaese, the people of New Guinea, Karens, Nagas, Ostiaks, Eskimos, Chinooks, Comanches, and Chippewas. What might be called mixed or compound mutilations are practiced by the New Zealanders, East Africans, Kondes, Kukas, and Calmucks. Among those practising simple but severe mutilations are the New Caledonians, the Bushmen, and some indigenous Australians. Those tribes having for their customs the practice of compound major mutilations are the Fiji Islanders, Sandwich Islanders, Tahitians, Tongans, Samoans, Javanese, Sumatrans, natives of Malagasy, Hottentots, Damaras, Bechuanas, Kaffirs, the Congo people, the Coast Negroes, Inland Negroes, Dahomeans, Ashantees, Fulahs, Abyssinians, Arabs, and Dakotas. Spencer has evidently made a most extensive and comprehensive study of this subject, and his paper is a most valuable contribution to the subject. In the preparation of this section we have frequently quoted from it.

The practice of self-bleeding has its origin in other mutilations, although the Aztecs shed human blood in the wors.h.i.+p of the sun. The Samoiedes have a custom of drinking the blood of warm animals. Those of the Fijians who were cannibals drank the warm blood of their victims.

Among the Amaponda Kaffirs there are horrible accounts of kindred savage customs. Spencer quotes:--"It is usual for the ruling chief on his accession to be washed in the blood of a near relative, generally a brother, who is put to death for the occasion." During a Samoan marriage-ceremony the friends of the bride "took up stones and beat themselves until their heads were bruised and bleeding." In Australia a novitiate at the ceremony of manhood drank a mouthful of blood from the veins of the warrior who was to be his sponsor.

At the death of their kings the Lacedemonians met in large numbers and tore the flesh from their foreheads with pins and needles. It is said that when Odin was near his death he ordered himself to be marked with a spear; and Niort, one of his successors, followed the example of his predecessor. Shakespeare speaks of "such as boast and show their scars." In the olden times it was not uncommon for a n.o.ble soldier to make public exhibition of his scars with the greatest pride; in fact, on the battlefield they invited the reception of superficial disfiguring injuries, and to-day some students of the learned universities of Germany seem prouder of the possession of scars received in a duel of honor than in awards for scholastic attainments.

Lichtenstein tells of priests among the Bechuanas who made long cuts from the thigh to the knee of each warrior who slew an enemy in battle.

Among some tribes of the Kaffirs a kindred custom was practiced; and among the Damaras, for every wild animal a young man destroyed his father made four incisions on the front of his son's body. Speaking of certain Congo people, Tuckey says that they scar themselves princ.i.p.ally with the idea of rendering themselves agreeable to the women of their tribe. Among the Itzaex Indians of Yucatan, a race with particularly handsome features, some are marked with scarred lines, inflicted as signs of courage.

Cosmetic Mutilations.--In modern times there have been individuals expert in removing facial deformities, and by operations of various kinds producing pleasing dimples or other artificial signs of beauty.

We have seen an apparatus advertised to be worn on the nose during the night for the purpose of correcting a disagreeable contour of this organ. A medical description of the artificial manufacture of dimples is as follows:--"The modus operandi was to make a puncture in the skin where the dimple was required, which would not be noticed when healed, and, with a very delicate instrument, remove a portion of the muscle.

Inflammation was then excited in the skin over the subcutaneous pit, and in a few days the wound, if such it may be called, was healed, and a charming dimple was the result." It is quite possible that some of our modern operators have overstepped the bounds of necessity, and performed unjustifiable plastic operations to satisfy the vanity of their patients.

Dobrizhoffer says of the Abipones that boys of seven pierce their little arms in imitation of their parents. Among some of the indigenous Australians it is quite customary for ridged and linear scars to be self-inflicted. In Tanna the people produce elevated scars on the arms and chests. Bancroft recites that family-marks of this nature existed among the Cuebas of Central America, refusal being tantamount to rebellion. Schomburgk tells that among the Arawaks, after a Mariquawi dance, so great is their zeal for honorable scars, the blood will run down their swollen calves, and strips of skin and muscle hang from the mangled limbs. Similar practices rendered it necessary for the United States Government to stop some of the ceremonial dances of the Indians under their surveillance.

A peculiar custom among savages is the amputation of a finger as a sacrifice to a deity. In the tribe of the Dakotas the relatives of a dead chief pacified his spirit by amputating a finger. In a similar way, during his initiation, the young Mandan warrior, "holding up the little finger of his left hand to the Great Spirit," ... "expresses his willingness to give it as a sacrifice, and he lays it on the dried buffalo skull, when another chops it off near the hand with a blow of the hatchet." According to Mariner the natives of Tonga cut off a portion of the little finger as a sacrifice to the G.o.ds for the recovery of a superior sick relative. The Australians have a custom of cutting off the last joint of the little finger of females as a token of submission to powerful beings alive and dead. A Hottentot widow who marries a second time must have the distal joint of her little finger cut off; another joint is removed each time she remarries.

Among the mutilations submitted to on the death of a king or chief in the Sandwich Islands, Cook mentions in his "Voyages" the custom of knocking out from one to four front teeth.

Among the Australian tribes the age of virility and the transition into manhood is celebrated by ceremonial customs, in which the novices are subjected to minor mutilations. A sharp bone is used for lancing their gums, while the throw-stick is used for knocking out a tooth.

Sometimes, in addition to this crude dentistry, the youth is required to submit to cruel gashes cut upon his back and shoulders, and should he flinch or utter any cry of pain he is always thereafter cla.s.sed with women. Haygarth writes of a semi-domesticated Australian who said one day, with a look of importance, that he must go away for a few days, as he had grown to man's estate, and it was high time he had his teeth knocked out. It is an obligatory rite among various African tribes to lose two or more of their front teeth. A tradition among certain Peruvians was that the Conqueror Huayna Coapae made a law that they and their descendants should have three front teeth pulled out in each jaw.

Cieza speaks of another tradition requiring the extraction of the teeth of children by their fathers as a very acceptable service to their G.o.ds. The Damaras knock out a wedge-shaped gap between two of their front teeth; and the natives of Sierra Leone file or chip their teeth after the same fas.h.i.+on.

Depilatory customs are very ancient, and although minor in extent are still to be considered under the heading of mutilations. The giving of hair to the dead as a custom, has been perpetuated through many tribes and nations. In Euripides we find Electra admonis.h.i.+ng Helen for sparing her locks, and thereby defrauding the dead. Alexander the Great shaved his locks in mourning for his friend, Hephaestion, and it was supposed that his death was hastened by the sun's heat on his bare head after his hat blew off at Babylon. Both the Dakota Indians and the Caribs maintain the custom of sacrificing hair to the dead. In Peru the custom was varied by pulling out eyelashes and eyebrows and presenting them to the sun, the hills, etc. It is said this custom is still in continuance. When Clovis was visited by the Bishop of Toulouse he gave him a hair from his beard and was imitated by his followers. In the Arthurian legends we find "Then went Arthur to Caerleon; and thither came messages from King Ryons who said, 'even kings have done me homage, and with their beards I have trimmed a mantle. Send me now thy beard, for there lacks yet one to the finis.h.i.+ng of the mantle.'" The a.s.sociation between short hair and slavery arose from the custom of taking hair from the slain. It existed among the Greeks and Romans, and was well known among the indigenous tribes of this continent. Among the Shoshones he who took the most scalps gained the most glory.

In speaking of the prisoners of the Chicimecs Bancroft says they were often scalped while yet alive, and the b.l.o.o.d.y trophies placed on the heads of their tormentors. In this manner we readily see that long hair among the indigenous tribes and various Orientals, Ottomans, Greeks, Franks, Goths, etc., was considered a sign of respect and honor. The respect and preservation of the Chinese queue is well known in the present day. Wis.h.i.+ng to divide their brother's kingdom, Clothair and Childebert consulted whether to cut off the hair of their nephews, the rightful successors, so as to reduce them to the rank of subjects, or to kill them. The G.o.ds of various people, especially the greater G.o.ds, were distinguished by their long beards and flowing locks. In all pictures Thor and Samson were both given long hair, and the belief in strength and honor from long hair is proverbial. Hercules is always pictured with curls. According to Goldzhier, long locks of hair and a long beard are mythologic attributes of the sun. The sun's rays are compared to long locks or hairs on the face of the sun. When the sun sets and leaves his place to the darkness, or when the powerful summer sun is succeeded by the weak rays of the winter sun, then Samson's long locks, through which alone his strength remains, are cut off by the treachery of his deceitful concubine Delilah (the languis.h.i.+ng, according to the meaning of the name). The beaming Apollo was, moreover, called the "Unshaven;" and Minos cannot conquer the solar hero, Nisos, until the latter loses his golden hair. In Arabic "Shams-on" means the sun, and Samson had seven locks of hair, the number of the planetary bodies. In view of the foregoing facts it seems quite possible that the majority of depilatory processes on the scalp originated in sun-wors.h.i.+p, and through various phases and changes in religions were perpetuated to the Middle Ages. Charles Martel sent Pepin, his son, to Luithprand, king of the Lombards, that he might cut his first locks, and by this ceremony hold for the future the place of his ill.u.s.trious father. To make peace with Alaric, Clovis became his adopted son by offering his beard to be cut. Among the Caribs the hair const.i.tuted their chief pride, and it was considered unequivocal proof of the sincerity of their sorrow, when on the death of a relative they cut their hair short. Among the Hebrews shaving of the head was a funeral rite, and among the Greeks and Romans the hair was cut short in mourning, either for a relative or for a celebrated personage.

According to Krehl the Arabs also had such customs. Spencer mentions that during an eruption in Hawaii, "King Kamahameha cut off part of his own hair" ... "and threw it into the torrent (of lava)."

The Tonga regarded the pubic hairs as under the special care of the devil, and with great ceremony made haste to remove them. The female inhabitants of some portions of the coast of Guinea remove the pubic hairs as fast as they appear. A curious custom of Mohammedan ladies after marriage is to rid themselves of the hirsute appendages of the p.u.b.es. Depilatory ointments are employed, consisting of equal parts of slaked lime and a.r.s.enic made into a paste with rose-water. It is said that this important ceremony is not essential in virgins. One of the ceremonies of a.s.suming the toga virilis among the indigenous Australians consists in submitting to having each particular hair plucked singly from the body, the candidate being required not to display evidences of pain during the operation. Formerly the j.a.panese women at marriage blackened their teeth and shaved or pulled out their eyebrows.

The custom of boring the ear is very old, mention of it being made in Exodus xxi., 5 and 6, in which we find that if a Hebrew servant served for six years, his freedom was optional, but if he plainly said that he loved his master, and his wife and children, and did not desire to leave their house, the master should bring him before the judges; and according to the pa.s.sage in Exodus, "he shall also bring him to the door or unto the doorpost, and his master shall bore his ear through with an awl; and he shall serve him forever." All the Burmese, says Sangermano, without exception, have the custom of boring their ears.

The days when the operations were performed were kept as festivals. The ludicrous custom of piercing the ears for the wearing of ornaments, typical of savagery and found in all indigenous African tribes, is universally prevalent among our own people.

The extremists in this custom are the Botocudos, who represent the most cruel and ferocious of the Brazilian tribes, and who especially cherish a love for cannibalism. They have a fondness for disfiguring themselves by inserting in the lower parts of their ears and in their under lips variously shaped pieces of wood ornaments called peleles, causing enormous protrusion of the under lip and a repulsive wide mouth, as shown in Figure 230.

Tattooing is a peculiar custom originating in various ways. The materials used are vermilion, indigo, carbon, or gunpowder. At one time this custom was used in the East to indicate caste and citizens.h.i.+p.

Both s.e.xes of the Sandwich Islanders have a peculiar tattooed mark indicative of their tribe or district. Among the Uapes, one tribe, the Tucanoes, have three vertical blue lines. Among other people tattooed marks indicated servility, and Boyle says the Kyans, Pakatans, and Kermowits alone, among the Borneo people, practised tattooing, and adds that these races are the least esteemed for bravery. Of the Fijians the women alone are tattooed, possibly as a method of adornment.

The tattooing of the people of Otaheite, seen by Cook, was surmised by him to have a religious significance, as it presented in many instances "squares, circles, crescents, and ill-designed representations of men and dogs." Every one of these people was tattooed upon reaching majority. According to Carl Bock, among the Dyaks of Borneo all of the married women were tattooed on the hands and feet, and sometimes on the thighs. The decoration is one of the privileges of matrimony, and is not permitted to unmarried girls. Andrew Lang says of the Australian tribes that the Wingong or the Totem of each man is indicated by a tattooed representation of it on his flesh. The celebrated American traveler, Carpenter, remarks that on his visit to a great prison in Burmah, which contains more than 3000 men, he saw 6000 tattooed legs.

The origin of the custom he was unable to find out, but in Burmah tattooing was a sign of manhood, and professional tattooers go about with books of designs, each design warding off some danger. Bourke quotes that among the Apaches-Yumas of Arizona the married women are distinguished by several blue lines running from the lower lip to the chin; and he remarks that when a young woman of this tribe is anxious to become a mother she tattoos the figure of a child on her forehead.

After they marry Mojave girls tattoo the chin with vertical blue lines; and when an Eskimo wife has her face tattooed with lamp-black she is regarded as a matron in society. The Polynesians have carried this dermal art to an extent which is unequaled by any other people, and it is universally practiced among them. Quoted by Burke, Sullivan states that the custom of tattooing continued in England and Ireland down to the seventh century. This was the tattooing with the woad. Fletcher remarks that at one time, about the famous shrine of Our Lady of Loretto, were seen professional tattooers, who for a small sum of money would produce a design commemorative of the pilgrim's visit to the shrine. A like profitable industry is pursued in Jerusalem.

Universal tattooing in some of the Eastern countries is used as a means of criminal punishment, the survival of the persecuted individual being immaterial to the torturers, as he would be branded for life and ostracized if he recovered. Ill.u.s.trative of this O'Connell tells of a case in Hebra's clinic. The patient, a man five feet nine inches in height, was completely tattooed from head to foot with all sorts of devices, such as elephants, birds, lions, etc., and across his forehead, dragons. Not a square of even a quarter inch had been exempt from the process. According to his tale this man had been a leader of a band of Greek robbers, organized to invade Chinese Tartary, and, together with an American and a Spaniard, was ordered by the ruler of the invaded province to be branded in this manner as a criminal. It took three months' continuous work to carry out this sentence, during which his comrades succ.u.mbed to the terrible agonies. During the entire day for this extended period indigo was p.r.i.c.ked in this unfortunate man's skin. Accounts such as this have been appropriated by exhibitionists, who have caused themselves to be tattooed merely for mercenary purposes. The accompanying ill.u.s.tration represents the appearance of a "tattooed man" who exhibited himself. He claimed that his tattooing was done by electricity. The design showing on his back is a copy of a picture of the Virgin Mary surrounded by 31 angels.

The custom of tattooing the arms, chest, or back is quite prevalent, and particularly among sailors and soldiers. The sequences of this custom are sometimes quite serious. Syphilis has been frequently contracted in this manner, and Maury and Dulles have collected 15 cases of syphilis acquired in tattooing. Cheinisse reports the case of a young blacksmith who had the emblems of his trade tattooed upon his right forearm. At the end of forty days small, red, scaly elevations appeared at five different points in the tattooed area. These broke down and formed ulcers. When examined these ulcers presented the peculiarities of chancres, and there was upon the body of the patient a well-marked syphilitic roseola. It was ascertained that during the tattooing the operator had moistened the ink with his own saliva.

Hutchinson exhibited drawings and photographs showing the condition of the arms of two boys suffering from tuberculosis of the skin, who had been inoculated in the process of tattooing. The tattooing was done by the brother of one of the lads who was in the last stages of phthisis, and who used his own saliva to mix the pigment. The cases were under the care of Murray of Tottenham, by whom they had been previously reported. Williams has reported the case of a militiamen of seventeen who, three days after an extensive tattooing of the left forearm, complained of pain, swelling, and tenderness of the left wrist. A day later acute left-sided pneumonia developed, but rapidly subsided. The left shoulder, knee, and ankle were successively involved in the inflammation, and a cardiac bruit developed. Finally ch.o.r.ea developed as a complication, limited for a time to the left side, but shortly spreading to the right, where rheumatic inflammation was attacking the joints. The last, however, quickly subsided, leaving a general, though mild ch.o.r.ea and a permanently damaged heart.

Infibulation of the male and female external genital organs for the prevention of s.e.xual congress is a very ancient custom. The Romans infibulated their singers to prevent coitus, and consequent change in the voice, and pursued the same practice with their actors and dancers.

According to Celsus, Mercurialis, and others, the gladiators were infibulated to guard against the loss of vigor by s.e.xual excesses. In an old Italian work there is a figure of an infibulated musician--a little bronze statue representing a lean individual tortured or deformed by carrying an enormous ring through the end of the p.e.n.i.s. In one of his pleasantries Martial says of these infibulated singers that they sometimes break their rings and fail to place them back--"et cujus refibulavit turgidum faber peruem." Heinsius considers Agamemnon cautious when he left Demodocus near Clytemnestra, as he remarks that Demodocus was infibulated. For such purposes as the foregoing infibulation offered a more humane method than castration.

Infibulation by a ring in the prepuce was used to prevent premature copulation, and was in time to be removed, but in some cases its function was the preservation of perpetual chast.i.ty. Among some of the religious mendicants in India there were some who were condemned to a life of chast.i.ty, and, in the hotter climates, where nudity was the custom, these persons traveled about exposing an enormous preputial ring, which was looked upon with adoration by devout women. It is said these holy persons were in some places so venerated that people came on their knees, and bowing below the ring, asked forgiveness--possibly for s.e.xual excesses.

Rhodius mentions the usage of infibulation in antiquity, and Fabricius d'Aquapendente remarks that infibulation was usually practiced in females for the preservation of chast.i.ty. No Roman maiden was able to preserve her virginity during partic.i.p.ation in the celebrations in the Temples of Venus, the debauches of Venus and Mars, etc., wherein vice was authorized by divine injunction; for this reason the lips of the v.a.g.i.n.a were closed by rings of iron, copper, or silver, so joined as to hinder coitus, but not prevent evacuation. Different sized rings were used for those of different ages. Although this device provided against the coitus, the maiden was not free from the a.s.saults of the Lesbians.

During the Middle Ages, in place of infibulation, chast.i.ty-girdles were used, and in the Italian girdles, such as the one exhibited in the Musee Cluny in Paris, both the a.n.u.s and v.u.l.v.a were protected by a steel covering perforated for the evacuations. In the Orient, particularly in India and Persia, according to old travelers, the l.a.b.i.a were sewed together, allowing but a small opening for excretions. Buffon and Brown mention infibulation in Abyssinia, the parts being separated by a bistoury at the time of marriage. In Circa.s.sia the women were protected by a copper girdle or a corset of hide and skin which, according to custom, only the husband could undo. Peney speaks of infibulation for the preservation of chast.i.ty, as observed by him in the Soudan. Among the Nubians this operation was performed at about the age of eight with great ceremony, and when the time for marriage approached the v.u.l.v.a had to be opened by incision. Sir Richard Buxton, a distinguished traveler, also speaks of infibulation, and, according to him, at the time of the marriage ceremony the male tries to prove his manhood by using only Nature's method and weapon to consummate the marriage, but if he failed he was allowed artificial aid to effect entrance. Sir Samuel Baker is accredited in The Lancet with giving an account in Latin text of the modus operandi of a practice among the Nubian women of removing the c.l.i.toris and nymphae in the young girl, and abrading the adjacent walls of the external l.a.b.i.a so that they would adhere and leave only a urethral aperture.

This ancient custom of infibulation is occasionally seen at the present day in civilized countries, and some cases of infibulation from jealousy are on record. There is mentioned, as from the Leicester a.s.sizes, the trial of George Baggerly for execution of a villainous design on his wife. In jealousy he "had sewed up her private parts."

Recently, before the New York Academy of Medicine, Collier reported a case of pregnancy in a woman presenting nympha-infibulation. The patient sought the physician's advice in the summer of 1894, while suffering from uterine disease, and being five weeks pregnant. She was a German woman of twenty-eight, had been married several years, and was the mother of several children. Collier examined her and observed two holes in the nymphae. When he asked her concerning these, she reluctantly told him that she had been compelled by her husband to wear a lock in this region. Her mother, prior to their marriage, sent her over to the care of her future husband (he having left Germany some months before). On her arrival he perforated the l.a.b.i.a minora, causing her to be ill several weeks; after she had sufficiently recovered he put on a padlock, and for many years he had practiced the habit of locking her up after each intercourse. Strange to relate, no physician, except Collier, had ever inquired about the openings. In this connection the celebrated Harvey mentions a mare with infibulated genitals, but these did not prevent successful labor.

Occasionally infibulation has been used as a means of preventing masturbation. De la Fontaine has mentioned this fact, and there is a case in this country in which acute dementia from masturbation was cured by infibulation. In this instance the prepuce was perforated in two opposite places by a trocar, and two pewter sounds (No. 2) were introduced into the wounds and twisted like rings. On the eleventh day one of the rings was removed, and a fresh one introduced in a new place. A cure was effected in eight weeks. There is recent mention made of a method of preventing masturbation by a cage fastened over the genitals by straps and locks. In cases of children the key was to be kept by the parents, but in adults to be put in some part of the house remote from the sleeping apartment, the theory being that the desire would leave before the key could be obtained.

Among some peoples the urethra was slit up as a means of preventing conception, making a meatus near the base of the p.e.n.i.s. Herodotus remarks that the women of a certain portion of Egypt stood up while they urinated, while the men squatted. Investigation has shown that the women were obliged to stand up on account of elongated nymphae and l.a.b.i.a, while the men sought a sitting posture on account of the termination of the urethra being on the inferior side of the base of the p.e.n.i.s, artificially formed there in order to prevent conception. In the Australian Medical Gazette, May, 1883, there is an account of some of the methods of the Central Australians of preventing conception. One was to make an opening into the male urethra just anterior to the s.c.r.o.t.u.m, and another was to slit up the entire urethra so far as to make but a single ca.n.a.l from the s.c.r.o.t.u.m to the glans p.e.n.i.s. Bourke quotes Palmer in mentioning that it is a custom to split the urethra of the male of the Kalkadoon tribe, near Cloncurry, Queensland, Australia Mayer of Vienna describes an operation of perforation of the p.e.n.i.s among the Malays; and Jagor and Micklucho-Maclay report similar customs among the Dyaks and other natives of Borneo, Java, and Phillipine Islands.

Circ.u.mcision is a rite of great antiquity. The Bible furnishes frequent records of this subject, and the bas-reliefs on some of the old Egyptian ruins represent circ.u.mcised children. Labat has found traces of circ.u.mcision and excision of nymphae in mummies. Herodotus remarks that the Egyptians practiced circ.u.mcision rather as a sanitary measure than as a rite. Voltaire stated that the Hebrews borrowed circ.u.mcision from the Egyptians; but the Jews claimed that the Phoenicians borrowed this rite from the Israelites.

Spencer and others say that in the early history of the Christian religion, St. Paul and his Disciples did not believe in circ.u.mcision, while St. Peter and his followers practiced it. Spencer mentions that the Abyssinians take a phallic trophy by circ.u.mcision from the enemy's dead body. In his "History of Circ.u.mcision," Remondino says that among the modern Berbers it is not unusual for a warrior to exhibit virile members of persons he has slain; he also says that, according to Bergman, the Israelites practiced preputial mutilations; David brought 200 prepuces of the Philistines to Saul. Circ.u.mcision is practiced in nearly every portion of the world, and by various races, sometimes being a civil as well as a religious custom. Its use in surgery is too well known to be discussed here. It might be mentioned, however, that Rake of Trinidad, has performed circ.u.mcision 16 times, usually for phimosis due to leprous tuberculation of the prepuce. Circ.u.mcision, as practiced on the c.l.i.toris in the female, is mentioned on page 308.

Ceremonial Ovariotomy.--In the writings of Strabonius and Alexander ab Alexandro, allusion is made to the liberties taken with the bodies of females by the ancient Egyptians and Lydians. Knott says that ablation of the ovaries is a time-honored custom in India, and that he had the opportunity of physically examining some of the women who had been operated on in early life. At twenty-five he found them strong and muscular, their mammary glands wholly undeveloped, and the normal growth of pubic hairs absent. The pubic arch was narrow, and the v.a.g.i.n.al orifice practically obliterated. The menses had never appeared, and there seemed to be no s.e.xual desire. Micklucho-Maclay found that one of the most primitive of all existing races--the New Hollanders--practiced ovariotomy for the utilitarian purpose of creating a supply of prost.i.tutes, without the danger of burdening the population by unnecessary increase. MacGillibray found a native ovariotomized female at Cape York who had been subjected to the operation because, having been born dumb, she would be prevented from bearing dumb children,--a wise, though primitive, method of preventing social dependents.

Castration has long been practiced, either for the production of eunuchs, or castrata, through vengeance or jealousy, for excessive cupidity, as a punishment for crime, in fanaticism, in ignorance, and as a surgical therapeutic measure (recently, for the relief of hypertrophied prostate). The custom is essentially Oriental in origin, and was particularly used in polygamous countries, where the mission of eunuchs was to guard the females of the harem. They were generally large, stout men, and were noted for their vigorous health. The history of eunuchism is lost in antiquity. The ancient Book of Job speaks of eunuchs, and they were in vogue before the time of Semiramis; the King of Lydia, Andramytis, is said to have sanctioned castration of both male and female for social reasons. Negro eunuchs were common among the Romans. All the great emperors and conquerors had their eunuchs.

Alexander the Great had his celebrated eunuch, Bagoas, and Nero, his Sporus, etc. Chevers says that the manufacture of eunuchs still takes place in the cities of Delhi, Lucknow, and Rajpootana. So skilful are the traveling eunuch-makers that their mortality is a small fraction of one per cent. Their method of operation is to encircle the external genital organs with a tight ligature, and then sweep them off at one stroke. He also remarks that those who retain their p.e.n.i.ses are of but little value or trusted. He divided the Indian eunuchs into three cla.s.ses: those born so, those with a p.e.n.i.s but no t.e.s.t.i.c.l.es, and those minus both t.e.s.t.i.c.l.es and p.e.n.i.s. Curran describes the traveling eunuch-makers in Central India, and remarks upon the absence of death after the operation, and invites the attention of gynecologists and operators to the successful, though crude, methods used. Curran says that, except those who are degraded by practices of s.e.xual perversions, these individuals are vigorous bodily, shrewd, and sagacious, thus proving the ancient descriptions of them.

Jamieson recites a description of the barbarous methods of making eunuchs in China. The operators follow a trade of eunuch-making, and keep it in their families from generation to generation; they receive the monetary equivalent of about $8.64 for the operation. The patient is grasped in a semi-p.r.o.ne position by an a.s.sistant, while two others hold the legs. After excision the wounded parts are bathed three times with a hot decoction of pepper-pods, the wound is covered with paper soaked in cold water, and bandages applied. Supported by two men the patient is kept walking for two or three hours and then tied down. For three days he is allowed nothing to drink, and is not allowed to pa.s.s his urine, the urethra being filled with a pewter plug. It generally takes about one hundred days for the wound to heal, and two per cent of the cases are fatal. There is nocturnal incontinence of urine for a long time after the operation.

Examples of castration because of excessive cupidity, etc.,--a most unwarranted operation,--are quite rare and are usually found among ecclesiastics. The author of "Faustin, or le Siecle Philosophique,"

remarked that there were more than 4000 castrated individuals among the ecclesiastics and others of Italy. The virtuous Pope Clement XIV forbade this practice, and describes it as a terrible abuse; but in spite of the declaration of the Pope the cities of Italy, for some time, still continued to contain great numbers of these victims. In France an article was inserted into the penal code providing severe punishment for such mutilations. Fortunately castration for the production of "castrata," or tenor singers, has almost fallen into disuse. Among the ancient Egyptians and Persians amputation of the virile member was inflicted for certain crimes of the nature of rape.

Castration as a religious rite has played a considerable role. With all their might the Emperors Constantine and Justinian opposed the delirious religion of the priests of Cybele, and rendered their offence equivalent to homicide. At the annual festivals of the Phrygian G.o.ddess Amma (Agdistis) it was the custom of young men to make eunuchs of themselves with sharp sh.e.l.ls, and a similar rite was recorded among Phoenicians. Brinton names severe self-mutilators of this nature among the ancient Mexican priests. Some of the Hottentots and indigenous Australians enforced semicastration about the age of eight or nine.

The Skoptzies, religious castrators in Russia, are possibly the most famous of the people of this description. The Russian government has condemned members of this heresy to hard labor in Siberia, but has been unable to extinguish the sect. Pelikan, Privy Counsel of the government, has exhaustively considered this subject. Articles have appeared in Le Progres Medical, December. 1876. and there is an account in the St. Louis Clinical Record, 1877-78. The name Skoptzy means "the castrated," and they call themselves the "White Doves." They arose about 1757 from the Khlish or flagellants. Paul I caused Sseliwanow, the true founder, to return from Siberia, and after seeing him had him confined in an insane asylum. After an interview, Alexander I transferred him to a hospital. Later the Councillor of State, Jelansky, converted by Sseliwanow, set the man free and soon the Skoptzies were all through Russia and even at the Court. The princ.i.p.al argument of these people is the nonconformity of orthodox believers, especially the priests, to the doctrines professed, and they contrast the lax morals of these persons with the chaste lives, the abstinence from liquor, and the continual fasts of the "White Doves." For the purpose of convincing novices of the Scriptural foundation of their rites and belief they are referred to Matthew xix., 12: "and there be eunuchs which have made themselves for the kingdom of Heaven's sake,"

etc.; and Mark ix., 43-47; Luke xxiii., 29: "blessed are the barren,"

etc., and others of this nature. As to the operation itself, pain is represented as voluntary martyrdom, and persecution as the struggle of the spirit of darkness with that of light. They got persons to join the order by monetary offers. Another method was to take into service young boys, who soon became lost to society, and lied with effrontery and obstinacy. They had secret methods of communicating with one another, and exhibited a pa.s.sion for riches, a fact that possibly accounts for their extended influence. The most perfect were those "worthy of mounting the white horse," the "bearers of the Imperial seal," who were deprived of the t.e.s.t.i.c.l.es, p.e.n.i.s, and s.c.r.o.t.u.m. The operation of castration among these people was performed at one stroke or at two different times, in the former case one cicatrix being left, and in the latter two. The greater number--those who had submitted to the "first purification," conferring upon them the "lesser seal"--had lost t.e.s.t.i.c.l.es and s.c.r.o.t.u.m. These people are said to have lost the "keys of h.e.l.l," but to retain the "key of the abyss" (female genitals). As instruments of excision the hot iron, pieces of gla.s.s, old wire, sharpened bone, and old razors are used. Only nine fatal cases resulting from the operation are known. At St. Petersburg Liprandi knew a rich Skoptzy who constantly kept girls--mostly Germans--for his own gratification, soon after having entered into the "first purification."

Few of them were able to remain with him over a year, and they always returned to their homes with health irretrievably lost. Women members of the order do not have their ovaries removed, but mutilation is practiced upon the external genitals, the mammae, and nipples. The first ablation is obtained by applying fire or caustics to the nipples, the second by amputation of the b.r.e.a.s.t.s, one or both, the third by diverse gashes, chiefly across the breast, and the fourth by resection of the nymphae or of the nymphae and c.l.i.toris, and the superior major l.a.b.i.a, the cicatrices of which would deform the v.u.l.v.a. Figure 232 represents the appearance of the external genital organs of a male Skoptzy after mutilation; Figure 233 those of a female.

Battey speaks of Skoptzies in Roumania who numbered at the time of report 533 persons. They came from Russia and practiced the same ceremonies as the heretics there.

CHAPTER XV.

ANOMALOUS TYPES AND INSTANCES OF DISEASE.

Tumors.--In discussing tumors and similar growths no attempt will be made to describe in detail the various types. Only the anomalous instances or examples, curious for their size and extent of involvement, will be mentioned. It would be a difficult matter to decide which was the largest tumor ever reported. In reviewing literature so many enormous growths are recorded that but few can be given here. Some of the large cystic formations have already been mentioned; these are among the largest tumors. Scrotal tumors are recorded that weighed over 200 pounds; and a limb affected with elephantiasis may attain an astonis.h.i.+ng size. Delamater is accredited with a report of a tumor that weighed 275 pounds, the patient only weighing 100 pounds at death. Benign tumors will be considered first.

Pure adenoma of the breast is a rare growth. Gross was able to collect but 18 examples; but closely allied to this condition is what is known as diffuse hypertrophy of the breast. In some parts of the world, particularly in India and Africa, long, dependent b.r.e.a.s.t.s are signs of beauty. On the other hand we learn from Juvenal and Martial that, like ourselves, the Greeks detested pendant and bulky b.r.e.a.s.t.s, the signs of beauty being elevation, smallness, and regularity of contour. In the Grecian images of Venus the b.r.e.a.s.t.s are never pictured as engorged or enlarged. The celebrated traveler Chardin says that the Circa.s.sian and Georgian women have the most beautiful b.r.e.a.s.t.s in the world; in fact the Georgians are so jealous of the regular contour and wide interval of separation of their b.r.e.a.s.t.s that they refuse to nourish their children in the natural manner.

The amount of hypertrophy which is sometimes seen in the mammae is extraordinary. Borellus remarks that he knew of a woman of ordinary size, each of whose mammae weighed about 30 pounds, and she supported them in bags hung about her neck. Durston reports a case of sudden onset of hypertrophy of the breast causing death. At the postmortem it was found that the left breast weighed 64 pounds and the right 40 pounds. Boyer successfully removed two b.r.e.a.s.t.s at an interval of twenty-six days between the two operations. The ma.s.s excised was one-third of the total body-weight.