ten
fail to take note of the reason why on these occasions her little
daughter invariably comes into the room. The child will have every
possible kind of excuse ready to enable her to seek the company of this
particular person. At times this goes further. We then notice that the
child endeavours to come into physical contact with the object of
affection, showing him great tenderness, and showering on him caresses.

Such a desire for intimate physical caresses must always arouse the
suspicion that sexual feelings have now been awakened. We must not, of
course, assume that every childish caress is sexually determined; but we
should always bear in mind this possibility in cases in which the
child's desire to caress someone is well marked. If such feelings
manifest themselves towards the end of the first period of childhood or
at the beginning of the second, observation will be comparatively easy,
for the younger the child is the less competent is it to conceal its
feelings. The consciousness that there is anything wrong in the
gratification of such sentiments awakens as a rule very gradually
indeed.

Similarly, it will be far easier in the case of children to observe
peripheral processes in the genital organs than it is to make such
observations in adults. Thus, even in the case of infants in arms, but
more often in the case of boys who are somewhat older, the mother or the
nurse may be surprised to observe erections when the boy is undressed
for his bath or some other reason, or when he has kicked off the
bedclothes at night. In other cases the child may be seen handling his
genital organs, either openly or beneath his clothing. Often, in the
absence of manual stimulation, the child adopts some other means of
stimulating his genital organs. Thus, in girls the legs will be crossed,
and the thighs rubbed lightly each against the other. In other cases,
both in boys and in girls, the child will lean against a piece of
furniture in what appears to be a perfectly innocent manner; but in
reality pressure is being exercised on the genital organs, it may be by
the corner of a table, it may be by the back of a chair; and then the
stimulus is strengthened by various movements. In some such way children
will effect masturbatory stimulation and obtain sexual gratification, in
the presence, not only of their mother, but in that of quite a number of
other persons. Guttceit[78] reports the case of a woman who squatted
down so that her