mosexuals may contest this assertion. It is clear, too,
that boys upon whom such relationships are imposed will sometimes tend
to grow up as male prostitutes, just in the same way as little girls
prematurely seduced in consequence of an early awakening of sexuality
often adopt a life of prostitution.

Children in whom sexuality has awakened are especially dangerous to
their associates, since they readily seduce others to sexual
malpractices. Thus, it sometimes happens, though happily not often, that
children attempt sexual intercourse with one another. A question in
forensic medicine formerly much discussed, is the age at which children
are first able to effect sexual intercourse. I have no doubt whatever
that by the end of the second period of childhood, in a comparatively
large number of boys, spontaneous erections occur adequate to allow the
introduction of the penis into the vagina to be effected; but no doubt
it might be difficult for such a boy to effect complete penetration into
the vagina of a girl in whom the hymen was still intact. Pouillet[98]
even asserts that all boys have the faculty of erection in quite early
childhood; and he places on record the following experiment, whose
repetition had better be avoided. If in an infant lying in its cradle
the edge of the foreskin be tickled with a feather, we shall at once see
the penis swell up and become erect, and the infant will grasp at it
with the hand. There is no doubt that boys in whom the sexual impulse
is prematurely awakened may be a danger to little girls through
attempting intercourse with them. More frequently, however, the danger
lies, not in attempts at coitus, but in other improper manipulations and
contacts, which may take almost every conceivable form. Mutual
masturbation is fairly common among children, or one child may
manipulate the genitals of another; such practices occur more often
between two boys than between two girls or between boy and girl. But
experience shows that other and more advanced sexual acts may occur,
though fortunately less often; for instance, paederastic acts between
boys, introduction of the penis of one individual into the mouth of
another, &c. Ferriani[99] has collected a number of cases of this kind,
occurring in youthful criminals. In boys he distinguishes two groups,
those from the tenth to the fourteenth, and those from the fourteenth to
the eighteenth year of life. He made inquiries regarding the sexual life
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