of this sexual perversion.  It is not, as we might infer, both from the definition usually given and from its probable biological heredity from primitive times, a perversion due to excessive masculinity.  The strong man is more apt to be tender than cruel, or at all events knows how to restrain within bounds any impulse to cruelty; the most extreme and elaborate forms of sadism (putting aside such as are associated with a considerable degree of imbecility) are more apt to be allied with a somewhat feminine organization.  Montaigne, indeed, observed long ago that cruelty is usually accompanied by feminine softness.

In the same way it is a mistake to suppose that the very feminine woman is not capable of sadistic tendencies.  Even if we take into account the primitive animal conditions of combat, the male must suffer as well as inflict pain, and the female must not only experience subjection to the male, but also share in the emotions of her partner’s victory over his rivals.  As bearing on these points, I may quote the following remarks written by a lady:  “It is said that, the weaker and more feminine a woman is, the greater the subjection she likes.  I don’t think it has anything at all to do with the general character, but depends entirely on whether the feeling of constraint and helplessness affects her sexually.  In men I have several times noticed that those who were most desirous of subjection to the women they loved had, in ordinary life, very strong and determined characters.  I know of others, too, who with very weak characters are very imperious toward the women they care for.  Among women I have often been surprised to see how a strong, determined woman will give way to a man she loves, and how tenacious of her own will may be some fragile, clinging creature who in daily life seems quite unable to act on her own responsibility.  A certain amount of passivity, a desire to have their emotions worked on, seems to me, so far as my small experience goes, very common among ordinary, presumably normal men.  A good deal of stress is laid on femininity as an attraction in a woman, and this may be so to very strong natures, but, so far as I have seen, the women who obtain extraordinary empire over men are those with a certain virility in their character and passions.  If with this virility they combine a fragility or childishness of appearance which appeals to a man in another way at the same time, they appear to be irresistible.”

I have noted some of the feminine traits in De Sade’s temperament and appearance.  The same may often be noted in sadists whose crimes were very much more serious and brutal than those of De Sade.  A man who stabbed women in the streets at St. Louis was a waiter with a high-pitched, effeminate voice and boyish appearance.  Reidel, the sadistic murderer, was timid, modest, and delicate; he was too shy to urinate in the presence of other people.  A sadistic zooephilist, described