A neurasthenic sensitiveness to odors, specially sexual odors, is frequently accompanied by lack of sexual vigor.  In this way we may account for the numerous cases in which old men in whom sexual desire survives the loss of virile powers—­probably somewhat abnormal persons at the outset—­find satisfaction in sexual odors.  Here, also, we have the basis for olfactory fetichism.  In such fetichism the odor of the woman alone, whoever she may be and however unattractive she may be, suffices to furnish complete sexual satisfaction.  In many, although not all, of those cases in which articles of women’s clothing become the object of fetichistic attraction, there is certainly an olfactory element due to the personal odor attaching to the garments.[50]

Olfactory influences play a certain part in various sexually abnormal tendencies and practices which do not proceed from an exclusively olfactory fascination.  Thus, cunnilingus and fellatio derive part of their attraction, more especially in some individuals, from a predilection for the odors of the sexual parts. (See, e.g., Moll, Untersuchungen ueber die Libido Sexualis, bd. 1, p. 134.) In many cases smell plays no part in the attraction; “I enjoy cunnilingus, if I like the girl very much,” a correspondent writes, “in spite of the smell.”  We may associate this impulse with the prevalence of these practices among sexual inverts, in whom olfactory attractions are often specially marked.  Those individuals, also, who are sexually affected by the urinary and alvine excretions ("renifleurs,” “stereoraires,” etc.) are largely, though not necessarily altogether, moved by olfactory impressions.  The attraction was, however, exclusively olfactory in the case of the young woman recorded by Moraglia (Archivio di Psichiatria, 1892, p. 267), who was irresistibly excited by the odor of the fermented urine of men, and possibly also in the case narrated to Moraglia by Prof.  L. Bianchi (ib. p. 568), in which a wife required flatus from her husband.

The sexual pleasure derived from partial strangulation (discussed in the study of “Love and Pain” in a previous volume) may be associated with heightened olfactory sexual excitation.  Dr. Kiernan, who points this out to me, has investigated a few neuropathic patients who like to have their necks squeezed, as they express it, and finds that in the majority the olfactory sensibility is thus intensified.

Even in ordinary normal persons, however, there can be no doubt that personal odor tends to play a not inconsiderable part in sexual attractions and sexual repulsions.  As a sexual excitant, indeed, it comes far behind the stimuli received through the sense of sight.  The comparative bluntness of the sense of smell in man makes it difficult for olfactory influence to be felt, as a rule, until the preliminaries of courtship are already over; so that it is impossible