A very complete case of such urolagnic fetichism—­complete because separated from association with the person accomplishing the act of urination—­has been recorded by Moraglia in a woman.  It is the case of a beautiful and attractive young woman of 18, with thick black hair, and expressive vivacious eyes, but sallow complexion.  Married a year previously, but childless, she experienced a certain amount of pleasure in coitus, but she preferred masturbation, and frankly acknowledged that she was highly excited by the odor of fermented urine.  So strong was this fetichism that when, for instance, she passed a street urinal she was often obliged to go aside and masturbate; once she went for this purpose into the urinal itself and was almost discovered in the act, and on another occasion into a church.  Her perversion caused her much worry because of the fear of detection.  She preferred, when she could, to obtain a bottle of urine—­which must be stale and a man’s (this, she said, she could detect by the smell)—­and to shut herself up in her own room, holding the bottle in one hand and repeatedly masturbating with the other.  (Moraglia, “Psicopatie Sessuali,” Archivio di Psichiatria, vol. xiii, fasc. 6, p. 267, 1892.) This case is of especial interest because of the great rarity of fully developed fetichism in women.  In a slight and germinal degree I believe that cases of fetichism are not uncommon in women, but they are certainly rare in a well-marked form, and Krafft-Ebing declared, even in the late editions of his Psychopathia Sexualis, that he knew of no cases in women.

So far we have been concerned with the urolagnic rather than the coprolagnic variety of scatalogical symbolism.  Although the two are sometimes associated there is no necessary connection, and most usually there is no tendency for the one to involve the other.  Urolagnia is certainly much the more frequently found; the act of urination is far more apt to suggest erotically symbolical ideas than the idea of defecation.  It is not difficult to understand why this should be so.  The act of urination lends itself more easily to sexual symbolism; it is more intimately associated with the genital function; its repetition is necessary at more frequent intervals so that it is more in evidence; moreover, its product, unlike that of the act of defecation, is not offensive to the senses.  Still coprolagnia occurs and not so very infrequently.  Burton remarked that even the normal lover is affected by this feeling:  “immo nec ipsum amicae stercus foctet."[29]

Of Caligula who, however, was scarcely sane, it was said “et quidem stercus uxoris degustavit."[30] In Parisian brothels (according to Taxil and others) provision is made for those who are sexually excited by the spectacle of the act of defecation (without reference to contact or odor) by means of a “tabouret de verre,” from under the glass floor of which the spectacle of the defecating women may be closely observed.  It may be added that the erotic nature of such a spectacle is referred to in the Marquis de Sade’s novels.