Page:Edward Prime-Stevenson - The Intersexes.djvu/173

 I had not a sort of sexual interest in handsome boys and men, and in pictures of them; liked to be caressed by men. Once, when I was about eight, my nurse and a female friend and myself one afternoon were passing a photographer's shop. We stopped and looked at the likenesses. I was struck by that of a handsome man, and spoke of it. My nurse said, "Oh, but a little gentleman should never waste his time admiring another gentleman. He must always admire the ladies". I answered with much decision, and I know feeling what I said—"But I think that a gentleman is always a great deal handsomer than any kind of a lady!" I proceeded to argue my statement out from the pictures, much to the amusement of the young women. My nurse had a lover, a line looking young butcher. His caresses, when we met, used to excite me sexually very much. All this before puberty. In school, I felt great admirations for certain handsome fellow-scholars. Their type was invariably blond, with a rather large (but not coarse) body, and with very clear, white skins. One such lad, from Surrey, exercised a remarkable influence on me, though I was careful not to let him or any one else notice it. I used to follow him with my eyes, for quarter-hours at a time. His least signs of friendliness put me into an intense nervous happiness. Often I could not sleep till late at night, just for thinking of this C—. At the parties for lads and girls, to which I was asked, the girls seemed to me of no mortal interest, while I used to note eagerly every trait and type of good looks or enhancement—a becoming cravat, a well fitted suit in my boy-friends. A thirteen, I decided that I would cut out of any illustrated journals and books that I could discover, the pictures of every handsome man, or boy, that they contained. This resolution I carried out with great secrecy, hiding my collection as if it had been so much counterfeit coin! It was a pleasure that increased very swiftly. In fact, this "gallery" not only was an outcome of early