Page:Edward Prime-Stevenson - The Intersexes.djvu/251

 Great. Peter is a further instance of dionism and uranianism, blended in one individual. Vehemently erotic as a young man, he was given to homosexual intimacies while a frequenter of women. The dualism 'of taste did not disappear as Peter grew older. In view of his relations with both sexes, and of his wonderful energy of character, there appears much of the Oriental in Peter's complex, ungovernably animal tendencies. A special uranian favorite of Peter was the celebrated parvenu Mentschnikoff. The notorious uranianism of Alexander I of Russia, has already been mentioned. But Alexander was not the last of Russian princes to be known as an Uranian. Two conspicuous scions in our own day have been actors in "affairs" that excited brisk comments in other cities than St. Petersburg.

We turn again to the history of English sovereigns. James I, an eccentric mixture of the kingly and unkingly—of the well-balanced and the "just not mad"—was, first and last, a consistent Uranian. His court became aware of it, even to its use by state-intriguers. James never could resist a handsome young man. Once in love with him, James was almost incredibly indifferent to moral un-worth behind mere beauty of body, exactly as dionistic princes have been mischievously bewitched by mistresses. The histories of James's chief favourites are good illustrations of the dangers of becoming a royal pet. Unluckily, James was incompetent to protect the young objects of his passion from the consequences of their elevation to his favour, or from the results of their own follies and crimes. His liking, too, was a shifting equation. Not simply a pederast, that quality distinguished fractionally James's sentimental intimacies with beautiful youths. Good-looking lads were deliberately put in the way of the royal Uranian to make use of his passion, either for themselves or others. James was always eager to teach an ephebus Greek