the fact that modesty itself has in English (like virtue) two distinct
meanings. In its original form it has no special connection with sex or
women, but may rather be considered as a masculine virtue. Cicero regards
"modestia" as the equivalent of the Greek sophrosune. This is the
"modesty" which Mary Wollstonecraft eulogized in the last century, the
outcome of knowledge and reflection, "soberness of mind," "the graceful
calm virtue of maturity." In French, it is possible to avoid the
confusion, and _modestie_ is entirely distinct from _pudeur_. It is, of
course, mainly with _pudeur_ that I am here concerned.




II.

Modesty an Agglomeration of Fears--Children in Relation to
Modesty--Modesty in Animals--The Attitude of the Medicean Venus--The
Sexual Factor of Modesty Based on Sexual Periodicity and on the Primitive
Phenomena of Courtship--The Necessity of Seclusion in Primitive Sexual
Intercourse--The Meaning of Coquetry--The Sexual Charm of Modesty--Modesty
as an Expression of Feminine Erotic Impulse--The Fear of Causing Disgust
as a Factor of Modesty--The Modesty of Savages in Regard to Eating in the
Presence of Others--The Sacro-Pubic Region as a Focus of Disgust--The Idea
of Ceremonial Uncleanliness--The Custom of Veiling the Face--Ornaments and
Clothing--Modesty Becomes Concentrated in the Garment--The Economic Factor
in Modesty--The Contribution of Civilization to Modesty--The Elaboration
of Social Ritual.


That modesty--like all the closely-allied emotions--is based on fear, one
of the most primitive of the emotions, seems to be fairly evident.[4] The
association of modesty and fear is even a very ancient observation, and is
found in the fragments of Epicharmus, while according to one of the most
recent definitions, "modesty is the timidity of the body." Modesty is,
indeed, an agglomeration of fears, especially, as I hope to show, of two
important and distinct fears: one of much earlier than human origin, and
supplied solely by the female; the other of more distinctly human
character, and of social, rather than sexual, origin.

A child left to itself, though very bashful, is wholly devoid of
modesty.[5] Everyone is familiar with the shocking _inconvenances_ of
children in speech and act, with the charming ways in which they
innocently disregard the conventions of modesty their elders thrust upon
them, or, even when anxious to carry them out, wholly miss the point at
issue: as when a child thinks that to put a little garment round the neck
satisfies the demands of modesty. Julius Moses states that modesty in the
uncovering of the sexual parts begins about the age of four. But in cases
when this occurs it is difficult to exclude teaching and example. Under
civilized conditions the convention of modesty long precedes its real
development. Bell has found that in love affairs before the age of nine
the girl is more aggressive than the boy and that at that age she begins
to be modest.[6] It may fairly be said that complete development of
modesty only takes place at the advent of puberty.[7] We may admit, with
Perez, one of the very few writers who touch on the evolution of this
emotion, that modesty may appear at a very early age if sexual desire
appears early.[8] We should not, however, be justified in asserting that
on this account modesty is a purely sexual phenomenon. The social impulses
also develop about puberty, and to that coincidence the compound nature of
the emotion of modesty may well be largely due.

The sexual factor is, however, the simplest and most primitive element of
modesty, and may, therefore, be mentioned first. Anyone who watches a
bitch, not in heat, when approached by a dog with tail wagging gallantly,
may see the beginnings of modesty. When the dog's attentions become a
little too marked, the bitch squats firmly down on the front legs and hind
quarters though when the period of oestrus comes her modesty may be flung
to the air and she eagerly turns her hind quarters to her admirer's nose
and elevates her tail high in the air. Her attitude of refusal is
equivalent, that is to say, to that which in the human race is typified by
the classical example of womanly modesty in the Medicean Venus, who
withdraws the pelvis, at the same time holding one hand to guard the
pubes, the other to guard the breasts.[9] The essential expression in each
case is that of defence of the sexual centers against the undesired
advances of the male.[10]

Stratz, who criticizes the above statement, argues (with
photographs of nude women in illustration) that the normal type
of European surprised modesty is shown by an attitude in which
the arms are crossed over the breast, the most sexually
attractive region, while the thighs are pressed together, one
being placed before the other, the shoulder raised and the back
slightly curved; occasionally, he adds, the hands may be used to
cover the face, and then the crossed arms conceal the breasts.
The Medicean Venus, he remarks, is only a pretty woman coquetting
with her body. Canova's Venus in the Pitti (who has drapery in
front of her, and presses her arms across her breast) being a
more accurate rendering of the attitude of modesty. But Stratz
admits that when a surprised woman is gazed at for some time, she
turns her head away, sinks or closes her eyes, and covers her
pubes (or any other part she thinks is being gazed at) with one
hand, while with the other she hides her breast or face. This he
terms the secondary expression of modesty. (Stratz, _Die
Frauenkleidung_, third ed., p. 23.)

It is certainly true that the Medicean Venus merely represents an
artistic convention, a generalized tradition, not founded on
exact and precise observation of the gestures of modesty, and it
is equally true that all the instinctive movements noted by
Stratz are commonly resorted to by a woman whose nakedness is
surprised. But in the absence of any series of carefully recorded
observations, one may doubt whether the distinction drawn by
Stratz between the primary and the secondary expression of
modesty can be upheld as the general rule, while it is most
certainly not true for every case. When a young woman is
surprised in a state of nakedness by a person of the opposite, or
even of the same, sex, it is her instinct to conceal the primary
centers of sexual function and attractiveness, in the first
place, the pubes, in the second place the breasts. The exact
attitude and the particular gestures of the hands in achieving
the desired end vary with the individual, and with the
circumstances. The hand may not be used at all as a veil, and,
indeed, the instinct of modesty itself may inhibit the use of the
hand for the protection of modesty (to turn the back towards the
beholder is often the chief impulse of blushing modesty, even
when clothed), but the application of the hand to this end is
primitive and natural. The lowly Fuegian woman, depicted by
Hyades and Deniker, who holds her hand to her pubes while being
photographed, is one at this point with the Roman Venus described
by Ovid (_Ars Amatoria_, Book  II):--

"Ipsa Venus pubem, quoties velamnia ponit,
Protegitur laeva semireducta manus."

It may be added that young men of the lower social classes, at
all events in England, when bathing at the seaside in complete
nudity, commonly grasp the sexual organs with one hand, for
concealment, as they walk up from the sea.

The sexual modesty of the female animal is rooted in the sexual
periodicity of the female, and is an involuntary expression of the organic
fact that the time for love is not now. Inasmuch as this fact is true of
the greater part of the lives of all female animals below man, the
expression itself becomes so habitual that it even intrudes at those
moments when it has ceased to be in place. We may see this again
illustrated in the bitch, who, when in heat, herself runs after the male,
and again turns to flee, perhaps only submitting with much persuasion to
his embrace. Thus, modesty becomes something more than a mere refusal of
the male; it becomes an invitation to the male, and is mixed up with his
ideas of what is sexually desirable in the female. This would alone serve
to account for the existence of modesty as a psychical secondary sexual
character. In this sense, and in this sense only, we may say, with Colin
Scott, that "the feeling of shame is made to be overcome," and is thus
correlated with its physical representative, the hymen, in the rupture of
which, as Groos remarks, there is, in some degree, a disruption also of
modesty. The sexual modesty of the female is thus an inevitable by-product
of the naturally aggressive attitude of the male in sexual relationships,
and the naturally defensive attitude of the female, this again being
founded on the fact that, while--in man and the species allied to him--the
sexual function in the female is periodic, and during most of life a
function to be guarded from the opposite sex, in the male it rarely or
never needs to be so guarded.[11]

Both male and female, however, need to guard themselves during the
exercise of their sexual activities from jealous rivals, as well as from
enemies who might take advantage of their position to attack them. It is
highly probable that this is one important sexual factor in the
constitution of modesty, and it helps to explain how the male, not less
than the female, cultivates modesty, and shuns publicity, in the exercise
of sexual functions. Northcote has especially emphasized this element in
modesty, as originating in the fear of rivals. "That from this seeking
after secrecy from motives of fear should arise an instinctive feeling
that the sexual act must always be hidden, is a natural enough sequence.
And since it is not a long step between thinking of an act as needing
concealment and thinking of it as wrong, it is easily conceivable that
sexual intercourse comes to be regarded as a stolen and therefore, in some
degree, a sinful pleasure."[12]

Animals in a state of nature usually appear to seek seclusion for sexual
intercourse, although this instinct is lost under domestication. Even the
lowest savages, also, if uncorrupted by civilized influences, seek the
solitude of the forest or the protection of their huts for the same
purpose; the rare cases in which coitus is public seem usually to involve
a ceremonial or social observance, rather than mere personal
gratification. At Loango, for instance, it would be highly improper to
have intercourse in an exposed spot; it must only be performed inside the
hut, with closed doors, at night, when no one is present.[13]

It is on the sexual factor of modesty, existing in a well-marked
form even among animals, that coquetry is founded. I am glad to
find myself on this point in agreement with Professor Groos, who,
in his elaborate study of the play-instinct, has reached the same
conclusion. So far from being the mere heartless play by which a
woman shows her power over a man, Groos points out that coquetry
possesses "high biological and psychological significance," being
rooted in the antagonism between the sexual instinct and inborn
modesty. He refers to the roe, who runs away from the stag--but
in a circle. (Groos, _Die Spiele der Menschen_, 1899, p. 339;
also the same author's _Die Spiele der Thiere_, pp. 288 _et
seq._) Another example of coquetry is furnished by the female
kingfisher (_Alcedo ispida_), which will spend all the morning in
teasing and flying away from the male, but is careful constantly
to look back, and never to let him out of her sight. (Many
examples are given by Buechner, in _Liebe und Liebesleben in der
Tierwelt_.) Robert Mueller (_Sexualbiologie_, p. 302) emphasizes
the importance of coquetry as a lure to the male.

"It is quite true," a lady writes to me in a private letter,
"that 'coquetry is a poor thing,' and that every milkmaid can
assume it, but a woman uses it principally in self-defence, while
she is finding out what the man himself is like." This is in
accordance with the remark of Marro, that modesty enables a woman
"to put lovers to the test, in order to select him who is best
able to serve the natural ends of love." It is doubtless the
necessity for this probationary period, as a test of masculine
qualities, which usually leads a woman to repel instinctively a
too hasty and impatient suitor, for, as Arthur Macdonald remarks,
"It seems to be instinctive in young women to reject the
impetuous lover, without the least consideration of his
character, ability, and fitness."

This essential element in courtship, this fundamental attitude of pursuer
and pursued, is clearly to be seen even in animals and savages; it is
equally pronounced in the most civilized men and women, manifesting itself
in crude and subtle ways alike. Shakespeare's Angelo, whose virtue had
always resisted the temptations of vice, discovered at last that

"modesty may more betray our sense
Than woman's lightness."

"What," asked the wise Montaigne, "is the object of that virginal shame,
that sedate coldness, that severe countenance, that pretence of not
knowing things which they understand better than we who teach them, except
to increase in us the desire to conquer and curb, to trample under our
appetite, all that ceremony and those obstacles? For there is not only
matter for pleasure, but for pride also, in ruffling and debauching that
soft sweetness and infantine modesty."[14] The masculine attitude in the
face of feminine coyness may easily pass into a kind of sadism, but is
nevertheless in its origin an innocent and instinctive impulse. Restif de
la Bretonne, describing his own shame and timidity as a pretty boy whom
the girls would run after and kiss, adds: "It is surprising that at the
same time I would imagine the pleasure I should have in embracing a girl
who resisted, in inspiring her with timidity, in making her flee and in
pursuing her; that was a part which I burned to play."[15] It is the
instinct of the sophisticated and the unsophisticated alike. The Arabs
have developed an erotic ideal of sensuality, but they emphasize the
importance of feminine modesty, and declare that the best woman is "she
who sees not men and whom they see not."[16] This deep-rooted modesty of
women towards men in courtship is intimately interwoven with the marriage
customs and magic rites of even the most primitive peoples, and has
survived in many civilized practices to-day.[17] The prostitute must be
able to simulate the modesty she may often be far from feeling, and the
immense erotic advantage of the innocent over the vicious woman lies
largely in the fact that in her the exquisite reactions of modesty are
fresh and vigorous. "I cannot imagine anything that is more sexually
exciting," remarks Hans Menjago, "than to observe a person of the opposite
sex, who, by some external or internal force, is compelled to fight
against her physical modesty. The more modest she is the more sexually
exciting is the picture she presents."[18] It is notable that even in
abnormal, as well as in normal, erotic passion the desire is for innocent
and not for vicious women, and, in association with this, the desired
favor to be keenly relished must often be gained by sudden surprise and
not by mutual agreement. A foot fetichist writes to me: "It is the
_stolen_ glimpse of a pretty foot or ankle which produces the greatest
effect on me." A urolagnic symbolist was chiefly excited by the act of
urination when he caught a young woman unawares in the act. A fetichistic
admirer of the nates only desired to see this region in innocent girls,
not in prostitutes. The exhibitionist, almost invariably, only exposes
himself to apparently respectable girls.

A Russian correspondent, who feels this charm of women in a
particularly strong degree, is inclined to think that there is an
element of perversity in it. "In the erotic action of the idea of
feminine enjoyment," he writes, "I think there are traces of a
certain perversity. In fact, owing to the impressions of early
youth, woman (even if we feel contempt for her in theory) is
placed above us, on a certain pedestal, as an almost sacred
being, and the more so because mysterious. Now sensuality and
sexual desire are considered as rather vulgar, and a little
dirty, even ridiculous and degrading, not to say bestial. The
woman who enjoys it, is, therefore, rather like a profaned altar,
or, at least, like a divinity who has descended on to the earth.
To give enjoyment to a woman is, therefore, like perpetrating a
sacrilege, or at least like taking a liberty with a god. The
feelings bequeathed to us by a long social civilization maintain
themselves in spite of our rational and deliberate opinions.
Reason tells us that there is nothing evil in sexual enjoyment,
whether in man or woman, but an unconscious feeling directs our
emotions, and this feeling (having a germ that was placed in
modern men by Christianity, and perhaps by still older religions)
says that woman _ought_ to be an absolutely pure being, with
ethereal sensations, and that in her sexual enjoyment is out of
place, improper, scandalous. To arouse sexual emotions in a
woman, if not to profane a sacred host, is, at all events, the
staining of an immaculate peplos; if not sacrilege, it is, at
least, irreverence or impertinence. For all men, the chaster a
woman is, the more agreeable it is to bring her to the orgasm.
That is felt as a triumph of the body over the soul, of sin over
virtue, of earth over heaven. There is something diabolic in such
pleasure, especially when it is felt by a man intoxicated with
love, and full of religious respect for the virgin of his
election. This feeling is, from a rational point of view, absurd,
and in its tendencies, immoral; but it is delicious in its
sacredly voluptuous subtlety. Defloration thus has its powerful
fascination in the respect consciously or unconsciously felt for
woman's chastity. In marriage, the feeling is yet more
complicated: in deflowering his bride, the Christian (that is,
any man brought up in a Christian civilization) has the feeling
of committing a sort of sin (for the 'flesh' is, for him, always
connected with sin) which, by a special privilege, has for him
become legitimate. He has received a special permit to corrupt
innocence. Hence, the peculiar prestige for civilized Christians,
of the wedding night, sung by Shelley, in ecstatic  verses:--

"'Oh, joy! Oh, fear! What will be done
In the absence of the sun!'"

This feeling has, however, its normal range, and is not, _per
se_, a perversity, though it may doubtless become so when unduly
heightened by Christian sentiment, and especially if it leads, as
to some extent it has led in my Russian correspondent, to an
abnormal feeling of the sexual attraction of girls who have only
or scarcely reached the age of puberty. The sexual charm of this
period of girlhood is well illustrated in many of the poems of
Thomas Ashe, and it is worthy of note, as perhaps supporting the
contention that this attraction is based on Christian feeling,
that Ashe had been a clergyman. An attentiveness to the woman's
pleasure remains, in itself, very far from a perversion, but
increases, as Colin Scott has pointed out, with civilization,
while its absence--the indifference to the partner's pleasure--is
a perversion of the most degraded kind.

There is no such instinctive demand on the woman's part for innocence in
the man.[19] In the nature of things that could not be. Such emotion is
required for properly playing the part of the pursued; it is by no means
an added attraction on the part of the pursuer. There is, however, an
allied and corresponding desire which is very often clearly or latently
present in the woman: a longing for pleasure that is stolen or forbidden.
It is a mistake to suppose that this is an indication of viciousness or
perversity. It appears to be an impulse that occurs quite naturally in
altogether innocent women. The exciting charm of the risky and dangerous
naturally arises on a background of feminine shyness and timidity. We may
trace its recognition at a very early stage of history in the story of Eve
and the forbidden fruit that has so often been the symbol of the masculine
organs of sex. It is on this ground that many have argued the folly of
laying external restrictions on women in matters of love. Thus in quoting
the great Italian writer who afterwards became Pope Pius II, Robert Burton
remarked: "I am of AEneas Sylvius' mind, 'Those jealous Italians do very
ill to lock up their wives; for women are of such a disposition they will
mostly covet that which is denied most, and offend least when they have
free liberty to trespass.'"[20]

It is the spontaneous and natural instinct of the lover to desire modesty
in his mistress, and by no means any calculated opinion on his part that
modesty is the sign of sexual emotion. It remains true, however, that
modesty is an expression of feminine erotic impulse. We have here one of
the instances, of which there, are so many, of that curious and
instinctive harmony by which Nature has sought the more effectively to
bring about the ends of courtship. As to the fact itself there can be
little doubt. It constantly forces itself on the notice of careful
observers, and has long been decided in the affirmative by those who have
discussed the matter. Venette, one of the earliest writers on the
psychology of sex, after discussing the question at length, decided that
the timid woman is a more ardent lover than the bold woman.[21] "It is the
most pudent girl," remarked Restif de la Bretonne whose experience of
women was so extensive, "the girl who blushes most, who is most disposed
to the pleasures of love," he adds that, in girls and boys alike, shyness
is a premature consciousness of sex.[22] This observation has even become
embodied in popular proverbs. "Do as the lasses do--say no, but take it,"
is a Scotch saying, to which corresponds the Welsh saying, "The more
prudish the more unchaste."[23]

It is not, at first, quite clear why an excessively shy and
modest woman should be the most apt for intimate relationships
with a man, and in such a case the woman is often charged with
hypocrisy. There is, however, no hypocrisy in the matter. The shy
and reserved woman holds herself aloof from intimacy in ordinary
friendship, because she is acutely sensitive to the judgments of
others, and fears that any seemingly immodest action may make an
unfavorable opinion. With a lover, however, in whose eyes she
feels assured that her actions can not be viewed unfavorably,
these barriers of modesty fall down, and the resulting intimacy
becomes all the more fascinating to the woman because of its
contrast with the extreme reserve she is impelled to maintain in
other relationships. It thus happens that many modest women who,
in non-sexual relationships with their own sex, are not able to
act with the physical unreserve not uncommon with women among
themselves, yet feel no such reserve with a man, when they are
once confident of his good opinion. Much the same is true of
modest and sensitive men in their relations with women.

This fundamental animal factor of modesty, rooted in the natural facts of
the sexual life of the higher mammals, and especially man, obviously will
not explain all the phenomena of modesty. We must turn to the other great
primary element of modesty, the social factor.

We cannot doubt that one of the most primitive and universal of the social
characteristics of man is an aptitude for disgust, founded, as it is, on a
yet more primitive and animal aptitude for disgust, which has little or no
social significance. In nearly all races, even the most savage, we seem
to find distinct traces of this aptitude for disgust in the presence of
certain actions of others, an emotion naturally reflected in the
individual's own actions, and hence a guide to conduct. Notwithstanding
our gastric community of disgust with lower animals, it is only in man
that this disgust seems to become transformed and developed, to possess a
distinctly social character, and to serve as a guide to social
conduct.[24] The objects of disgust vary infinitely according to the
circumstances and habits of particular races, but the reaction of disgust
is fundamental throughout.

The best study of the phenomena of disgust known to me is, without doubt,
Professor Richet's.[25] Richet concludes that it is the _dangerous_ and
the _useless_ which evoke disgust. The digestive and sexual excretions and
secretions, being either useless or, in accordance with widespread
primitive ideas, highly dangerous, the genito-anal region became a
concentrated focus of disgust.[26] It is largely for this reason, no
doubt, that savage men exhibit modesty, not only toward women, but toward
their own sex, and that so many of the lowest savages take great
precautions in obtaining seclusion for the fulfillment of natural
functions. The statement, now so often made, that the primary object of
clothes is to accentuate, rather than to conceal, has in it--as I shall
point out later--a large element of truth, but it is by no means a
complete account of the matter. It seems difficult not to admit that,
alongside the impulse to accentuate sexual differences, there is also in
both men and women a genuine impulse to concealment among the most
primitive peoples, and the invincible repugnance often felt by savages to
remove the girdle or apron, is scarcely accounted for by the theory that
it is solely a sexual lure.

In this connection it seems to me instructive to consider a special form
of modesty very strongly marked among savages in some parts of the world.
I refer to the feeling of immodesty in eating. Where this feeling exists,
modesty is offended when one eats in public; the modest man retires to
eat. Indecency, said Cook, was utterly unknown among the Tahitians; but
they would not eat together; even brothers and sisters had their separate
baskets of provisions, and generally sat some yards apart, with their
backs to each other, when they ate.[27] The Warrua of Central Africa,
Cameron found, when offered a drink, put up a cloth before their faces
while they swallowed it, and would not allow anyone to see them eat or
drink; so that every man or woman must have his own fire and cook for
himself.[28] Karl von den Steinen remarks, in his interesting book on
Brazil, that though the Bakairi of Central Brazil have no feeling of shame
about nakedness, they are ashamed to eat in public; they retire to eat,
and hung their heads in shame-faced confusion when they saw him innocently
eat in public. Hrolf Vaughan Stevens found that, when he gave an Orang
Laut (Malay) woman anything to eat, she not only would not eat it if her
husband were present, but if any man were present she would go outside
before eating or giving her children to eat.[29] Thus among these peoples
the act of eating in public produces the same feelings as among ourselves
the indecent exposure of the body in public.[30]

It is quite easy to understand how this arises. Whenever there is any
pressure on the means of subsistence, as among savages at some time or
another there nearly always is, it must necessarily arouse a profound and
mixed emotion of desire and disgust to see another person putting into his
stomach what one might just as well have put into one's own.[31] The
special secrecy sometimes observed by women is probably due to the fact
that women would be less able to resist the emotions that the act of
eating would arouse in onlookers. As social feeling develops, a man
desires not only to eat in safety, but also to avoid being an object of
disgust, and to spare his friends all unpleasant emotions. Hence it
becomes a requirement of ordinary decency to eat in private. A man who
eats in public becomes--like the man who in our cities exposes his person
in public--an object of disgust and contempt.

Long ago, when a hospital student on midwifery duty in London slums, I had
occasion to observe that among the women of the poor, and more especially
in those who had lost the first bloom of youth, modesty consisted chiefly
in the fear of being disgusting. There was an almost pathetic anxiety, in
the face of pain and discomfort, not to be disgusting in the doctor's
eyes. This anxiety expressed itself in the ordinary symptoms of modesty.
But, as soon as the woman realized that I found nothing disgusting in
whatever was proper and necessary to be done under the circumstances, it
almost invariably happened that every sign of modesty at once
disappeared.[32] In the special and elementary conditions of parturition,
modesty is reduced to this one fear of causing disgust; so that, when that
is negated, the emotion is non-existent, and the subject becomes, without
effort, as direct and natural as a little child. A fellow-student on
similar duty, who also discovered for himself the same character of
modesty--that if he was careful to guard her modesty the woman was careful
also, and that if he was not the woman was not--remarked on it to me with
sadness; it seemed to him derogatory to womanhood that what he had been
accustomed to consider its supreme grace should be so superficial that he
could at will set limits to it.[33] I thought then, as I think still, that
that was rather a perversion of the matter, and that nothing becomes
degrading because we happen to have learned something about its
operations. But I am more convinced than ever that the fear of causing
disgust--a fear quite distinct from that of losing a sexual lure or
breaking a rule of social etiquette--plays a very large part in the
modesty of the more modest sex, and in modesty generally. Our Venuses, as
Lucretius long since remarked and Montaigne after him, are careful to
conceal from their lovers the _vita postscenia_, and that fantastic fate
which placed so near together the supreme foci of physical attraction and
physical repugnance, has immensely contributed to build up all the
subtlest coquetries of courtship. Whatever stimulates self-confidence and
lulls the fear of evoking disgust--whether it is the presence of a beloved
person in whose good opinion complete confidence is felt, or whether it is
merely the grosser narcotizing influence of a slight degree of
intoxication--always automatically lulls the emotion of modesty.[34]
Together with the animal factor of sexual refusal, this social fear of
evoking disgust seems to me the most fundamental element in modesty.

It is, of course, impossible to argue that the fact of the sacro-pubic
region of the body being the chief focus of concealment proves the
importance of this factor of modesty. But it may fairly be argued that it
owes this position not merely to being the sexual centre, but also as
being the excretory centre. Even among many lower mammals, as well as
among birds and insects, there is a well-marked horror of dirt, somewhat
disguised by the varying ways in which an animal may be said to define
"dirt." Many animals spend more time and energy in the duties of
cleanliness than human beings, and they often show well-marked anxiety to
remove their own excrement, or to keep away from it.[35] Thus this element
of modesty also may be said to have an animal basis.

It is on this animal basis that the human and social fear of arousing
disgust has developed. Its probably wide extension is indicated not only
by the strong feeling attached to the constant presence of clothing on
this part of the body,--such constant presence being quite uncalled for if
the garment or ornament is merely a sort of sexual war-paint,--but by the
repugnance felt by many savages very low down in the scale to the public
satisfaction of natural needs, and to their more than civilized
cleanliness in this connection;[36] it is further of interest to note that
in some parts of the world the covering is not in front, but behind;
though of this fact there are probably other explanations. Among civilized
people, also, it may be added, the final and invincible seat of modesty is
sometimes not around the pubes, but the anus; that is to say, that in such
cases the fear of arousing disgust is the ultimate and most fundamental
element of modesty.[37]

The concentration of modesty around the anus is sometimes very
marked. Many women feel so high a degree of shame and reserve
with regard to this region, that they are comparatively
indifferent to an anterior examination of the sexual organs. A
similar feeling is not seldom found in men. "I would permit of an
examination of my genitals by a medical man, without any feeling
of discomfort," a correspondent writes, "but I think I would
rather die than submit to any rectal examination." Even
physicians have been known to endure painful rectal disorders for
years, rather than undergo examination.

"Among ordinary English girls," a medical correspondent writes,
"I have often noticed that the dislike and shame of allowing a
man to have sexual intercourse with them, when newly married, is
simply due to the fact that the sexual aperture is so closely
apposed to the anus and bladder. If the vulva and vagina were
situated between a woman's shoulder blades, and a man had a
separate instrument for coitus, not used for any excretory
purpose, I do not think women would feel about intercourse as
they sometimes do. Again, in their ignorance of anatomy, women
often look upon the vagina and womb as part of the bowel and its
exit of discharge, and sometimes say, for instance,
'inflammation of the _bowel_', when they mean _womb_. Again,
many, perhaps most, women believe that they pass water through
the vagina, and are ignorant of the existence of the separate
urethral orifice. Again, women associate the vulva with the anus,
and so feel ashamed of it; even when speaking to their husbands,
or to a doctor, or among themselves; they have absolutely no name
for the vulva (I mean among the upper classes, and people of
gentle birth), but speak of it as 'down below,' 'low down,' etc."

Even though this feeling is largely based on wrong and ignorant
ideas, it must still be recognized that it is to some extent
natural and inevitable. "How much is risked," exclaims Dugas, "in
the privacies of love! The results may be disillusion, disgust,
the consciousness of physical imperfection, of brutality or
coldness, of aesthetic disenchantment, of a sentimental shock,
seen or divined. To be without modesty, that is to say, to have
no fear of the ordeals of love, one must be sure of one's self,
of one's grace, of one's physical emotions, of one's feelings,
and be sure, moreover, of the effect of all these on the nerves,
the imagination, and the heart of another person. Let us suppose
modesty reduced to aesthetic discomfort, to a woman's fear of
displeasing, or of not seeming beautiful enough. Even thus
defined, how can modesty avoid being always awake and restless?
What woman could repeat, without risk, the tranquil action of
Phryne? And even in that action, who knows how much may not have
been due to mere professional insolence!" (Dugas, "La Pudeur,"
_Revue Philosophique_, November, 1903.) "Men and Women," Schurtz
points out (_Altersklassen und Maennerbuende_, pp. 41-51), "have
certainly the capacity mutually to supplement and enrich each
other; but when this completion fails, or is not sought, the
difference may easily become a strong antipathy;" and he proceeds
to develop the wide-reaching significance of this psychic fact.

I have emphasized the proximity of the excretory centres to the sexual
focus in discussing this important factor of modesty, because, in
analyzing so complex and elusive an emotion as modesty it is desirable to
keep as near as possible to the essential and fundamental facts on which
it is based. It is scarcely necessary to point out that, in ordinary
civilized society, these fundamental facts are not usually present at the
surface of consciousness and may even be absent altogether; on the
foundation of them may arise all sorts of idealized fears, of delicate
reserves, of aesthetic refinements, as the emotions of love become more
complex and more subtle, and the crude simplicity of the basis on which
they finally rest becomes inevitably concealed.

Another factor of modesty, which reaches a high development in savagery,
is the ritual element, especially the idea of ceremonial uncleanness,
based on a dread of the supernatural influences which the sexual organs
and functions are supposed to exert. It may be to some extent rooted in
the elements already referred to, and it leads us into a much wider field
than that of modesty, so that it is only necessary to touch slightly on it
here; it has been exhaustively studied by Frazer and by Crawley. Offences
against the ritual rendered necessary by this mysterious dread, though
more serious than offences against sexual reticence or the fear of causing
disgust, are so obviously allied that they all reinforce one another and
cannot easily be disentangled.

Nearly everywhere all over the world at a primitive stage of thought, and
even to some extent in the highest civilization, the sight of the sexual
organs or of the sexual act, the image or even the names of the sexual
parts of either man or woman, are believed to have a curiously potent
influence, sometimes beneficent, but quite as often maleficent. The two
kinds of influence may even be combined, and Riedel, quoted by Ploss and
Bartels,[38] states that the Ambon islanders carve a schematic
representation of the vulva on their fruit trees, in part to promote the
productiveness of the trees, and in part to scare any unauthorized person
who might be tempted to steal the fruit. The precautions prescribed as
regards coitus at Loango[39] are evidently associated with religious
fears. In Ceylon, again (as a medical correspondent there informs me),
where the penis is worshipped and held sacred, a native never allows it to
be seen, except under compulsion, by a doctor, and even a wife must
neither see it nor touch it nor ask for coitus, though she must grant as
much as the husband desires. All savage and barbarous peoples who have
attained any high degree of ceremonialism have included the functions not
only of sex, but also of excretion, more or less stringently within the
bounds of that ceremonialism.[40] It is only necessary to refer to the
Jewish ritual books of the Old Testament, to Hesiod, and to the customs
prevalent among Mohammedan peoples. Modesty in eating, also, has its roots
by no means only in the fear of causing disgust, but very largely in this
kind of ritual, and Crawley has shown how numerous and frequent among
primitive peoples are the religious implications of eating and
drinking.[41] So profound is this dread of the sacred mystery of sex, and
so widespread is the ritual based upon it, that some have imagined that
here alone we may find the complete explanation of modesty, and Salomon
Reinach declares that "at the origin of the emotion of modesty lies a
taboo."[42]

Durkheim ("La Prohibition de l'Inceste," _L'Annee Sociologique_,
1898, p. 50), arguing that whatever sense of repugnance women may
inspire must necessarily reach the highest point around the womb,
which is hence subjected to the most stringent taboo,
incidentally suggests that here is an origin of modesty. "The
sexual organs must be veiled at an early period, to prevent the
dangerous effluvia which they give off from reaching the
environment. The veil is often a method of intercepting magic
action. Once constituted, the practice would be maintained and
transformed."

It was doubtless as a secondary and derived significance that the
veil became, as Reinach ("Le Voile de l'Oblation," op. cit., pp.
299-311) shows it was, alike among the Romans and in the Catholic
Church, the sign of consecration to the gods.

At an early stage of culture, again, menstruation is regarded as a process
of purification, a dangerous expulsion of vitiated humors. Hence the term
_katharsis_ applied to it by the Greeks. Hence also the mediaeval view of
women: "_Mulier speciosa templum aedificatum super cloacam_," said
Boethius. The sacro-pubic region in women, because it includes the source
of menstruation, thus becomes a specially heightened seat of taboo.
According to the Mosiac law (Leviticus, Chapter XX, v. 18), if a man
uncovered a menstruating woman, both were to be cut off.

It is probable that the Mohammedan custom of veiling the face and head
really has its source solely in another aspect of this ritual factor of
modesty. It must be remembered that this custom is not Mohammedan in its
origin, since it existed long previously among the Arabians, and is
described by Tertullian.[43] In early Arabia very handsome men also veiled
their faces, in order to preserve themselves from the evil eye, and it has
been conjectured with much probability that the origin of the custom of
women veiling their faces may be traced to this magico-religious
precaution.[44] Among the Jews of the same period, according to
Buechler,[45] the women had their heads covered and never cut their hair;
to appear in the streets without such covering would be like a prostitute
and was adequate ground for divorce; adulterous women were punished by
uncovering their heads and cutting their hair. It is possible, though not
certain, that St. Paul's obscure injunction to women to cover their heads
"because of the angels," may really be based on the ancient reason, that
when uncovered they would be exposed to the wanton assaults of spirits (1
Corinthians, Ch. XI, vv. 5-6),[46] exactly as Singhalese women believe
that they must keep the vulva covered lest demons should have intercourse
with them. Even at the present day St. Paul's injunction is still observed
by Christendom, which is, however, far from accepting, or even perhaps
understanding, the folk-lore ground on which are based such injunctions.

Crawley thus summarizes some of the evidence concerning the
significance of the veil:--

"Sexual shyness, not only in woman, but in man, is intensified at
marriage, and forms a chief feature of the dangerous sexual
properties mutually feared. When fully ceremonial, the idea takes
on the meaning that satisfaction of these feelings will lead to
their neutralization, as, in fact, it does. The bridegroom in
ancient Sparta supped on the wedding night at the men's mess, and
then visited his bride, leaving her before daybreak. This
practice was continued, and sometimes children were born before
the pair had ever seen each other's faces by day. At weddings in
the Babar Islands, the bridegroom has to hunt for his bride in a
darkened room. This lasts a good while if she is shy. In South
Africa, the bridegroom may not see his bride till the whole of
the marriage ceremonies have been performed. In Persia, a husband
never sees his wife till he has consummated the marriage. At
marriages in South Arabia, the bride and bridegroom have to sit
immovable in the same position from noon till midnight, fasting,
in separate rooms. The bride is attended by ladies, and the groom
by men. They may not see each other till the night of the fourth
day. In Egypt, the groom cannot see the face of his bride, even
by a surreptitious glance, till she is in his absolute
possession. Then comes the ceremony, which he performs, of
uncovering her face. In Egypt, of course, this has been
accentuated by the seclusion and veiling of women. In Morocco, at
the feast before the marriage, the bride and groom sit together
on a sort of throne; all the time, the poor bride's eyes are
firmly closed, and she sits amidst the revelry as immovable as a
statue. On the next day is the marriage. She is conducted after
dark to her future home, accompanied by a crowd with lanterns and
candles. She is led with closed eyes along the street by two
relatives, each holding one of her hands. The bride's head is
held in its proper position by a female relative, who walks
behind her. She wears a veil, and is not allowed to open her eyes
until she is set on the bridal bed, with a girl friend beside
her. Amongst the Zulus, the bridal party proceeds to the house of
the groom, having the bride hidden amongst them. They stand
facing the groom, while the bride sings a song. Her companions
then suddenly break away, and she is discovered standing in the
middle, with a fringe of beads covering her face. Amongst the
people of Kumaun, the husband sees his wife first after the
joining of hands. Amongst the Bedui of North East Africa, the
bride is brought on the evening of the wedding-day by her girl
friends, to the groom's house. She is closely muffled up. Amongst
the Jews of Jerusalem, the bride, at the marriage ceremony,
stands under the nuptial canopy, her eyes being closed, that she
may not behold the face of her future husband before she reaches
the bridal chamber. In Melanesia, the bride is carried to her new
home on some one's back, wrapped in many mats, with palm-fans
held about her face, because she is supposed to be modest and
shy. Among the Damaras, the groom cannot see his bride for four
days after marriage. When a Damara woman is asked in marriage,
she covers her face for a time with the flap of a headdress made
for this purpose. At the Thlinkeet marriage ceremony, the bride
must look down, and keep her head bowed all the time; during the
wedding-day, she remains hiding in a corner of the house, and the
groom is forbidden to enter. At a Yezedee marriage, the bride is
covered from head to foot with a thick veil, and when arrived at
her new home, she retires behind a curtain in the corner of a
darkened room, where she remains for three days before her
husband is permitted to see her. In Corea, the bride has to cover
her face with her long sleeves, when meeting the bridegroom at
the wedding. The Manchurian bride uncovers her face for the first
time when she descends from the nuptial couch. It is dangerous
even to see dangerous persons. Sight is a method of contagion in
primitive science, and the idea coincides with the psychological
aversion to see dangerous things, and with sexual shyness and
timidity. In the customs noticed, we can distinguish the feeling
that it is dangerous to the bride for her husband's eyes to be
upon her, and the feeling of bashfulness in her which induces her
neither to see him nor to be seen by him. These ideas explain the
origin of the bridal veil and similar concealments. The bridal
veil is used, to take a few instances, in China, Burmah, Corea,
Russia, Bulgaria, Manchuria, and Persia, and in all these cases
it conceals the face entirely." (E. Crawley, _The Mystic Rose_,
pp. 328 et seq.)

Alexander Walker, writing in 1846, remarks: "Among old-fashioned