Mirrors are present in profusion in high-class brothels — on the walls
and also above the beds. Innocent youths and girls are also often
impelled to contemplate themselves in mirrors and sometimes thus
produce the first traces of sexual excitement. I have referred to the
developed forms of this kind of self -contemplation in the Study of
Auto-erotism, and in this connection have alluded to the fable of Nar-
cissus, whence NS,cke has since devised the term Narcissism for this
group of phenomena. It is only necessary to mention the enormous
production of photographs, representing normal and abnormal sexual ac-
tions, specially prepared for the purpose of exciting or of gratifying
sexual appetites, and the frequency with which even normal photographs
of the nude appeal to the same lust of the eyes.
^ William Ellis, Polynesian Researches, second edition, 1832, voL 1,
p. 215.
188 PSTCnOLOGT OF SEX.
