THE first of these anomalies to be noted is the association of active cruelty, or passive physical suffering, with sexual desire. In this category we may properly place many of those numerous instances, such as negro child-rape, and the debaucheries of the Roman Nero, in which the infliction of pain seems to be an essential element in the gratification of sexual lust. One of the strangest phenomena of the entire sexual sphere, and that most difficult of analysis, the attempts to account for it have, of course, been various, and, in some cases, curious.