Amerigo Vespucci and other early travelers noted the existence of some of
these appliances, and since Miklucho-Macleay carefully described them as
used in Borneo[82] their existence has been generally recognized. They are
usually regarded merely as ethnological curiosities. As such they would
not concern us here. Their real significance for us is that they
illustrate the comparative insensitiveness of the genital canal in women,
while at the same time they show that a certain amount of what we cannot
but regard as painful stimulation is craved by women, in order to heighten
tumescence and increase sexual pleasure, even though it can only by
procured by artificial methods. It is, of course, possible to argue that
in these cases we are not concerned with pain at all, but with a strong
stimulation that is felt as purely pleasurable. There can be no doubt,
however, that in the absence of sexual excitement this stimulation would
be felt as purely painful, and--in the light of our previous
discussion--we may, perhaps, fairly regard it as a painful stimulation
which is craved, not because it is itself pleasurable, but because it
heightens the highly pleasurable state of tumescence.
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