Expelled from University.
I earned my living in a minor capacity in the university, and expulsion also meant that my income was cut off. The shock of expulsion rendered me a mental wreck. But I did not have the courage to return to my village home. Nor could I even apply to my father for money. Since soon after my arrest two years prior to the present date, he had, as already described, displayed a pronounced antipathy for me, rendering my visits home almost intolerable. In addition, because of the double-life my nature forced me to lead, I decided I must remain in New York.
I removed to a part of the city where I would not be likely to encounter any of my college acquaintances, and began to look around for means of support. I spent several hours every day in answering advertisements. I would have been only too glad to accept such a position as shoveling coal into a furnace, but at the end of a month, had found nothing. In applying for positions, I was abashed in the consciousness that I was ranked as a degenerate and an outcast from society. I could not name as reference any member of the university or let it become known that I had been a student there. After my expulsion I called on the two professors with whom I was most intimate, and asked if I could refer to them. One replied: “Knowing your nature, I could not recommend you for any position, however menial. You cannot be trusted.” (And yet shortly afterward I was for thirty months in the employ of a millionaire in the most confidential capacity, and was surpassed in faithfulness by no employee.) The other: “You must realize that youare an outcast from society.”
An Outcast from Society.
All hope for the future and all courage for battling with the world were gone, and every day on my return from several hours’ fruitless search, I would throw myself on the bed and give vent to my feelings in a violent fit of weeping. While walking the street, I would weep aloud and be on the borderline of hysterical screaming. I repeatedly entertained thoughts of suicide.
In a few weeks I was penniless and a shelterless wanderer on the streets in midwinter. I was driven for shelter to the Bowery, because there alone lodging could be obtained for fifteen cents, and a big meal of coarse and even disgusting food for ten cents. Thus I was compelled to live for nine weeks before a way was opened to something better.
During the nine weeks I was of the opinion that I must pass the rest of my days as an outcast from society, while of course living out the “Jennie-June” life to which I was apparently predestined. I was grateful to Providence that it was I and not one of my sisters who was predetermined to the life of a fille de joie and an outcast. In suffering such a fate, I believed that I was paying the penalty to God for the sin of some progenitor. I believed myself appointed by the God who visits the iniquities of the fathers upon the children to live out the rest of my life in mourning and paroxysms of grief, such as then visited me every day.
Year 1896—I Become a Low-Class Fairie.
The manner of life of a high-class fairie has been described. I was fated also to trace out the life of a low-class one. But even in my present extreme poverty, Iwas decidedly averse to making a gainful occupation out of the life. I wanted my freedom of action, and was unalterably opposed to intimacy for pecuniary gain with any one whom I did not adore. During the present nine weeks I accepted whatever was voluntarily proffered, but otherwise left money entirely out of consideration. I moreover did not resume my Fourteenth Street life, which might have proved less impecunious, because it was comparatively “poor pickings” there; because I was much more strongly attracted toward the rough, burly adolescents of the foreign laborer quarters than toward the young gentleman libertines of Fourteenth Street; and finally because I had twice encountered on Fourteenth Street associates at the university. Fortunately I happened to be alone both times and my actions not suspicious, but I realized I was taking a great deal of risk there. Moreover, I did not return regularly to my Mulberry Street friends because I now found on my occasional visits there that it was a barren “stamping ground.” The tradition was lodged there that I was well furnished with money, which reputation is fatal to the success of a penniless fairie.
Living as I was now compelled to live and necessarily mingling daily with men of loose morals, the charm of masculine beauty proved more powerful than ever before. Furthermore, it is not surprising that a person, deprived of even what are regarded as the necessities of a decent existence, should indulge immoderately in the single one of life’s pleasures of which there was an abundant supply. In the environment in which forces outside of my controlplaced me, there was in me a practically irresistible impulse to adopt the manner of life I did. I would never have made the profession of the fairie the main business of life if it had not been for the peculiar concurrence of circumstances, expulsion from college, inability to find respectable employment, etc. That I now led the life I did was perhaps more the fault of Christian society than my own. While the world condemned, I have always believed that the Omniscient Judge pardoned because I was the victim of circumstances and of innate psychical forces.
I Touch Bottom.
The fact that I could now satisfy every day my instinctive yearnings to pass for a female and spend six evenings a week in the company of adolescent ruffians went far towards counterbalancing the many tears I had to shed when there was nothing to divert my thoughts from my condition of an outcast and an outlaw. I never coquetted on Sunday evenings, which I devoted to worship of my Creator at some mission. I no longer experienced any shame at displaying my feminine mentality everywhere outside of the missions, as no one knew who I was. In many neighborhoods I was hailed as “Jennie June.”
Besides the Bowery, the streets most frequented by me during these nine weeks—as well as during the not immediately following two years when I was compelled to go on a female-impersonation spree once in two weeks—were the following: (1) In the foreign Hebrew quarter: Grand, from Bowery eastward to Allen, and Allen and Christie, for several blocks on both sides of Grand. (2) In the foreign Italian quarter, containing also a large sprinkling of Irish immigrants: Grand, from Bowerywestward to Sullivan and Thompson; the whole lengths of the two latter streets; Bleecker from Thompson to Carmine; and Mulberry south of Spring. (3) In Chinatown: Doyers, Pell, and Mott streets. I did not seek the Chinese, who were sexually repulsive, but the adolescent toughs and young gentleman libertines who visited Chinatown evenings from all parts of the city.
My Then “Stamping Ground.”
The present palatial Police Headquarters, built subsequently to my frequenting these neighborhoods, is at the geographical center of my field of those days. My fairie apprenticeship was in large part passed within two hundred feet of the site of this edifice, then occupied by a public market, and some of my fairie adventures occurred on the very site.
With the exception of the soldiers and sailors, practically all my beaux of these neighborhoods were of foreign parentage, but born in New York. The Irish predominated, then came the Italians, and then the Hebrews. Practically all belonged to one of these classes, as did nearly all the inhabitants of the quarters frequented. But my experience as a fairie elsewhere, particularly over a large part of Europe, proved that religion and race make no difference in respect to the reception accorded an invert.
Since I had lost my position in the social body, I was willing to take greater risks of bodily harm. I would enter low “clubrooms” with several wild heartless ruffians whom perhaps I had never seen before. Many a midnight I was promenading the street arm in arm with a pair of adolescent longshoremen cutthroats whom I hadnever seen before, or with youthful soldiers or sailors. Even some youthful policemen went skylarking with me on the back streets after all the inhabitants had gone to bed. Most of the police on the Bowery knew me as a fairie, but were always friendly. This street at that time was the wide-open “red-light” district for the un-Americanized laborer and for the common soldier or sailor.
Continuous Blackmail.
When I felt feeble and fatigued—then my usual condition—flirtation quickened the heart’s action and the flow of blood. I forgot my weariness, and if shivering with the cold before, my body now glowed with warmth.
Incorrigible thieves, who had only just learned that I was a fairie, have immediately grasped me on a brightly lighted street thronged with pedestrians, and ransacked my pockets, while clasping me to their breast and crying out: “Oh how she loves me! Oh how she loves me!” Their purpose was to create the impression on those who were hurrying by that I was embracing them. Some adolescent ruffians demanded money every time they ran across me, and helped themselves to all I had if I refused them. If they found nothing, they would sometimes beat me in their disappointment. Some would promise me a beating when we next met unless I brought them a stipulated sum.
Occasionally boys hardly in their teens would demand blackmail. I was entirely innocent of even carrying on conversation with them, but they knew me through the adolescents of their neighborhood. The charges of these mere boys, though entirely false, were feared much more than those of adults, because it would have been a farmore serious offence to have had anything to do with those of tender years. Being no match for me in size, these boys had to resort to various expedients to extort money. They would sometimes attack me five or six together. Words cannot depict my terror on being thus attacked. The boys had their parents near to take their part, while I had not a soul to appeal to for help and to establish my innocence. I feared that all the ignorant foreign population would rise up against me, and in their wrath, kill me.
Chronic Overwhelming Fear.
If a mere boy attacked me single-handed, he would suddenly leap upon my back, hold himself there by throwing one arm tight around my neck so that I could not dislodge him, and if I ran, had to carry him along; and with the hand that was free, he would rain blows on me. To escape from such a predicament, I was glad to give him a few nickels.
Naturally as timid as the cry-baby species of woman, I always promenaded the dimly lighted side streets of these foreign quarters like a cat crossing a road, ever alert, ever halting to reconnoitre, and occasionally compelled to take to my heels on catching sight of the burly form, a dozen yards away, of a ruffian who never cared for my society, but who, because of innate loathing of a fairie—nourished by the statutes’ making the latter an outlaw—beat and robbed me at every opportunity. It was similar with young men not attractive to me, to whom I had refused my company. Through being as swift of foot as a gazelle, I escaped many blows. If flight were impossible, I would try entreaty. If entreaty failed, I would resortto ruse. Knocked down by a sledge-hammer blow, I would feign insensibility, and in all but one instance that ended the beating.
Typical Night on Bowery.
Is it any wonder that generally before starting out for a ramble on the side streets, I felt as if I were going forth to meet death on the scaffold? But I was fascinated by the adolescents who spent their evenings on these streets, and who had previously given me their company, and I was hoping to meet them again. I was also led on by the craze for as many as possible every evening. Maximum erat octo; modus, duo aut tres.
On the Bowery itself, soldiers and sailors were my special quest. As already indicated, these two types were to me thebeau idealof masculine beauty. I outline one of my most successful nights.
I encounter four stalwart artillerymen of about my own age. I am bewitched and must find some way to make their acquaintance immediately. I would not take the risk of indecently accosting them as girls commonly did on the Bowery at that time. I adopted the expedient of walking along under their noses on the crowded sidewalk, swaying my shoulders energetically and taking very short steps. In a few seconds they shouted out, “Hello Pretty!” surrounded me, and overwhelmed me with terms of endearment, while I begged them to take me to be their baby and slave. A room is secured for an hour. When the time came to part, I was pained at the thought. It was hard for a moment or an hour to possess the society of a human demigod whom one would like toabide with and worship and serve forever, and then to be abruptly, completely, and eternally separated. Returned to the street, they repeatedly request me to leave them. Arrived at their objective, a low dance-hall, they are compelled to use threats of violence, and abandon me at the entrance.
Sample of Conversation.
Two flashily dressed adolescents emerge. They halt in order to light cigarettes but find they have no matches. I offer some, welcoming the opportunity to enter into conversation. “You are handsome, sporty-looking fellows. I cannot tell you how much I adore you.”
“What’s here? A fairie?”
“Yes, I’m a fairie, and I would like to be a slave to sports like you. Don’t this fellow look every inch a slugger? How I worship sluggers!”
“You do, do you? Do you want to take a walk with us?”
“Delighted. I was just crying because some soldiers shook me, but making your acquaintance brings me happiness again, because you are wild young bloods.”
“What do you see in a fellow to love any way? I don’t see anything. What good do you get out of loving a fellow?”
“Well, what do you see in a girl to love? I don’t see anything. Girls are not brave. They are not rough. They are not strong. You are brave, rough, and strong, and that is why I love you. I love fellows for the same reason you love girls—because they are my opposites. The weak love the strong and the strong, the weak. The brave love the timid and the timid, the brave. The shy love the bold and the bold, the shy.
Sample of Numerous Robberies.
I love a boyBecause I’m coy;It would be wrongNot to love the strong;In the fierce and roughI find the right stuff;The gallant and braveThey make me rave;While the reckless and boldAre better than gold.”
I love a boyBecause I’m coy;It would be wrongNot to love the strong;In the fierce and roughI find the right stuff;The gallant and braveThey make me rave;While the reckless and boldAre better than gold.”
I love a boyBecause I’m coy;It would be wrongNot to love the strong;In the fierce and roughI find the right stuff;The gallant and braveThey make me rave;While the reckless and boldAre better than gold.”
I love a boy
Because I’m coy;
It would be wrong
Not to love the strong;
In the fierce and rough
I find the right stuff;
The gallant and brave
They make me rave;
While the reckless and bold
Are better than gold.”
I always sought by sprightly conversation to win the good will of chance companions, but a small proportion were incorrigible. As soon as we arrived on a dark deserted street, one of the young men said: “Do you know I am a detective, and I arrest you for accosting us. But if you’ll hand me a dollar, I will let you off this time.” (Impersonating a detective is a common practice in robbing fairies.)
“I haven’t that much, and you wouldn’t take from a poor unfortunate the few cents he has, would you?”
“Hand over all you’ve got! You’ll find you have run up against a hard party!”
“You ought not to hit me like that, because I’m a girl. A fellow ought to be ashamed to hit a girl.”
“You’re no girl, you!” adding the appropriate vulgar epithet.
“I am too. I can take you to a doctor and prove it by his word. I am a girl incarnated in a boy’s body.”
For fear of a pummeling, I handed over all I had, less than a dollar.
Excessive Venery Very Harmful.
“I am undecided what to do with you, lock you up, or give you a thrashing, you d—— fairie!”
“Please let me go! I am very weak and can’t stand much. You want to punish me for being a fairie, but I can’t help being what Nature made me. Do you think any one would be a fairie from choice when they are the most despised of mankind? Think how much better God has been to you than to me. Have pity on me! I am one of the most unfortunate of human beings! For your dear mother’s sake—whom every boy must love—I beg you to show me mercy!”
An appeal to mother-love seldom failed. I return to the dance-hall and enter. My soldier friends are nowhere to be seen, so I take a seat among a group of blue-jackets of my own age, and am not slow in betraying my character through expressions of my admiration. A room is hired.
It was after threeA. M.when I sought rest. But my brain was so excited that I tossed about for two hours, having alternately chills for five minutes, and then fever. I felt that I was going to lose my mind any moment, and besought the Omniscient to allay my excitement. I had gone beyond my strength, and in addition the excessive venery was harmful to the nervous system. After five o’clock, I repeatedly fell into a doze, but immediately beginning to dream that my face and buccal cavity were covered with the most loathsome syphilitic ulcers—such as a university confidant had once told me he had seen in a hospital,falsely, in order to scare me from fellatio with strangers—I would awake with a start, horror-stricken.After suffering this nightmare a dozen times, I finally fell into a restful sleep lasting until early afternoon.
Typical Night on Side Street.
A typical night on the side streets: On Canal Street near Thompson was a pool parlor where acquaintances of the highest type for this period of my life—in large part adolescent drivers for the express companies—passed their evenings. While I was received in pool parlors of a lower grade, my presence would have been unwelcome here. One evening I was loafing in front of the place, waiting for some acquaintance to pass. Before long I was recognized, my presence announced to those within, and all temporarily interrupted their games to crowd around me. The majority had never seen me before, and were anxious to interview the person who was then the talk of the young “sports” of that part of the town, as well as of many other parts. Even in the foreign laborer quarters of New York City, if is rare for a young man to run across a professional fairie—as they constitute as near as I canguessonly one out of every three thousand physical males—and furthermore, I have been repeatedly told that I acted the part in such perfection as never seen in any other.
Question after question was addressed to me: How did I ever get it into my head that I was a girl? Why had I been born that way? Was it because my parents had indulged shortly before I was born, so that membrum virile concurreret meam faciem? Wasn’t it because God wished to visit upon me some sin of my parents? (Practically all were more or less devout Roman Catholics.)Were any of my brothers similarly affected? Had I ever had relations with a woman? At what age did the peculiar desire show itself? Etc. I gladly answered every question, and told them the story of my life, only with such non-essential variations from the truth as my protection demanded.
Occasionally Told Story of Life.
All soon returned to their games except four, none of whom I had ever met previously. I consented to take a walk with two, and insisted that the others must leave us because of their age, only sixteen. We strolled to the neighboring absolutely deserted shore of the Hudson River, and took possession of one of the hundreds of covered trucks stalled there for the night. I soon discovered the two that had been left behind peeking into the van. Startled for fear of a plot, I leaped to the ground in order to flee. But on their immediately starting in to caress me, I fell at their feet in adoration. Both were clad in the blue uniform of express-company employees, and therefore presented a particularly pleasing appearance.
Some adolescents—as these four—went to extremes just for the novelty of it, out of curiosity to observe my peculiar nature, or to derive amusement through frolicking with me. In some cases, subsequently filled with abhorrence that I would so lower myself—as they looked upon it—they would be moved to inflict physical pain, or temporary disfigurement of the face, which I shrunk from a thousand times more than from pain.
After an hour of such treatment as filled me with bliss, a change of attitude began to manifest itself. Knowing by experience that I was destined to suffer, I watched mychance, unexpectedly dashed away from them, and with the extraordinary speed that I was capable of when frightened, directed my course away from the absolutely deserted river front. All four immediately started in pursuit. The zig-zag chase—for I turned at every corner—extended more than a quarter of a mile. The terrifying shouts, “Stop thief! Stop thief!” rang in my ears throughout the course, and I as continuously prayed for the help of the Almighty to enable me to escape. Their cries, however, failed to bring assistance since the streets of this wholesale and warehouse section are at midnight entirely deserted.
A Typical Chase.
I was at about the end of my endurance, and realized that unless something unexpected happened, I must in a moment fall into their hands. But a merciful Providence was about to intervene to save a persecuted outcast from what promised to be a serious assault. I had just turned the acute angle that Vestry Street makes with Canal, and the nearest of my pursuers was only a hundred feet behind. Toward midnight the horse cars on Canal Street ran only at fifteen minute intervals, but at that very second one happened to be jogging along only twenty-five feet from the apex of the acute angle. I leaped upon the platform and entered the car. If this had happened in sight of my pursuers, they would undoubtedly have followed my example and assaulted me inside the car, as happened in another similar adventure.
In Darkest New York.
On another midnight, as I was sauntering down —— —— looking for company, I became infatuatedwith a giant of a ruffian seated on a hydrant just below —— Street. I began my prattle and we soon walked off together to the neighboring —— Park. He appeared to be such a reckless character that I was afraid to accompany him off a public place, and contented myself with spooning on one of the park benches. We were soon joined by two pals, who had followed to see what was up, because maybe there was a chance for highway robbery. But they discovered that it was only a low-class fairie. They were also splendid specimens of the youthful ruffian. I was madly attracted toward all three, and now reclining in the bosom of one, and now in that of another, I gave utterance to the infant’s natural language expressive of contentment at being petted and babied by these giants, whom I affectionately called my “Big Braves.” I would lift their hands to my mouth and cover them with kisses, and roll up their sleeves and cover their arms with kisses.
After some time, two of them said goodnight, leaving me alone with the giant whose acquaintance I had first made. I finally agreed to accompany him to his room. Whenever we sighted a policeman, he remarked: “Let’s go over to the other side of the street. I don’t want that cop to see my face.” After entering the side-door of a repulsive-looking “Saloon,” we walked down a very long passage, divided into sections by several heavily barricaded doors, each provided with a peep-hole and door-tender, who opened only to the elect. Protection was thus secured against surprises by the police. We finally arrived in a spacious room filled with small tables, around whichwere seated a dozen flashily dressed “sports,” about the same number of shabbily clad ruffians, three or four girls costumed as for a fancy-dress ball, and five “sports” in the biological sense of that word, that is, youths with no front teeth, hair à la mode de Oscar Wilde (that is, hanging down in ringlets over the ears and collar) and clad in bright colored wrappers. Their faces were painted, and their bodies also were seen to be when later they threw aside the loose wrappers.
Professional Fairies.
The assemblage were sipping their favorite beverages. From time to time decidedly obscene dances took place—in 1897 to be seen only in brothels, but in 1917 gracing even university receptions. In the terpsichorean art, our universities today stand only where our brothels stood twenty years ago. One of the painted youths furnished the dance music. Another from time to time rendered the latest songs in a treble voice.
When some came forward to make my acquaintance, my friend introduced me as “Miss June.” I protested: “Not Miss June. That doesn’t sound pretty. Jennie June. I am only a baby girl, not a grown-up female.”
Three of the fairies were introduced to me as Jersey Lily, Annie Laurie, and Grace Darling. Two others had adopted the names of living star actresses. The unreflecting and uneducated victims of innate androgynism, and having passed their lives exclusively in the slums of New York, they had always been perfectly satisfied with the lot Nature had ordained for them. As already stated, in unenlightened lands, as India, these human “sports,” clad in feminine apparel, appear in public in the company ofyoung bloods. Among the American Indians, they adopt the dress and occupation of squaws, become married to a brave, and lead a quiet virtuous life of toil. But Christendom has refused to acknowledge that God has created this type of human being, the woman with masculine genitals. It hunts them down, and drives them from one section of our great cities to another by repeated raids on their resorts. It attributes their fundamental peculiarities to moral degradation, when they are due to Nature. Of course, in the case of these fairies in the slums of New York, deep moral degradation had supervened upon their innate androgynism.
Fairies in All Communities.
Active pederasts, who frequent such resorts, and normal young men who visit them just to see life, spoon with me. A charming smooth-spoken young gallant holds me on his lap before the roomful of people, and addresses me as “My dear boy,” to which I reply, “Please don’t call meboy; call megirl.” I am bewitched by my wooer, who uses to me the most indecent language I ever heard, and right in the hearing of all those assembled. I do not act rational. I do not wish to act rational. I wish to act like a baby girl. I am in high spirits, and the men visitors are much amused at my conduct. The other fairies also impersonate the woman and the baby, much to the amusement of their audience. Whoever has visited such a performance must acknowledge that this type of human being are born actors, or actresses, whichever term may be preferred. They themselves prefer the latter.
On another midnight when I was promenading theBowery, a band of young desperadoes, who had been indulging freely in liquor, emerged from a dance-hall. They were longshoremen, coal-heavers, etc. Their burly forms and bacchanalian madness fascinated me, and I rushed into their midst exclaiming: “Where did you get these pretty red badges? Won’t you give me one?” They were all members of some political club which had given a dance that night.
Close of Low-Class Fairie Period.
The gang immediately recognized my character, and I became the recipient of chivalrous and amorous attentions from them all. I accompanied them on their way home, down the Bowery to Chatham Square, and then eastward to the neighborhood of Water Street. They repeatedly urged me to enter some low dive with them, but I would not think of it. They were too reckless and vicious a lot, and I was satisfied with being wooed by them on the public street in their delightfully wild and rough way. Finally arrived at a groggery where some of them felt at home, they will no longer listen to a refusal. They drag me inside and down into the cellar.
Has the reader ever perused the account of the deeds of the sons of Belial in Gibeah, performed 3,400 years ago to the detriment of a certain Levite and his concubine, as recorded in the Book of Judges? These modern sons of Belial, these lowest, most ignorant, most animal, and most vicious of all the inhabitants of the modern Babylon, repeated that night on their helpless victim the deeds of the men of ancient Gibeah. I was then carried to the street and abandoned.
This assault proved to be the millstone that broke thecamel’s back. I was at last rendered unable to be on my feet owing to spinal trouble, and to excruciating pain in the anus whenever I attempted to walk. I was compelled to enter a hospital.
Year 1897—I Reform.
For several years following, cleanliness required me gerere pannum perpetuo intra subuculam causa incontinentiae defecationis. But it was of little account, by no means rendering me what Beza would denominate “a stinking androgyne.” The liquid excretion did not at all interfere with my pursuits of the scholar or the female-impersonator. As I must keep everything secret, I took upon myself the entire care of the cloths in my room. After a few years, the sphincter again functioned completely.
When able to leave the hospital, I felt satiated for life with coitus, and exceedingly homesick. I yielded to the temptation to find shelter under the parental roof. On my arrival home, which I had hardly expected to see again, I could do nothing but weep for the first half hour, and it was several hours before I could speak without bursting into tears. My mother enfolded her “little innocent boy,” and my father had softened. Of course I never gave a true account of our period of estrangement.
I now believed that my career as a fairie was over. My early religious enthusiasm was renewed, and I began to spend a large part of my time in related studies. As already made known, I had had the career of a foreign missionary in mind from childhood up to the age of nineteen, and before many weeks I felt that now I was loosed from that terrible obsession by the “procreative” side ofhuman life, I could look forward to laboring in the field of missions. After two months of activity in church work in my native village, an opening presented itself in the near-by metropolis.
A Self-Abnegating Religious Teacher.
I thus passed an exceedingly satisfactory summer, and hoped and prayed that this religious enthusiasm might continue indefinitely. What a contrast between this life and that as Jennie June! While the phenomena of the procreative side of life bring to man the highest earthly bliss, they also occasion the intensest misery. The life as Jennie June had been a bitter life apart from all the extraneous suffering. But in a life given for others, seeking not its own, there was everything satisfying, and nothing to regret. Truly there is a glorious salvation from sin and unhappiness in announcing glad tidings to the poor, binding up the broken-hearted, and opening the eyes of the spiritually blind.
But this salvation was not to be mine. It is in the power of the vast majority of the human race to live what are called decent, moral lives; but it is not in the power of all. My “sin” was a disease of the mind, not wilful sin, especially at this and earlier periods of my career. I was a born “nymphomaniac,” if this word may be used of one who has no nymphae. In respect to the strength of the urge after coition, I am akin to the male rather than the female sex. As few others have tried, I tried to overcome the evil inherent in my nature, but in vain. The manner in which this period of religious enthusiasm ended is shown in the following extract from a letter written to my spiritual adviser.
God Hides His Face from Me.
“... But the blessing of God suddenly left me, and I found myself without a single thought on religion to give expression to. Previously I had no loss for words. Every verse of scripture had been to me a revelation of divine truth, bristling with suggestions for my talks; but now all are to me empty words, without force. The scriptures appear to me false. The story of Christ appears to me to be a myth. I agonize before God, and beseech Him to restore unto me the joy of salvation, and not to take the Holy Spirit from me. I cry out: ‘I do not believe it to be a myth! These infidel thoughts which come upon me are not mine! I believe, Lord, I believe, but my mind proves false to me! Help thou mine unbelief!’
“But God makes himself known in no way. It is to me as if there were no God. But I will persist in believing there is one. I read the Bible chapter after chapter, praying for light, but all the time there is nothing but darkness and doubt in my heart. Continually the thought comes into my mind: ‘There is no personal God.’ I still read diligently Row’s ‘Jesus of the Evangelists,’ which in former times had carried me up into the third heaven of bliss in the conviction of the historic character of the Gospels, and in adoration of the Christ; but the very same book is now tedious and falls flat. I had been speaking as if fully inspired by the Holy Ghost, and lost all consciousness of self. But the last three times, I spoke simply because I had to, my own heart being full ofemotionsof unbelief. After three flat failures, I decided to give up.
“My thorn in the flesh also now gives me no rest day nor night. It drives peace from my mind every day, and sleep from my eyes every night. Few have to endure suchtorture of unsatisfied longing. How I do bewail the fact that I have this abnormal passion which cries out for appeasement! It is not I who wish the gratification, I call God to witness. I wish all passion annihilated in me, and to spend my days in study and in doing good.... I have been celibate five months, and expected to continue so forever, but I now suspect such a life to be contrary to God’s will. All my hopes of leading an honorable life have been dissipated. All the indications are that God does not call me to preach the Gospel....”
Divine Ban on Celibacy.
A few mornings later I happened to be reading in the 23d Street Y. M. C. A. A poorly clad adolescent brushed lightly against me and I felt myself electrified. Looking up furtively, I recognized a Bowery favorite of six months before. To me his face appeared to be lighted up with an unearthly radiance, and a halo of glory encircled his head. As my identity was known at the Y. M. C. A., and as I was wearing my valuables, I did not dare reveal myself. But I was acutely lovesick the remainder of the day, pining to run across my friend again under circumstances such that I could greet him.
It actually chanced the following morning that I again encountered him, this time on the street several blocks distant from the Y. M. C. A. Though clad as a prosperous citizen, I would have greeted him on the street if he had not this time been accompanied by a malevolent-looking pal. After we had passed without either giving any sign of recognition, he came up behind, tapped me on the shoulder, and said: “Hello! Don’t you remember me? Don’t you remember meeting me on Doyers Street?”
Conflicts of Double Life.
I was thunderstruck. It was the only time I have ever been recognized by a paramour of the slums in a quarter of the city distant from our place of meeting. I now enumerate my encounters with acquaintances of the one life while living out the other side of my double life.
Three where I was not recognized: I meet face to face a policeman on Broadway who was my very first companion at the opening of my life as a fairie (“Red Mike”). While secretary to a millionaire in the suburbs, I rode twelve miles in the same car with two Mulberry Street companions with whom I had passed many evenings. I would not allow them to see my face. A soldier with whom I, as Jennie June, became acquainted at a fort, came near, ten years previously, being a member of my Sunday school class. (I wish to remind the reader that I engaged in no religious work while yielding to the “procreative” instincts. I have always considered such a combination scandalous. Inverts, while committing no sin in following their instincts in moderation, should leave church work absolutely alone unless they are able to crucify their carnal desire.) I myself recognized the soldier only after learning his name, and that he came from my own native village. I of course did not let him know that we once attended the same church.
Two of my Stuyvesant Square friends once greeted me in a store, and another on a street car. In a large city several hundred miles from New York, I was greeted by an actor friend of my Fourteenth Street days. Three different times in cities several hundred miles from New YorkI was greeted by former soldiers with whom I had associated at forts in the suburbs of that city. A number of times in the heart of New York I ran across soldiers with whom I had associated at those forts. Once while in a theatre, a soldier a few seats back called out, “Jennie June,” but I pretended not to hear him. On another occasion, while living in a small suburb, I was stopped near my home by a young man who asked if I could tell him “where a fellow they call ‘Jennie June’ lives?” Evidently he thought he recognized myself as Jennie June, but I boldly replied that I had never heard of such an individual. I feared a disclosure of my double life, but nothing eventuated.
Recognized by Jennie June’s Associates.
While visiting my native village in 1907, where I was now a stranger to nearly all the inhabitants, one of a group of young men whom I passed called out: “Hello Jennie June!... Hello Jennie June!... Why don’t you say something?” My appearing as if I did not hear him probably led him to conclude that he was mistaken. It is almost a miracle that the little community in which I was reared did not learn of my double life, since approximately four thousand young men knew me only as “Jennie June,” about one-half of whom were at one time soldiers by profession, and therefore wanderers over the face of the earth.
In 1914, in New York City, almost in front of the building where I was employed, a Stuyvesant Square acquaintance of more than ten years before thought he recognized me, called out “Jennie June,” and threw kisses. I pretended not to notice anything, which probably made him conclude he was mistaken.
J. J. Encounters Ralph Werther’s Associates.
Encounters with associates of my scholarly self while I was living out the life of “Jennie June” were almost equally numerous. While promenading the Bowery as a low-class fairie, I once passed a schoolmate from my native village, but he did not appear to recognize me. On two occasions while promenading Fourteenth Street as a high-class fairie, I passed university associates, but on only one occasion was there a sign of recognition. At neither time did my conduct happen to be suspicious.
While on a train returning from a frolic with soldiers of a fort in the suburbs, and somewhat disheveled, I rode in the same car with a university acquaintance, but avoided him, so that he probably did not recognize me. While entertaining at a shore resort a soldier to whom I was incognito, I ran across a near friend, to whom I was compelled to introduce the soldier. The friend was ever afterward cool and evidently suspected the truth. While walking with a ruffian of the slums, I was recognized by a chance travelling companion with whom I had sat at the same table for a week on a steamer. I denied my identity.
One evening when dressed rather shabbily and on a car bound for the slums, I was compelled to tip my hat to a lady friend who was also a passenger. I was thankful that it did not happen to be a male friend. When even in a more dilapidated condition, having spent the preceding night in the slums, and on a car bound for the room where I was to exchange my shabby clothes for my ordinary apparel, an intimate lady friend boarded the car. Hiding my face as best I could, I alighted at the next stop.
Once when my face had only just been battered up byviolent blows, I rode several miles in the same car with a male acquaintance who possibly recognized me. While in bed in a hospital with my face all battered out of shape, I was under the care of a former physician, to whom however I never had had occasion to reveal that I was an invert. Though we had met a score of times intimately, he failed to recognize me on account of my extreme disfigurement, and I was ashamed to make myself known. I had of course registered at the hospital under an assumed name.
I Am Held Up on Broadway.
To return to the chance meeting on Broadway—I was face to face with the individual whom at the time I desired to meet above every one else in the world, but through fear of blackmail or other undesirable consequences, did not dare confess that I had ever seen. After a moment of speechlessness, and with voice trembling through fright, I answered, “You are mistaken in the person. I do not remember ever seeing you before.”
“O you must remember me. You told me you were a waiter in a restaurant on the Bowery. Ain’t you working there no more?”
“I never worked in a restaurant. You mistake me for some one else.” Saying this I started to walk on.
“No, not just yet. I think I can convince you that we have met before.” He mentions things that occurred at our former meetings. Although all that he said was true, I continued to refuse to admit my identity. Finally he lost patience: “Say, give me a dollar, will you? I haven’t had anything to eat for two days. Hand it out,or I’ll make it so hot for you right here that you’ll wish you had!”
Involuntary Muscle Dance.
Expecting to be knocked into the gutter, or that something even worse was about to transpire, I yielded to his demand. He pocketed the money and went on his way. I saw slipping by perhaps the only opportunity of my life to make an appointment with the particular individual with whom at the time I was madly in love. I was also emboldened because I had found out that he would be easy with me. I ran after him and exclaimed: “I want to meet you again. Where do you hang out?”
“In Madison Square evenings.”
I immediately turned down a side street and hid in a doorway in order to ascertain whether I was being followed. From that meeting I rejoiced in the hope of future intimacy with one of my favorites of the Bowery period, and on the three following evenings wearily promenaded Madison Square for hours in search of him. On the third evening I with great joy discovered him seated alone. Eagerly approaching, I aped, as usual on such occasions, the voice and manners of a baby girl, while I began a graceful dance with various muscles of my body, motions occasionally aroused under sexual excitement. For the first time in nearly six months I adopted the role of “Jennie June,” and it gave me great satisfaction.
“My beautiful, beautiful Jew boy, I feared I would never see you again. Say, do you know you are beautiful? Do you know you are beautiful?”
“What do you do now since you don’t work in a restaurant?”