[150] These autumn festivals
culminated in the great festival of the winter solstice which we have
perpetuated in the celebrations of Christmas and New Year. Thus, while
the two great primitive culminating festivals of spring and autumn
correspond exactly (as we shall see) with the seasons of maximum
fecundation, even in the Europe of to-day, the earlier spring (March)
and--though less closely--autumn (November) festivals correspond with the
periods of maximum spontaneous sexual disturbance, as far as I have been
able to obtain precise evidence of such disturbance. That the maximum of
physiological sexual excitement should tend to appear earlier than the
maximum of fecundation is a result that might be expected.
The considerations so far brought forward clearly indicate that among
primitive races there are frequently one or two seasons in the
year--especially spring and autumn--during which sexual intercourse is
chiefly or even exclusively carried on, and they further indicate that
these primitive customs persist to some extent even in Europe to-day. It
would still remain, to determine whether any such influence affects the
whole mass of the civilized population and determines the times at which
intercourse, or fecundation, most frequently takes place.
This question can be most conveniently answered by studying the seasonal
variation in the birthrate, calculating back to the time of conception.
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