Note 171 — Chapter III

For 63% of them then degeneracy cannot be the cause, nor does it follow that it is the cause in the remaining 37% of cases. For many women with these stigmata are not found at all among the ranks of prostitution. To bring out the real import of the researches in question we must put beside them the results of an examination of non-prostitutes. It is for this reason that I wish to call attention to the work of Dr. P. Näcke, “Verbrechen und Wahnsinn beim Weibe”, in which the author arrives at the result that only 3% of the normal women examined by him failed to show signs of degeneracy.171 It seems to me, then, that when we find figures so low among normal women the thesis of Professor Lombroso is not proved.