DESTINY: The Data of Biology PART DESTINY CHAPTER The Data of Biology W OMAN? Very simple, say the fanciers of simple formulas: she is a womb, an ovary; she is a female-this word is sufficient to define her. In the mouth of a man the epithet female has the sound of an insult, yet he: is not ashamed of his animal nature; on the contrary, he is proud if someone says of him: "He is a maler"The term"female"is derogatory not because it emphasizes woman's animality, but because it imprisons her in her sex; and if this sex seems to man to be con temptable and inimical even in harmless dumb animals, it is evidently cause of the uneasy hostility stirred up in him by woman. Never- eless he wishes to find in biology a justification for this sentiment. The word female brings up in his mind a saraband of vast, round ovum engulfs and castrates the agile spermatozoon; the ale praying mantis and the spider, satiated with love, crush and ur their partners; the bitch in heat runs through the alleys, trail- ing behind her a wake of depraved odors; the she-monkey presents her posterior immodestly and then steals away with hypocritical co- query; and- the most superb wild beasts-the tigress, the lioness, the