arterial walls will completely relax, and the amount of blood in the part affected will be increased correspondingly.
Alcohol, even in moderate doses, paralyzes the vasomotor nerves which control the minute blood-vessels, thus allowing these vessels to become dilated with the flowing blood.
"With the disturbance of power in the extreme vessels, more disturbance is set up in other organs, and the first organ that shares in it is the heart. With each beat of the heart a certain degree of resistance is offered by the vessels when their nervous supply is perfect, and the stroke of the heart is moderate in respect both to tension and to time. But when the vessels are rendered relaxed, the resistance is removed, the heart begins to run quicker like a clock from which the pendulum has been removed, and the heart-stroke is greatly increased in frequency. It is easy to account in this manner for the quickened heart and pulse which accompany the first stage of deranged action from alcohol."—Richardson.
Dr. Parkes of England, assisted by Count Wollowicz, conducted inquiries upon the effects of alcohol upon the heart, with a young and healthy man. At first they made accurate count of the heart beats during periods when the young man drank water only; then of the beats during successive periods in which alcohol was taken in increasing quantities. Thus step by step they measured the precise action of alcohol on the heart, and thereby the precise primary influence induced by alcohol. Their results are stated by themselves as follows:—
