58 
TRANSACTIONS OF THE TEXAS ACADEMY OP SCIENCE. 
the drug acts in the manner made out by Gluzinski, the apparent effects 
must vary according as one or more of the cardiac actions of the drug 
appear to triumph; so that the phenomena noted by Gluzinski are not 
absolutely contradictory to those of the other observers.” 
In my own experiments with sparteine regarding the actions of this 
agent on the circulation particularly, the frog and the dog were the ani¬ 
mals chiefly employed. 
When sparteine, in doses of about 0.005 gramme per kilo of the ani¬ 
mal’s weight, is administered intravenously to mammals, especially the 
Fig. L. 
Tracing II.—The same, without interruption, the heart ceasing at this point, 
or 6 minutes and 20 seconds after the stoppage of respiration. 
dog, there occurs at first a slight rise of the arterial pressure accompanied 
with an increased action of the heart. In a short time both the rate of 
the pulse and the height of the blood-pressure fall below the normal 
standard, to return, if the dose is not pushed beyond the limits men¬ 
tioned, to the original point. If the ingestion of the drug, however, be 
continued, the depression, with slight variations is gradual till the occur¬ 
rence of death of the animal. A noticeable phenomenon is the enormous 
increase in size of the individual pulse-waves accompanying the reduc¬ 
tion in the frequency of the cardiac beat and the fall of the arterial pres¬ 
sure (See tracing II, Figs. E, F, G, and H; and tracing III, Figs. O and 
P). Regarding the heart itself, phenomena similar to those seen in the 
dog are observed in the batrachian. 
I shall first study the action of sparteine on the heart of the frog. 
These experiments consisted of two series: one in which the organ was 
simply exposed; in the other series, the heart was isolated. In both in¬ 
stances a control experiment was at the same time performed, using for 
the latter a normal solution of chloride of sodium. I detail the follow¬ 
ing experiments: 
