ANGINA PECTORIS (q.v.) is a painful disease of the heart which has been already described. Palpitation, is an extremely rapid and sometimes forcible action of the heart. Irregular and Intermittent Action, are sufficiently described by their names ; irregular action may be tumultuous or so peculiar as to deserve the name of a veritable delirium cordis; intermission consists in the dropping of a beat every second, third, or fourth time, or seldomer. Sometimes the intermission only applies to the pulse, the heart acting regularly, and is caused by that particular systole not being forcible enough to propel the blood to the periphery ; occasionally we have two beats of the pulse and then an intermission, constituting what has been termed a pulses bigeminus, or the rhythm of the intermission may be even more varied. All these forms of perverted action of the heart may accompany valvular lesions, or they may occur in hearts whose valves are sound; the walls of such hearts are, however, almost. invariably more or less feeble, imperfectly nourished, and the blood often poor and watery. They are rarely indicative of any real danger, though sufficiently troublesome and alarming to the sufferer ; they arise from abnormal innervation, and are part of the penalties we pay for our present state of organization. We could enjoy nothing if we could not also suffer ; and the blush of sensitiveness, the quickened pulse of affection, are paid for by the throb of anxiety, and the fatal inhibition of the heart's action due to overwhelming emotion. Most of these cases, however, own a much more ignoble origin : a flatulent distention of the stomach, a crapulous dyspepsia, the abuse of alcohol and tobacco, &c., are frequent sources of nervous heart trouble, so frequent that in some parts where young men most do congregate the tobacco-heart