This last condition reached, the body loses power as if it were being gradually drained even of its blood." CONGESTION OF THE LUNGS.
"The vessels of the lungs are easily relaxed by alcohol; and as they, of all parts, are most exposed to vicissitudes of heat and cold, they are readily congested when, paralyzed by the spirit, they are subjected to the effects of a sudden fall of atmospheric temperature.

Thus, the suddenly fatal congestions of lungs which so easily befall the confirmed alcoholic during the severe winter seasons." ORGANIC DETERIORATIONS OF THE HEART.
The heart is one of the greatest sufferers from alcohol.

Quoting again from Dr.Richardson: "The membranous structures which envelope and line the organ are changed in quality, are thickened, rendered cartilaginous and even calcareous or bony.

Then the valves, which are made up of folds of membrane, lose their suppleness, and what is called valvular disease is permanently established.

The coats of the great blood-vessel leading from the heart, the aorto, share, not unfrequently, in the same changes of structure, so that the vessel loses its elasticity and its power to feed the heart by the recoil from its distention, after the heart, by its stroke, has filled it with blood.
"Again, the muscular structure of the heart fails, owing to degenerative changes in its tissue.