Most of the marksmen shot even worse, some of them from eight to twelve per cent. worse.
The Professor continues: “An amusing feature of the tests was that some of the riflemen insisted not only that they could, but actually were shooting better after drinking the spirits, whilst in reality their marksmanship had fallen off as much as ten per cent.”
The late Sir Victor Horsley permitted me to quote the following from one of his lectures.
The cerebral activity of taking alcohol lasts only a few minutes, then marked slowing sets in, and for the rest of the time during which alcohol acts, varying from two to four hours according to the individual, the cerebral activity is diminished. It took longer for a person who had imbibed small quantities of alcohol to think, the evidence was overwhelming that alcohol in small quantities had a most deleterious effect on voluntary muscular work.
These facts bear out in every particular my own observations in watching others.
I find they are not so active in their movements, especially if they have to turn round suddenly to shoot, but at the same time they had more confidence in their ability to shoot.
Who has not seen (to go to the extreme case) when a large dose of alcohol has been swallowed and a man is “under the influence of liquor” that the “patient” is ready to fight all comers, although he cannot stand on his legs.
As Professor Kraeplin says, “the subject experimented on cannot judge—he thinks alcohol makes him shoot better although the actual facts are the other way about.”
At the Olympic Games which take place each four years, the members of the United States Rifle and Revolver Teams which compete are water-drinkers and non-smokers, and they are practically unbeaten to date.
Major Smith W. Brookhart of the Ordnance Department, United States National Guard, writing in Arms and the Man, May 4, 1918, says: “Civilization has advanced so much in the past decade, that it is now almost superfluous to write a caution against the use of stimulants. Every rifleman will admit that alcohol is an enemy. Total abstinence, bone dry, is the only safe rule. Tobacco or any other stimulants should also be avoided. They may not be so fatal as alcohol, but they all tend in the wrong direction. The man who wants to climb into the championship class and stay there must be a normal man. The proper attitude of mind will give every man more pleasure in conquering a habit than in submitting to it. To win over the smoking habit is an achievement of which to be proud and it improves the scores.”