106 PICTUEE-WEITING AND WORD- WRITING. 



and make a cross ; then ten again, and so on, till they have 

 finished; then they take the tens together, and make with 

 them hundreds, thousands, and hundreds of thousands.'^ ^ A 

 more naodern observer says of the distant tribe of the Creeks, 

 that they reckon by tens, and that in recording on grave-posts 

 the years of age of the deceased, the scalps he has taken, or 

 the war-parties he has led, they make perpendicular strokes for 

 units, and a cross for ten." The Chinese character for ten is 

 an upright cross ; and in an old Chinese account of the life of 

 Christ, it is said that " they made a very large and heavy ma- 

 chine of wood, resembling the character ten," which he carried, 

 and to which he was nailed.^ The Egyptians, in their hiero- 

 glyphic character, counted by upright strokes up to nine, and 

 then made a special sign for ten, in this respect resembling 

 the modern Creek Indians ; and the fact that the Chinese only 

 count I II 1 1 1 in strokes, and go on with an X for four, and 

 then with various other symbols till they come to 4- or ten, 

 does not interfere with the fact, that in three or four systems 

 of numeration, so far as we know independent of one another, 

 in Italy, China, and North America, more or less of the earlier 

 numerals are indicated by counted strokes, and ten by a crossed 

 stroke. Such an origin for the Roman X is quite consistent 

 with a half X or \J, being used for five, to save making a num- 

 ber of strokes which would be difficult to count at a glance.* 



However this may be, the pictorial origin of | | j [ || is be- 

 yond doubt. And in technical writing, such terms as T-square 

 and S-kook, and phrases such as " Q before clock 4 min.," 

 and " ]) rises at 8h. 35m.," survive to show that even in the 

 midst of the highest European civilization, the spirit of the 

 earliest and rudest form of writing is not yet quite extinct. 



1 Loskiel, Gesch. der Mission der eyangelischen Briider ; Barby, 1789, p. 39. 



2 Schoolcraft, part i. p. 273. 



^ Davis, 'The Chinese;' London, 1851, vol. ii. p. 176. 



^ A dactylic origm of V, as being a rude figure of the open hand, with thumb 

 stretched out, and fingers close together, succeeding the I II III III! , made with the 

 upright fingers, has been propounded by Grotefend, aud has occurred to others. 

 It is plausible, but wants actual evidence. 



