xxxvi 



THE QUINARY SYSTEM. 



-r^MERII- 2. p. 

 £ Normal or Typical. 



s i 



\ J* 

 Aberrant. > 



Here tlie fifth member may be perceived " leading round" to 

 the first in order to inosculate with it. The term osculant^ that 

 is, kissing, or touching, is applied to " groups, which" are said to 

 44 form the passage between neighbouring groups of higher degree 

 and denomination than themselves."* " Laying aside osculant 

 groups," says Mr. MacLeay, 44 every natural group is divisible 

 into five, which always admits of a binary distribution, that is, into 

 two and three."f 44 Notwithstanding, also, the opposite declarations 

 which I have heard made," Mr. MacLeay says, 44 1 must persist in 

 asserting that neither the arrangement of these groups, nor the 

 groups themselves are arbitrary. Both, I may say, are almost ma- 

 thematically proved to be natural. " % We are taught further, that 

 such circular groups of five members as this, make an approach or 

 passage towards other groups, and that the whole objects of crea- 

 tion may be thus linked together in circular groups of fives. When 

 the systematists cannot perfect this number five in any particular 

 group, they tell us that the deficient member has either perished 



* Vigors, Zool. Journ. ii. 65. f Linn. Trans, vol. xiv. p. 587. 

 % Dying Struggle, p. 28. 



