CHAPTER IV. TACUBAYA. PACHUCA. REAL DEL MONTE.

The fact is that ten is not the best number for the purpose; you can halve it, it is true, but that is about all you can do with it, for its being divisible by five is of hardly any use for practical purposes. Eight would be a much better number, for you can halve it three times in succession; and twelve is perhaps the most convenient number possible, as it will divide by two, three, and four. It is this convenient property that leads tradesmen to sell by dozens, and grosses, rather than by tens and hundreds. If we used eights or twelves instead of tens for numeration, we might of course preserve all the advantages of the Indian or Arabic numerals; in the first case, we should discard the ciphers 8 and 9, and reckon 5, 6, 7, 10; and in the second case, we should want two new ciphers for ten and eleven; and 10 would stand for twelve, and 11 for thirteen. Our happening to have ten fingers has really led us into a rather inconvenient numerical system.