not in thought the same adjectival character in the numeral as there is in the nounal group. If I say bright stars, fabled graces, uncertain seas, receptive senses, these adjectives have the same relation to their substantives, whether those substantives be taken in the plural or in the singular. Whereas the numerals two, three, four, five, belong to their substantives only conjointly and not severally. It may have been a dim sense of this difference that caused the vacillation which has appeared in language about the adjectival declension of numerals. In Saxon the first three numerals were declined. Thus, preora is genitive of preo: 'Pis is þæra preora hida land gemære''This is the landmeer of the three hides.' (A.D. 749.)

458. This group is exceedingly retentive of antiquity. Not only is there a radical identity in the numerals throughout the Gothic family, but these again are identical with the numerals of other families of languages. This indicates a very high antiquity. We may illustrate this fact by comparative tables. First, we will compare the different forms assumed by the numerals in some of the chief branches of our own Gothic family, and then we will pass beyond that limit and take into our comparison some of the most illustrious languages of the Indo-European stock.

6

459. In consequence of the luxuriant declension of the numerals in Sanskrit, I have followed the authority of Bopp's Grammar for the theme' in each case; that is to say, the part of the word which is present or implied in each of the various forms under which it appears in literature.

2 For wēnō-dika. Michel Bréal, Grammaire Comparée par Bopp, Tomė

1 For dakan.

ii. p. 233.

460. It is in the Ordinal numbers that the numeral more particularly assumes the adjectival character. We retain all the Ordinals in their Saxon form except two, namely, first and second. First rose into its place from the dialects; but second was borrowed from the French-a solitary instance among the Numerals, properly so called. The Saxon word. in its place was OTHER, a word which has now a pronominal value only. It had this pronominal value in ancient times, in the Old High German andar and in the Mosogothic anthar. This equivocal use it doubtless was which caused our adoption in this single case of a French Ordinal. The Germans also have discarded ander from the numerical function probably for the same reason; and they have made a new Ordinal for that place after the prevalent type, der zweite.

461. Adverbial numerals are such as once, twice, thrice, four times, &c., where it is to be observed that the difference of adverbial form between the first three numerals and their successors is of a piece with the fact that these three were and others were not, or at last not in an equal degree, declinable in Saxon. It is generally found in languages that the earlier numerals are the more liable to flexion. The adverbs once, twice, thrice, are in fact genitival forms under a frenchified orthography. In the Ormulum they are spelt thus, aness, twizess, thrizess. But even when divested of their French garb, they do not prove to be old Saxon forms. In Saxon times the genitive was not used for this purpose: there was indeed an adverbial ANES (genitive of ÂN, one) but it meant ‘at one,' ' of one accord.' For once, twice, thrice, the Saxon was ane, tuwa, thriwa. But although our forms are not ancient, their distinctness from the rest of their series is founded upon an ancient distinction. For in the correponding Saxon series there was a like transition: the next terms were feower sidon, fif sidon, &c.

The numerals have been inserted in this place as a sort of appendix to the nounal group, because of their manifest affinity to that group. At the same time, enough has been said to indicate that they have a several character of their own, and that it would be unphilological to let them be absorbed into any class of words whatever.

That this is the proper place for the numerals we conclude not only from their assimilation to the nounal group on the one hand, but also from certain traces of affinity which they bear to the pronouns on the other.