language Crawfurd finds fourteen different classes of numerals "without
exhausting the list."[143]

In examining the numerals of different languages it will be found that the
tens of any ordinary decimal scale are formed in the same manner as in
English. Twenty is simply 2 times 10; 30 is 3 times 10, and so on. The word
"times" is, of course, not expressed, any more than in English; but the
expressions briefly are, 2 tens, 3 tens, etc. But a singular exception to
this method is presented by the Hebrew, and other of the Semitic languages.
In Hebrew the word for 20 is the plural of the word for 10; and 30, 40, 50,
etc. to 90 are plurals of 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9. These numerals are as
follows:[144]

10, eser, 20, eserim,
3, shalosh, 30, shaloshim,
4, arba, 40, arbaim,
5, chamesh, 50, chamishshim,
6, shesh, 60, sheshshim,
7, sheba, 70, shibim,
8, shemoneh 80, shemonim,
9, tesha, 90, tishim.

The same formation appears in the numerals of the ancient Phoenicians,[145]
and seems, indeed, to be a well-marked characteristic of the various
branches of this division of the Caucasian race. An analogous method
appears in the formation of the tens in the Bisayan,[146] one of the Malay
numeral scales, where 30, 40, ... 90, are constructed from 3, 4, ... 9, by
adding the termination _-an_.

No more interesting contribution has ever been made to the literature of