Number-characters X, V and XX

Meaning

The characters X, V and XX are presented within a warning about reckoning at the beginning of the subsequent work. X is called a character, middle or point; V is explicitly its half; XX appears in a further reckoning whose precise application is not made transparent. The passage couples these signs with warnings against over-precision, haste and malformed outcome. The English preserves the characters and the uncertainty between number and time rather than supplying a decoded schedule. Their exact typography should remain retrievable. They are neither a warrant for inventing chemical proportions nor ordinary prose words whose ambiguity can be removed by silent normalization.