head() doesn't do anything particularly useful for tables ... For example: z <- sample(1:20,size=1000,replace=TRUE) z2 <- sample(1:20,size=1000,replace=TRUE) t1 <- table(z,z2) head(t1) as.matrix() doesn't help ... head(as.matrix(t1)) this does ... class(t1) <- "matrix" so does head.table <- utils:::head.matrix is it worth making this duplication in the code? Ben Bolker