comparing a string to a number?

I've recently taken over an app that I didn't develop.

I found this in the code:

<xsl:if test="/Output/response/Field &lt; '20'">

This is confusing to me for a few reasons.  

1) The '20' is in quotes
2) the value of the Field node is most often a number, but on some occasions it's a letter/number pair, like 1A or 1B.

Can this check ever work?  Would 1A ever be "less" than '20'?

-Matt

 XSL-List info and archive:  http://www.mulberrytech.com/xsl/xsl-list