Separating variables in read.table

If I have a table (we'll call it, "test") containing two columns (as below):

i	x1	x2	x3	x4	x5	y
0	1.125	0.232	7.160	0.0859 8.905 1.5563
7	0.920	0.268	8.804	0.0865 7.388 0.8976
15	0.835	0.271	8.108	0.0852 5.348 0.7482
22	1.000	0.237	6.370	0.0838 8.056 0.7160
29	1.150	0.192	6.441	0.0821 6.960 0.3130
37	0.990	0.202	5.154	0.0792 5.690 0.3617
44	0.840	0.184	5.896	0.0812 6.932 0.1139
58	0.650	0.200	5.336	0.0806 5.400 0.1139


Is there a simple command to break this table into individual variables without having to code:

i <- test$i
x1 <- test$x1
x2 <- test$x2
.
.
.
And so on. . 

Many Thank for any assistance.

Patrick
This email message, including any attachments, is for th...{{dropped:6}}