The daily morning journal and courier., 1901-04-01
THE PROCESS or CONVERTING
 COTTON INTO SILK.

l SOI IOIN lNIO SlLh.
 Cotton has often masqueraded as silk,
 but it seems rather queer that it can be
 made into real silk. The nitrated cot ton is put into a cylinder with ether
 alcohol and slowly revolved for twelve
 hours. Then, under pressure of forty
 five atmospheres; 1t is squirted out of
 glass tubes whose bore is e-one-t thou
 sandth of an inch. The air solidifies
 the threads as they are carried along
 on moving belts. They are fine as silk
 worm filaments and as lustrous. They
 take dyes we'll but they are so infiam-
 mable as to be almost explosive, obvi-
 ously fatal defect Just here is where
 the modern chemist shows the kind of
 creature he Is and what his principles
 are. I don't know what you think of a
 man that deliberately and to compass his own selfish ends takes advantage Of the little weaknesses of the elements and introduces a temper into peaceful chemical combinations to lead astray some members Such men exist They get their living by such, tricks. They even hold up their heads and call them selves respectables Here is this nitryl, living happily, so far as we know, with cellulose, and along comes the chemist and brings in a snirking, stylish To- thario of a srlphydrate of calcium and away goes the giddy, deluded nitryl leaning on his arm just like the poor lady In East Lynne" All that the de- serted artificial silk can do after that is to look pretty. It never plucks tip the courage to explode. We'll, it's a queer world
 One of the uses of this modification of the cottony, pithy structure found in all vegetables Is to spin 1t into threads and char 1t for the luminous loops in incan-, descent lamps. Also when woven into a kind of bobbinet and impregnated with the oxides of thoriun1 and cerium it makes the mantle of the Welsbach | light.
 Artificial silk can also be made out of glue, thus demonstrating that our an- cestors were not so foolish and ignorant as we like to think. So far as we can judge there was no reason why they | should not have made the proverb read: J You can't make a silk purse out of | cows heel" But they didn't say that. | They used another slmile. They were smart enough After taking all the trouble tolmake proverb they did not | propose to have science get the laugh | on them by making silk out of cows' hoofs and horns. The gelatine Is dis solved in water to the proper consisten- y, dyed and forced through tiny glass tubes as with the cellulose silk. It is 'eally an animal product like the silk worm silk, but the manufacturers have lot yet been able to get the appliances Or water -proof1ng the thread with the 'apor of formaline that the silkworm las which secrets the same drug for the ame purpose. Also, it is quite difficult o dry the thread quickly on the carry ng belts, for you can easily see that l hey cannot be made very long. sup ,ose every one that reads this will in- tantly think it would be easy to dry he threads if the room was made very warm, but, unfortunately, warmth and moisture together have the property of making the glue softer. Another difH- ulty is that the silk must be dyed be- ore it is spun, and as gelatine has a yay of not being the same shade for the anne quality of stickiness It is pretty ard to tell what color you will get till
 IS dry. If the spun threads are baked in the dye pot the stuff thinks nat this is a new way of making wine slly and makes all possible haste to nange itself from dress goods into des- ert Still, 1t makes very pretty silk
 you don't wear 1t out in rainstorrn. Harvey Southerland in Ainslees
 POLITICAL. \