One Thousand Ways to Make Money by Page Fox

989. MAGIC SILK.--It seems like the trick of the magician to speak of

turning cotton into silk, but it can actually be done, or at least cotton can be made to resemble silk, so that discrimination between the two fabrics is impossible. About fifty years ago, one Mercer, a French chemist, showed that cotton when subjected to the action of concentrated acid or alkalies, contracts and has a greater affinity for dyes, but it has only just been discovered that “mercerization” gives also a brilliant luster to the cotton. The cotton is stretched violently during the operation, and when an energetic rubbing is added to the tension the tissue receives a permanent luster. It thus replaces silk at a fraction of its cost, and offers a splendid chance for financial enterprise.