Symzonia: Voyage of Discovery

Their cloth is a beautiful substance, manufactured in a peculiar manner, by a process resembling that employed by the natives of the South Sea Islands, and not unlike our mode of making paper. The material is found in caves and amongst the rocks of the mountains, where a species of insects, larger than our spider, produce it in great abundance. They form webs somewhat like those of spiders, but of a firmer texture, and more compactly woven. These webs have the properties of asbestos, owing probably to the insects subsisting upon that or some similar substance. The inhabitants collect them with great care, and lay them in a mould of the dimensions of the piece of cloth to be made, placing so many of them one upon another as the intended thickness of the cloth requires. This done, a fluid preparation which hardens by the influence of fire, without losing its elasticity, is poured over it. It is then pressed firmly together, and passed over a heated cylinder, which completes the operation. This cloth is extremely convenient. Being incombustible, like asbestos, it is only necessary to pass a garment through the fire to purify it perfectly. It is also very durable; and being exquisitely white, it corresponds admirably with the delicate complexions of the people, and the mild light of the region they inhabit. All the divisions of labour necessary to the convenience and welfare of society, are here perfectly understood. The community is not bewildered by a voluminous and complex system of political economy, consisting of abstract principles, buried in abstract and unintelligible words, and rendered too intricate to be understood by those who have common sense, or too inapplicable to civilized society to be adopted by those who have any sort of sense--invented by the Wise men of one country to mislead the politicians of another, and to depress the Good and the Useful.