Nowadays such things as celluloid and pyralin can be sold under their
own name, but in the early days the artificial plastics, like every new
thing, had to resort to _camouflage_, a very humiliating expedient since
in some cases they were better than the material they were forced to
imitate. Tortoise shell, for instance, cracks, splits and twists, but a
"tortoise shell" comb of celluloid looks as well and lasts better. Horn
articles are limited to size of the ceratinous appendages that can be
borne on the animal's head, but an imitation of horn can be made of any
thickness by wrapping celluloid sheets about a cone. Ivory, which also
has a laminated structure, may be imitated by rolling together alternate
white opaque and colorless translucent sheets. Some of the sheets are
wrinkled in order to produce the knots and irregularities of the grain
of natural ivory. Man's chief difficulty in all such work is to imitate
the imperfections of nature. His whites are too white, his surfaces are
too smooth, his shapes are too regular, his products are too pure.
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