This metal is of a white color and very difficult to melt, it is
about eight times heavier than water and is chiefly obtained from the
ore known as kupfer-nickel, found very plentifully in Germany; this
kupfer-nickel is a native arseniuret of nickel, that is, nickel in
chemical combination with arsenic. It is very difficult to separate
these two metals, but an effectual and cheap process has lately been
devised to do so.
Nickel is attracted by the magnet similar to iron but in an inferior
degree. Till lately nickel was but little used, but it now forms the
basis of those compound metals known as nickel-silver, German-silver,
and British-plate, all which varieties are generally employed as
an economical substitute for silver; it is also used largely as a
foundation on which to deposit pure silver by the electro-plating
process, for which purpose it is most admirably suited being very
superior to copper in consequence of its color, as the silver always
wears off unequally and exposes the ground work of metal beneath.
German-silver is composed of copper, nickel, and zinc, in various
proportions. Nickel always forms one of the constituents of meteoric
iron, those mysterious masses called aerolites, which sometimes fall
to the earth.