230 



NICKEL NICOLAI. 



ceases. The fluid is filtered again, and more of the 

 apple-green matter obtained by evaporation, which, 

 when retHssolved, becomes opaque, owing to the pre- 

 cipitation of arsenious acid. The fluid is again fil- 

 tered, evaporated, and suffered to crystallize, when 

 the sulphate of nickel may be relied upon as being 

 entirely pure. This sulphate, being again dissolved, 

 is decomposed by carbonate of soda, and the resulting 

 carbonate, maile into balls with oil, and surrounded 

 with charcoal in a crucible, and being heated in a 

 melting furnace fur two hours, yields a pure button 

 of nickel. Its colour, in this condition, is between 

 that of silver and tin ; and when polished, its lustre 

 is equal to that of platinum. It is malleable, and can 

 be forged into bars when hot, and hammered into 

 plates when cold ; specific gravity, when cast, is 

 8-402, and when forged, 8'66. It is capable of being 

 drawn into very fine wire. It is less fusible than 

 iron. In a covered crucible, some of it is volatilized, 

 and appears in drops on the cover of the crucible. It 

 is attractable by the magnet nearly in the same de- 

 gree as iron, and becomes itself a magnet by touch- 

 ing, hammering, &c. As nickel does not rust, it has 

 a very great superiority over steel in the construction 

 of a compass. There are two oxides of nickel the 

 dark ash-gray and the black. If potash be added to 

 the solution of the nitrate or sulphate, and the pre- 

 cipitate dried, we obtain the protoxide. It may Jbe 

 regarded as a compound of about 100 metal with 28 

 oxygen. The peroxide was formed by Thenard, by 

 passing chlorine through the protoxide diffused in 

 water : a black insoluble peroxide remains at the 

 bottom. Its colour is a brilliant black. When heated 

 it loses oxygen, and becomes protoxide. Sulphuret 

 of nickel, prepared directly from its elements, is of a 

 yellow colour, like iron pyrites, and brittle. It consists 

 of seventy nickel and thirty sulphur. Chloride of nickel 

 is prepared by evaporating the muriate to dryness. 

 It is of a yellow green colour, and is a proto-chloride. 

 When calcined in a retort, one portion, of an olive- 

 green colour, remains in the bottom of the vessel, 

 while another sublimes, and crystallizes in small, 

 light, brilliant plates of a gold yellow colour; these 

 are the deutochloride. An iodide of nickel may be 

 obtained by heating iodine and nickel in a tube. It 

 is a brown substance ; fusible ; soluble in water, to 

 which it imparts a light-green colour. The salts of 

 nickel possess the following general properties : 

 They have usually a green colour, and yield a white 

 precipitate with ferroprussiate of potash. Ammonia 

 dissolves the oxide of nickel. Sulphureted hydrogen 

 and infusion of galls occasion no precipitate. The 

 hydrosulphuret of potash throws down a black pre- 

 cipitate. Their composition has been very imper- 

 fectly, ascertained. The sulphuric and muriatic acids 

 have little action upon nickel. Sulphate of nickel 

 crystallizes very readily. Its primary form is a right 

 square prism. The nitric and nitro-muriatic acids 

 aie the most appropriate solvents of nickel. The 

 nitric solution is of a pure green colour. Carbonate 

 of potash throws down from it a pale apple-green 

 precipitate, which, when well washed and dried, is 

 very light. When ammonia is added in excess to a 

 nitric solution of nickel, a blue precipitate is formed, 

 which changes to a purple-red in a few hours, and is 

 converted to an apple-green by an acid. The alloys 

 of nickel with other metals are unimportant. With 

 gold, in the ratio of twenty grains to one ounce, 

 nickel, a brass coloured brittle compound is formed. 

 With iron it unites in every proportion. If nickel 

 prevails, the metal is white, and the ductility and 

 magnetism are equal to that of iron. It does not 

 amalgamate with mercury. Pure nickel being dear 

 and rare, it is entirely unknown in common life, and 

 almost so in the arts. It would undoubtedly be ap- 



plied to useful purposes if it could be found in suffi- 

 cient quantity. The ores of nickel are not numerous. 

 They consist of native nickel, arsenical nickel, and 

 nickel ochre. Native nickel is found in delicate 

 capillary crystals, of a metallic lustre and brass-yellow 

 colour. According to Arfredson, it consists of 64'35 

 nickel and 34-26 sulphur. Before the blow-pipe, it 

 melts into a brittle metalllic globule, colours glass of 

 borax violet-blue, and is dissolved in nitric acid with- 

 out leaving a residue. It occurs at Johanngeorgen- 

 stadt in Saxony, Joacbimsthal in Bohemia, and in 

 the Westerwald. It has sometimes been called 

 capillary pyrites. Arsenical nickel, or kupfer nickel, 

 occurs reticulated, dendritic and botryoidal, but more 

 commonly massive. Cleavage unknown, imperfect ; 

 fracture .small conchoidal, uneven ; surface smooth ; 

 lustre metallic ; colour copper-red ; streak pale, 

 brownish-black ; brittle ; hardness above that of 

 fluor ; specific gravity 765. It consists of nickel 

 44-20 ; arsenic 54'72, with small proportions of iron, 

 lead, cobalt, and sulphur. Before the blow-pipe, it 

 melts upon charcoal, and emits an arsenical smell. 

 It chiefly occurs in veins, often accompanied by ores 

 of silver and lead. In undergoing natural decom- 

 position, it is sometimes covered by an apple-green, 

 friable substance, which is called the nickel oc/ire, 

 and which consists of 37-35 oxide of nickel and a 

 little cobalt, of 36-97 arsenic acid, and 24'32 of 

 water. Arsenical nickel is found in veins, at Schnee- 

 berg, Freiberg, and several other places in Saxony ; 

 also in Bohemia, Thuringia, Hessia, Dauphiny, Corn- 

 wall. It has been met with also in the United States, 

 at one locality, Chatham, Connecticut, associated 

 with arsenical cobalt. Mr Dobereiner has observed 

 that the metallic alloy, consisting chiefly of arsenic 

 and nickel, which is obtained from the process of 

 fabricating smalt, often crystallizes in four-sided 

 tabular crystals, and is in every respect similar to 

 arsenical nickel. 



NICKOJACK CAVE. See Cave. 



NICK, OLD; the devil. Butler sportively de- 

 rives this term from Nicholas Machiavelli ; 



Nick Machiavel had ne'er a trick 

 (Though he gave name to our Old Nick') 

 But was below the least of these. 



Hudibras, p. ui. c. 1. 1. 1314. 



But it was in use among the English writers before 

 the time of Nick Machiavel, and is derived from our 

 Saxon ancestors, who called the devil Old Nick, or, 

 probably, from the northern sea-god, or evil spirit of 

 the waters (Nicken). 



NICOBAR ISLANDS; a group of nineteen 

 islands in the bay of Bengal, between 6 45' and 

 9 15' N. lat., and 93 and 95 E. Ion. They yield 

 cocoas, plantains, teak, sassafras, pine-apples. The 

 thick forests and heavy dews render the climate un- 

 healthy for foreigners. The Danes formed a settle- 

 ment here in 1756, but were obliged to abandon it, 

 on account of the mortality among the colonists. 



NICODEMUS ; one of the leaders of the Pha- 

 risees, who is represented in the gospel as a ruler 

 of the Jews. He went to Jesus by night to receive 

 the instructions of a teacher whom he believed to 

 come from God, and afterwards defended him openly 

 before the Pharisees, and assisted Joseph of Arima- 

 thea in paying the last honours to their divine Master. 

 Nicodemus was afterwards deprived of his dignities, 

 driven from the synagogue, and banished from Jeru- 

 salem by the Jews. A spurious gospel, called the 

 Acts, is ascribed to him. 



NICOLAI, CHRISTOPHER FREDERIC ; a German 

 author and bookseller of some note in the history of 

 German literature, as the founder of the AllgewetH* 

 Deutsche liibliothek, which contributed essentially to 

 promote a critical spirit in Germany. Nicolai. was 



