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NICKEL. 
NICKEL. 
M.  Charles  Tissier  has  communicated  to  the  Paris  Academy 
of  Sciences  a  note  upon  some  peculiar  properties  of  nickel. 
This  metal,  which  is  placed  near  to  iron  in  the  electro-chemical 
tables  of  Berzelius,  as  also  in  the  classification  of  metals  in  fami- 
lies by  Ampere,  is  again  brought  near  to  the  latter  metal  in  M. 
Thenard's  classification  according  to  the  affinity  of  metals  for 
oxygen.  However,  although  nickel  resembles  iron  so  closely  by 
its  atomic  weight  and  by  analogous  compounds,  such  as  its  salts, 
such  is  not  the  case  when  we  consider  nickel  in  other  respects ; 
thus  it  is  generally  supposed,  on  account  of  its  place  in  the 
electro-chemical  series,  that  nickel  will  precipitate  copper  from 
its  solution  as  zinc  and  iron  do.  M.  Tissier  assures  us,  however, 
that  no  such  phenomenon  takes  place.  He  has  left  pure  fused 
nickel  for  15  hours  in  a  liquid  containing  a  mixture  of  chloride 
of  ammonium  and  sulphate  of  copper  (1  part)  and  water  (10 
parts).  At  the  end  of  this  time  no  copper  had  been  precipita- 
ted, and  the  piece  of  nickel  which  weighed  18-925  grammes  be- 
fore the  experiment,  weighed  exactly  the  same  when  it  was  ter- 
minated. A  piece  of  bronze  of  aluminium  placed  in  the  same 
conditions  has  been  found  to  lose  6  per  cent,  of  its  weight,  and 
a  piece  of  German  silver  more  than  7  per  cent. 
All  acids,  save  nitric  acid,  have  only  a  weak  solvent  power 
on  melted  nickel.  In  15  hours  sulphuric  acid,  diluted  with  twice 
its  weight  of  water,  only  dissolved  0.032  grammes  of  18  grammes 
submitted  to  its  action.  Strong  hydrochloric  acid  only  dissolved 
0«15  grammes  of  the  same  quantity  in  the  same  time. 
When  these  results  are  compared  to  those  obtained  with  iron, 
zinc,  copper,  lead  and  tin,  it  is  seen  how  superior  nickel  is  to 
these  metals,  and  how  much  nearer  it  comes  to  silver  ;  for  like 
the  latter  it  appears  to  be  attacked  with  ease  by  nitric  acid 
alone.  According  to  M.  Wertheim  the  tenacity  of  nickel  is  to 
that  of  iron  as  90  is  to  70.  M.  Tissier  next  informs  us  that 
nickel  can  be  obtained  in  France,  in  the  pure  state,  at  10  francs 
a  pound  (Eng.),  or  20  francs  the  kilogramme,  and  that,  at  this 
price,  with  the  properties  it  possesses,  it  is  capable  of  many  useful 
applications,  among  others  that  of  serving  in  calico  printing  to 
take  off  the  excess  of  color  or  mordant  from  the  cylinders.  The 
