procrastination, and at one time was thinking of appealing to the army to set Wilson aside and elect a successor; but at last, on the 13th of September, he forced Wilson to make up his mind to the assault, and he himself was chosen to lead the attacking column. On the morning of the 14th he led his column, 1000 strong, in the attack on the Kashmir gate, and successfully entered the streets of Delhi. But in trying to clear the ramparts as far as the Lahore Gate, he undertook a task beyond the powers of his wearied troops. In encouraging them as they hesitated, he turned his back on the enemy and was shot in the back. The wound was mortal, but his magnificent physique allowed him to linger for nine days before finally succumbing on the 23rd of September.
His best epitaph is found in the words of Sir John Lawrence’s Mutiny Report:—
“Brigadier-General John Nicholson is now beyond human praise and human reward. But so long as British rule shall endure in India, his fame can never perish. He seems especially to have been raised up for this juncture. He crowned a bright, though brief, career by dying of the wound he received in the moment of victory at Delhi. The Chief Commissioner does not hesitate to affirm that without John Nicholson Delhi could not have fallen.”
See J. L. Trotter, Life of John Nicholson (1904); Sir John Kaye, Lives of Indian Officers (1889); Bosworth Smith, Life of Lord Lawrence (1883); Lady Edwardes, Memorials of Sir Herbert Edwardes (1886); and S. S. Thorburn, Bannu (1876).
NICHOLSON, WILLIAM (1753–1815), English writer on natural
philosophy, was born in London in 1753, and after leaving school
made two voyages as midshipman in the East India service.
He subsequently entered an attorney’s office, but, having become
acquainted, in 1775, with Josiah Wedgwood, he lived for some
years at Amsterdam as agent for the sale of pottery. On his
return to England he was induced by Thomas Holcroft to devote
himself to the composition of light literature for periodicals,
assisting that writer also with some of his plays and novels.
Meanwhile he employed himself on the preparation of An Introduction
to Natural Philosophy, which was published in 1781 and
was at once successful. A translation of Voltaire’s Elements of
the Newtonian Philosophy soon followed, and he now entirely
devoted himself to scientific pursuits and philosophical journalism.
In 1784 he was appointed secretary to the General Chamber of
Manufacturers of Great Britain, and he was also connected with
the Society for the Encouragement of Naval Architecture, established
in 1791. He bestowed much attention upon the construction
of various machines for comb-cutting, file-making, cylinder
printing, &c.; he also invented an areometer. In 1800 he began
in London a course of public lectures on natural philosophy and
chemistry, and about this period he made the discovery of the
decomposition of water by the Voltaic current. In 1797 the
Journal of Natural Philosophy, Chemistry and the Arts, generally
known as Nicholson’s Journal, the earliest work of the kind in
Great Britain, was begun; it was carried on till 1814. During
the later years of his life Nicholson’s attention was chiefly directed
to Waterworks engineering at Portsmouth, at Gosport and in
Southwark. He died in London on the 21st of May 1815.
Besides considerable contributions to the Philosophical Transactions, Nicholson wrote translations of Fourcroy’s Chemistry (1787) and Chaptal’s Chemistry (1788), First Principles of Chemistry (1788) and a Chemical Dictionary (1795); he also edited the British Encyclopaedia, or Dictionary of Arts and Sciences (6 vols., 8vo, London, 1809).
NICHOLSON, WILLIAM (1784–1844), Scottish painter, was
born at Newcastle-on-Tyne. Having settled in Edinburgh, he
painted portraits both in oil and water-colour; and along with
Thomas Hamilton the architect he was one of the founders and
most vigorous promoters of the Scottish Academy, of which
he became the first secretary (1826–1333) In 1818 he published
a series of etchings entitled Portraits of Distinguished Living
Characters of Scotland, including Sir Walter Scott, Lord Jeffrey,
Robert Burns and Professor Wilson.
NICIAS (d. 414 B.C.), a soldier and statesman in ancient Athens,
inherited from his father Niceratus a considerable fortune invested
mainly in the silver mines of Laurium. Evidence of his
wealth is found in the fact that he had no less than 1000 slaves
whom he hired out. He gravitated naturally to the aristocratic
party, and was several times colleague with Pericles in the
strategia. On the death of Pericles he was left leader of the aristocrats against the advanced party of Cleon (q.v.). He made use of his wealth both to buy off enemies (especially informers) and to acquire popularity by the magnificent way in
which he discharged various public services, especially those
connected with the state religion, of which he was a strong
supporter. In the field he displayed extreme caution, and prior
to the great Sicilian expedition achieved a number of minor
military successes. In 421 he took a prominent part in the
arrangement of the “Peace of Nicias,” which terminated the
first decade of the Peloponnesian War (q.v.). He now entered
with varying success upon a period of rivalry with Alcibiades,
the details of which are largely matters of conjecture. So bitter
was the strife that the ostracism of one seemed inevitable, but
by a temporary coalition they secured instead the banishment
of the demagogue Hyperbolus (417). In 415 he was appointed
with Alcibiades and Lamachus to command the Sicilian expedition,
and, after the flight of Alcibiades (q.v.) and the death
of Lamachus, was practically the sole commander, the much
more capable Demosthenes, who was sent to his aid, being
apparently of comparatively little weight. How far it is just to
attribute to his excessive caution and his blind faith in omens
the disastrous failure it is difficult to say. At all events it is
clear that the management of so great an enterprise was a task
far beyond his powers. He was a man of conventional respectability
and mechanical piety, without the originality which was
required to meet the crisis which faced him. His popularity
with the aristocratic party in Athens is, however, strikingly
shown by the lament of Thucydides over his death: “He
assuredly, among all Greeks of my time, least deserved to come
to so extreme a pitch of ill-fortune, considering his exact performance
of established duties to the divinity” (vii. 86, Grote’s
version).
Besides Thucydides see Plutarch’s Nicias and Diod. xii. 83; also the general authorities on the history of Greece, and the article Peloponnesian War.
NICIAS, son of Nicomedes, an Attic painter of the 4th century B.C. Pliny (xxxv. 131) gives a list of his works. He was associated with Praxiteles, whose statues he coloured, thus adding to their value.
NICKEL (symbol Ni, atomic weight 58·68 (O＝16)), a metallic
element. It has been known from the earliest times, being
employed by the Chinese in the form of an alloy called pakfong.
It was first isolated in an impure condition in 1751 by A. F.
Cronstedt from niccolite, and his results were afterwards confirmed
by T. O. Bergman in 1775 (De niccolo, opusc. 2, p. 231;
3, p. 459; 4, p. 374). It occurs in the uncombined condition
and alloyed with iron in meteorites; as sulphide in millerite
and nickel blende, as arsenide in niccolite and cloanthite, and
frequently in combination with arsenic and antimony in the form
of complex sulphides. In recent years it has been found in
considerable quantities in New Caledonia in the form of a
hydrated silicate of nickel and magnesia approximating to the
constitution (NiO, MgO)SiO2·nH2O (J. Garnier, 1865), and in
Canada in the form of nickeliferous pyrrhotines, which consist
of sulphides of iron associated with sulphides of nickel and
copper, embedded in a matrix of gneiss. At the present time
nickel is obtained practically entirely from garnierite and the
nickeliferous pyrrhotines. When the former is used it is roasted
with calcium sulphate or alkali waste to form a~ matte which is
then blown in a Bessemer converter or heated in a reverberatory
furnace with a siliceous flux with the object of forming a rich
nickel sulphide. This sulphide is then by further heating converted
into the oxide and finally reduced to the state of metal
by ignition with carbon in clay crucibles. The process adopted
for the Canadian ores, which are poor in copper and nickel,
consists in a preliminary roasting in heaps and smelting in a blast
furnace in order to obtain a matte, which is then further smelted
with a siliceous flux for a rich matte. This rich matte is then
mixed with coke and salt-cake and melted down in an open
hearth furnace. The nickel sulphide so obtained is then roasted
to oxide and reduced to metal. For a wet method of extraction
