Silver


. . . most useful precious metal, it is prized for coins, jewelry, plate, photography, and medicine.
By KENNETH M. SWEZEY
OF THE precious metals, gold, silver, and platinum, silver is both the most common and the most useful. Beauty, malleability, sonorousness, and resistance to atmospheric oxygen have put it in demand for coins, jewelry, tableware, ornaments, and bells since the beginning of history. Because it has the highest electric conductivity of any substance, it is prized in electric equipment. Silver nitrate, its most common salt, is used in making indelible ink and hair dyes, in photography and silver plating, and in medicine as an antiseptic and germicide taken both internally and externally.