I'm pretty sure its illegal to sell
as silver, stuff that isn't hallmarked.
I've never really encountered too much of it. I don't like it and it's fraught with all this sort of nonsense - and the cleaning.

I bought the forks in a charity shop - because they were *not* silver plated and because they were a nice old-fashioned simple design of fork - the kind of fork I like for using. It was only much later that I bothered investigating them, and then only because they had the jeweller's name on them. I thought to try to find a bit of history or their age - but the (very young) assistant ran off with one, tested it and told me they were solid silver.
He was keen for me to order more to match - at £80 per fork, but sadly, very reluctant to even consider giving me £80 per fork.
I'm completely unsure about any illegalities - I could of course take the forks to get then assayed and marks put on - but the marks would be lying as far as age was concerned and would do nothing for the desirability of the forks for flogging.
I'd probably be best selling them for (tested) scrap.
None of this helps you with your magnifier! All I can suggest is to think of a nice-ish number for a decorative and useful thing and get rid.
