Mole (choled, , in our version 'weasel'). Although the similarity of sound in names is an unsafe ground to depend upon when it is applied to specific animals, still, the Hebrew and Syriac appearing likewise to imply creeping into, creeping underneath by burrowing—characteristics most obvious in moles—and the Arabic denomination being undoubted, choled may be assumed to indicate the above animal. This conclusion is the more to be relied on as the animal is rather common in Syria, and in some places abundant. Zoologists have considered the particular species to be the Talpa Europœa, which, under the name of the common mole, is so well known as not to require a more particular description. The ancients represented the mole to have no eyes: which assertion later scientific writers believed they had disproved by showing our species to be possessed of these organs, though exceedingly small. Nevertheless, recent observations have proved that a species, in other respects scarcely, if at all, to be distinguished from the common, is totally destitute of eyes. It is to be found in Italy, and probably extends to the East, instead of the Europea. Moles must not, however, be considered as forming a part of the Rodent order, whereof all the families and genera are provided with strong incisor teeth, like rats and squirrels, and therefore intended for subsisting chiefly on grain and nuts: they are on the contrary supplied with a great number of small teeth, to the extent of twenty-two in each jaw—indicating a partial regimen; for they feed on worms, larvae, and underground insects, as well as on roots, and thus belong to the insectivorous order: which brings the application of the name somewhat nearer to carnivora and its received interpretation 'weasel.'
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John Kitto was an English biblical scholar of Cornish descent.Born in Plymouth, John Kitto was a sickly child, son of a Cornish stonemason. The drunkenness of his father and the poverty of his family meant that much of his childhood was spent in the workhouse. He had no more than three years of erratic and interrupted education. At the age of twelve John Kitto fell on his head from a rooftop, and became totally and permanently deaf. As a young man he suffered further tragedies, disappointments and much loneliness. His height was 4 ft 8 in, and his accident left him with an impaired sense of balance. He found consolation in browsing at bookstalls and reading any books that came his way.
From these hardships he was rescued by friends who became aware of his mental abilities and encouraged him to write topical articles for local newspapers, arranging eventually for him to work as an assistant in a local library. Here he continued to educate himself.
One of his benefactors was the Exeter dentist Anthony Norris Groves, who in 1824 offered him employment as a dental assistant. Living with the Groves family, Kitto was profoundly influenced by the practical Christian faith of his employer. In 1829 he accompanied Groves on his pioneering mission to Baghdad and served as tutor to Groves's two sons. In 1833 Kitto returned to England via Constantinople, accompanied by another member of the Groves mission, Francis William Newman. Shortly afterwards he married, and in due course had several children.
A London publisher asked Kitto to write up his travel journals for a series of articles in the Penny Magazine, a publication read at that time by a million people in Britain, reprinted in America and translated into French, German and Dutch. Other writing projects followed as readers enquired about his experiences in the East amidst people living in circumstances closely resembling those of Bible times.
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