Mouse. plural mice. n. s. [mus, Saxon; mus, Latin.] The smallest of all beasts; a little animal haunting houses and corn fields, destroyed by cats.
The eagle England being in prey,
To her unguarded nest the weazel Scot
Comes sneaking, and so sucks her princely eggs;
Playing the mouse in absence of the cat. Shakespeare.
These shall be unclean; the weasle, the mouse, and the tortoise. Lev. xi. 29.
Where mice and rats devour'd poetick bread,
And with heroick verse luxuriously were fed. Dryden.
This structure of hair I have observed in the hair of cats, rats, and mice. Derham's Physico-Theol.