Mice

Mouse

I holde a mouses herte nat worth a leek. That hath but oon hole for to sterte to.

       Chaucer—Paraphrase of the Prologue of The Wyves Tale of Bath. L. 572.   1 
 The mouse that hath but one hole is quickly taken.
       Herbert—Jacula Prudentum. Plautus—Trunculentus. IV.   1 
               It had need to bee

A wylie mouse that should breed in the cat's eare.

       Heywood—Proverbs. Pt. II. Ch. V.   1 

"Once on a time there was a mouse," quoth she,

 "Who sick of worldly tears and laughter, grew

Enamoured of a sainted privacy;

 To all terrestrial things he bade adieu,

And entered, far from mouse, or cat, or man, A thick-walled cheese, the best of Parmesan."

       Lorenzo Pignotti—The Mouse Turned Hermit.   1 
 When a building is about to fall down all the mice desert it.
       Pliny the Elder—Natural History. Bk. VIII. Sec. CIII.   1 

The mouse that always trusts to one poor hole, Can never be a mouse of any soul.

       Pope—The Wife of Bath. Her Prologue. L. 298.   1 

The mouse ne'er shunn'd the cat as they did budge From rascals worse than they.

       Coriolanus. Act I. Sc. 6. L. 44.