Chap. 82.] 
ANIMALS TAMED IK PART ONLY. 
351 
stomachs are opened for this purpose, and some of the metal is 
always to be found there, which they have pilfered,** so great 
a delight do they take in stealing ! We learn from our Annals, 
also, that at the siege of Casilinum,*^ by Hannibal, a mouse was 
sold for two hundred denarii,*^ and that the person w^ho sold 
it perished with hunger, while the purchaser survived. To 
be visited by white mice is considered as indicative of a fortu- 
nate event; but our Annals are full of instances in which the 
singing*^* of a mouse has interrupted the auspices.*"^ Mgidius 
informs us, that the field-mouse conceals itself during winter : 
this is also said to be the case with the dormouse, which the 
regulations of the censors, and of M. Scaurus, the chief of the 
senate, when he was consul,*^ have banished from our tables,*^ 
no less than shell-fish and birds, which are brought from a 
foreign country. The dormouse is also a half- wild animal, and 
the same person^ made warrens for them in large casks, who 
.first formed parks for wild boars. In relation to this subject, 
it has been remarked that dormice will not mate, unless they 
happen to be natives of the same forest ; and that if those are 
put together that are brought from different rivers or moun- 
tains, they will fight and destroy each other. These animals 
nourish their parents, when worn out with old age, Vv^ith a 
singular degree of affection. This old age of theirs is put an 
We have two passages in Livy, B. xxvii. and B. xxx., where gold is 
said to have been gnawed by mice.— B. 
See B. iii. c. 9. In e.g. 217, this place was occupied by Fabius with 
a strong garrison, to prevent Hannibal from passing the Vulturnus ; and 
the following year, after the battle of Cannse, was occupied by a small body 
of Roman troops, who, though little more than 1000 in number, withstood 
the assaults of Hannibal during a protracted siege, until compelled by 
famine to surrender. 
This sum would be about £7. — B. 
It is by no means improbable that occentus here means singing," 
and not merely squeaking as the singing of a mouse would no doubt be 
deemed particularly ill-boding in those times. At the present day, a mouse 
has been heard to emit a noise which more nearly resembled singing than 
squeaking ; and a singing mouse " has been the subject of an exhibition 
more than once. 
We have frequent allusions to this occurrence in the writings of the 
Romans, some of which are referred to by Dalechamps ; Lemaire, vol. iii. 
p. 563.— B. 
A.u.c. 639 ; it does not appear what was the cause of this pro- 
hibition. — B. 
^•^ See B. xxxvi. c. 2. 
Fulvius Lupinus, as already stated in c. 78. — B. 
