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  [Illustration: Page 5.
  {Husband and wife in bed looking at white mouse}]




            _NEW JUVENILE LIBRARY._


                      The

                     STORY

                     of the

                  WHITE MOUSE.


                Embellished With
          _Four Elegant Copperplates._
          A New and Correct Edition.


                    LONDON:
          Printed for the Booksellers.
                     1816.




  The
  STORY
  of the
  WHITE MOUSE.


In the kingdom of Bonbobbin, which, by the Chinese annals, appears
to have flourished twenty thousand years ago, there reigned a prince,
endowed with every accomplishment which generally distinguishes the sons
of kings. His beauty was brighter than the sun. The sun, to which he was
nearly related, would sometimes stop his course, in order to look down
and admire him.

His mind was not less perfect than his body; he knew all things without
having ever read; philosophers, poets, and historians, submitted their
works to his decision; and so penetrating was he, that he could tell the
merit of a book by looking on the cover. He made epic poems, tragedies,
and pastorals, with surprising facility; song, epigram, or rebus,
was all one to him; though, it is observed, he could never finish an
acrostick. In short, the fairy who presided at his birth had endowed him
with almost every perfection; or, what was just the same, his subjects
were ready to acknowledge he possessed them all; and, for his own
part, he knew nothing to the contrary. A prince so accomplished,
received a name suitable to his merit; and he was called
_Bonbenin-bonbobbin-bonbobbinet_, which signifies Enlightener
of the Sun.

As he was very powerful, and yet unmarried, all the neighbouring kings
earnestly sought his alliance. Each sent his daughter, dressed out in
the most magnificent manner, and with the most sumptuous retinue
imaginable, in order to allure the prince; so that, at one time, there
were seen at his court, not less than seven hundred foreign princesses,
of exquisite sentiment and beauty, each alone sufficient to make seven
hundred ordinary men happy.

Distracted in such a variety, the generous Bonbenin, had he not been
obliged by the laws of the empire to make choice of one, would very
willingly have married them all, for none understood gallantry better.
He spent numberless hours of solicitude, in endeavouring to determine
whom he should choose. One lady was possessed of every perfection, but
he disliked her eye-brows; another was brighter than the morning-star,
but he disapproved her fong-whang; a third did not lay enough of white
on her cheek; and a fourth did not sufficiently blacken her nails. At
last, after numberless disappointments on the one side and the other, he
made choice of the incomparable Nanhoa, queen of the Scarlet Dragons.

The preparations for the royal nuptials, or the envy of the disappointed
ladies, needs no description; both the one and the other were as great
as they could be. The beautiful princess was conducted, amidst admiring
multitudes, to the royal couch, where, after being divested of every
encumbering ornament, he came more chearful than the morning; and
printing on her lips a burning kiss, the attendants took this as a
proper signal to withdraw.

Perhaps I ought to have mentioned in the beginning, that, among several
other qualifications, the prince was fond of collecting and breeding
mice, which being an harmless pastime, none of his counsellors thought
proper to dissuade him from; he therefore kept a great variety of
these pretty little animals in the most beautiful cages, enriched with
diamonds, rubies, emeralds, pearls, and other precious stones. Thus he
innocently spent four hours each day in contemplating their innocent
little pastimes.

But, to proceed, the prince and princess now retired to repose; and
though night and secrecy had drawn the curtain, yet delicacy retarded
those enjoyments which passion presented to their view. The prince
happening to look towards the outside of the bed, perceived one of the
most beautiful animals in the world, a white mouse with green eyes,
playing about the floor, and performing an hundred pretty tricks. He was
already master of blue mice, red mice, and even white mice with yellow
eyes; but a white mouse with green eyes, was what he long ende