How, my daughters! I thought I had instructed them enough: Children! retire; why do you walk this way? _Mir._ It is within our bounds, sir. _Prosp._ But both take heed, that path is very dangerous; remember what I told you. _Dor._ Is the man that way, sir? _Prosp._ All that you can imagine ill is there. The curled lion, and the rugged bear, Are not so dreadful as that man. _Mir._ Oh me, why stay we here then? _Dor._ I'll keep far enough from his den, I warrant him. _Mir._ But you have told me, sir, you are a man; And yet you are not dreadful. _Prosp._ Ay, child; but I Am a tame man; old men are tame by nature, But all the danger lies in a wild young man. _Dor._ Do they run wild about the woods? _Prosp._ No, they are wild within doors, in chambers, and in closets. _Dor._ But, father, I would stroak them, and make them gentle; then sure they would not hurt me. _Prosp._ You must not trust them, child: No woman can come near them, but she feels a pain, full nine months. Well, I must in; for new affairs require my presence: Be you, Miranda, your sister's guardian. [_Exit_ PROS. _Dor._ Come, sister, shall we walk the other way? The man will catch us else: We have but two legs, And he, perhaps, has four. _Mir._ Well, sister, though he have; yet look about you. _Dor._ Come back! that way is towards his den. _Mir._ Let me alone; I'll venture first, for sure he can Devour but one of us at once. _Dor._ How dare you venture? _Mir._ We'll find him sitting like a hare in's form, And he shall not see us. _Dor._ Ay, but you know my father charged us both. _Mir._ But who shall tell him on't? we'll keep each other's counsel. _Dor._ I dare not, for the world. _Mir._ But how shall we hereafter shun him, if we do not know him first? _Dor._ Nay, I confess I would fain see him too. I find it in my nature, because my father has forbidden me. _Mir._ Ay, there's it, sister; if he had said nothing, I had been quiet. Go softly, and if you see him first, be quick, and beckon me away. _Dor._ Well, if he does catch me, I'll humble myself to him, and ask him pardon, as I do my father, when I have done a fault. _Mir._ And if I can but escape with life, I had rather be in pain nine months, as my father threatened, than lose my longing. [_Exeunt._ SCENE III. _Enter_ HIPPOLITO. _Hip._ Prospero has often said, that nature makes Nothing in vain: Why then are women made? Are they to suck the poison of the earth, As gaudy coloured serpents are? I'll ask That question, when next I see him here. _Enter_ MIRANDA _and_ DORINDA _peeping_. _Dor._ O sister, there it is! it walks about Like one of us. _Mir._ Ay, just so, and has legs as we have too.