Pygmalion

MRS. HIGGINS. Very nicely put, indeed, Henry. No woman could resist

such an invitation.

HIGGINS. You let her alone, mother. Let her speak for herself. You will

jolly soon see whether she has an idea that I haven't put into her head

or a word that I haven't put into her mouth. I tell you I have created

this thing out of the squashed cabbage leaves of Covent Garden; and now

she pretends to play the fine lady with me.

MRS. HIGGINS [placidly] Yes, dear; but you'll sit down, won't you?

Higgins sits down again, savagely.

LIZA [to Pickering, taking no apparent notice of Higgins, and working

away deftly] Will you drop me altogether now that the experiment is

over, Colonel Pickering?

PICKERING. Oh don't. You mustn't think of it as an experiment. It

shocks me, somehow.

LIZA. Oh, I'm only a squashed cabbage leaf.

PICKERING [impulsively] No.

LIZA [continuing quietly]--but I owe so much to you that I should be

very unhappy if you forgot me.

PICKERING. It's very kind of you to say so, Miss Doolittle.

LIZA. It's not because you paid for my dresses. I know you are generous

to everybody with money. But it was from you that I learnt really nice

manners; and that is what makes one a lady, isn't it? You see it was so

very difficult for me with the example of Professor Higgins always

before me. I was brought up to be just like him, unable to control

myself, and using bad language on the slightest provocation. And I

should never have known that ladies and gentlemen didn't behave like

that if you hadn't been there.

HIGGINS. Well!!

PICKERING. Oh, that's only his way, you know. He doesn't mean it.

LIZA. Oh, I didn't mean it either, when I was a flower girl. It was

only my way. But you see I did it; and that's what makes the difference

after all.

PICKERING. No doubt. Still, he taught you to speak; and I couldn't have

done that, you know.

LIZA [trivially] Of course: that is his profession.

HIGGINS. Damnation!

LIZA [continuing] It was just like learning to dance in the fashionable

way: there was nothing more than that in it. But do you know what began

my real education?

PICKERING. What?

LIZA [stopping her work for a moment] Your calling me Miss Doolittle

that day when I first came to Wimpole Street. That was the beginning of

self-respect for me. [She resumes her stitching]. And there were a

hundred little things you never noticed, because they came naturally to

you. Things about standing up and taking off your hat and opening

doors--