Pygmalion by G. B. Shaw-5/5
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5. AKT Der Salon von Mrs. Higgins Sie befindet sich wie zuvor an ihrem Schreibtisch. Das Stubenmädchen kommt herein.
DAS STUBENMÄDCHEN [an der Tür]: Mr. Henry, gnädige Frau, ist unten bei Colonel Pickering.
MRS. HIGGINS: Nun, führe sie herauf.
DAS STUBENMÄDCHEN: Sie benutzen gerade das Telefon, gnädige Frau. Ich glaube, sie telefonieren mit der Polizei.
MRS. HIGGINS: Was!
DAS STUBENMÄDCHEN [kommt näher und dämpft ihre Stimme]: Mr. Henry ist aufgewühlt, gnädige Frau. Ich dachte, ich sollte es Ihnen besser erzählen.
MRS. HIGGINS: Wenn Sie mir erzählt hätten, dass Mr. Henry nicht aufgewühlt wäre, würde es überraschender sein. Bitten Sie sie, heraufzukommen, wenn sie mit der Polizei fertig sind. Ich vermute, er hat etwas verloren.
DAS STUBENMÄDCHEN : Ja, gnädige Frau. [Sie geht]
MRS. HIGGINS: Gehen Sie nach oben und teilen Sie Miss Doolittle mit, dass Mr. Henry und der Colonel hier sind. Bitten Sie sie, nicht herunterzukommen, bis ich sie zu mir rufen lasse.
DAS STUBENMÄDCHEN: Ja, gnädige Frau.
Higgins platzt herein. Er ist, wie das Stubenmädchen gesagt hat, aufgewühlt.
HIGGINS: Schau mal, Mutter: Hier ist eine so verflixte Sache!
MRS. HIGGINS: Ja, mein Lieber. Guten Morgen. [Er zügelt seine Ungeduld und küsst sie, während das Stubenmädchen rausgeht]. Was gibt es?
HIGGINS: Eliza hat Reißaus genommen.
MRS. HIGGINS: [schreibt ruhig weiter] Du musst sie erschreckt haben.
HIGGINS: Ich soll sie erschreckt haben! Unsinn! Es wurde ihr gestern Abend, wie üblich überlassen, alle Lichter auszuschalten und all das; und dann, anstatt ins Bett zu gehen, hat sie sich umgezogen und das Haus verlassen: in ihrem Bett hat niemand geschlafen. Sie kam heute Morgen vor sieben Uhr mit einem Taxi, um ihre Sachen zu holen; und diese dumme Frau Pearce ließ sie sie mitnehmen, ohne mir ein Wort darüber zu sagen. Was soll ich machen?
MRS. HIGGINS: Am besten gar nichts, Henry. Es ist das gute Recht des Mädchens, zu gehen, wenn sie es wünscht.
HIGGINS: [geht abgelenkt durch den Raum] Aber ich kann nichts finden. Ich weiß nicht, welche Termine ich habe. Ich bin - [Pickering kommt herein. Mrs. Higgins legt ihren Stift weg und wendet sich vom Schreibtisch ab].
PICKERING [schüttelt ihr die Hand]: Guten Morgen, Mrs. Higgins. Hat Henry es Ihnen gesagt? [Er setzt sich auf die Ottomane].
HIGGINS: Was sagt dieser Dummkopf von einem Inspektor? Haben Sie einen Finderlohn ausgesetzt?
MRS. HIGGINS [steht in entrüsteter Verwunderung auf]: Du willst doch nicht sagen, dass du die Polizei auf Eliza angesetzt hast?
HIGGINS: Natürlich. Wofür ist die Polizei da? Was sonst hätten wir tun können? [Er sitzt in dem elisabethanischen Stuhl.]
PICKERING: Der Inspektor machte viele Schwierigkeiten. Ich denke wirklich, dass er uns einer ungebührlichen Absicht verdächtigt hat.
MRS. HIGGINS: Nun, natürlich hat er das. Welches Recht hast du, zur Polizei zu gehen und den Namen des Mädchens anzugeben, als wäre sie ein Dieb, ein verlorener Regenschirm oder etwas ähnliches? Wirklich! [Sie setzt sich wieder hin, tief verärgert.]
HIGGINS: Aber wir möchten sie finden.
PICKERING: Wir können sie nicht so gehen lassen, wissen Sie, Mrs. Higgins. Was sollten wir tun?
MRS. HIGGINS: Ihr habt beide nicht mehr Verstand, jeder als zwei Kinder. Ach - [Das Stubenmädchen kommt herein und unterbricht das Gespräch.]
DAS STUBENMÄDCHEN: Mr. Henry, ein Herr wünscht insbesondere, Sie zu sehen. Er wurde von der Wimpole Street geschickt.
HIGGINS: Oh, Mist! Ich kann jetzt keinen sehen. Wer ist es?
DAS STUBENMÄDCHEN: Ein Mr. Doolittle, Sir.
PICKERING: Doolittle! Meinen Sie den Müllmann?
DAS STUBENMÄDCHEN: Müllmann! Oh nein, Sir, ein Herr.
HIGGINS: [springt aufgeregt auf] Bei Gott, Pick, es ist ein Verwandter von ihr, zu dem sie gegangen ist. Jemand, von dem wir nichts wissen. [Zum Stubenmädchen]: Schicken Sie ihn rauf, schnell.
DAS STUBENMÄDCHEN: Jawohl, Sir. [Sie geht].
HIGGINS: [geht eifrig zu seiner Mutter] Vornehme Verwandte! nun werden wir was hören. [Er setzt sich in den Chipendale Stuhl].
MRS. HIGGINS : Kennst du jemanden aus ihrer Familie?
PICKERING : Nur den Vater: diesen Burschen, von dem wir erzählt haben.
DAS STUBENMÄDCHEN: [ankündigend) Mr. Doolittle. [Sie zieht sich zurück].
Doolittle tritt ein. Er ist hervorragend gekleidet in einen neuen modischen Gehrock, mit weißer Weste und grauer Hose. Eine Blume im Knopfloch, ein umwerfend schöner Seidenhut und Lackschuhe aus Leder runden die Wirkung ab. Er ist zu sehr mit der Angelegenheit beschäftigt, wegen der er gekommen ist, um Mrs. Higgins zu bemerken. Er geht direkt auf Higgins zu und behelligt ihn mit heftigen Vorwürfen.
DOOLITTLE: [zeigt auf sich selbst] Sehen Sie hier! Sehen Sie das hier? Sie haben das gemacht.
HIGGINS: Was habe ich gemacht, Mann?
DOOLITTLE: Das hier, meine ich. Schauen Sie es sich an. Siehen Sie sich diesen Hut an. Sehen Sie sich diesen Mantel an.
PICKERING: Hat Eliza Ihnen was zum Anziehen gekauft?
DOOLITTLE: Eliza! Nicht sie. Und ob! Warum sollte sie mir Kleidung kaufen?
MRS. HIGGINS: Guten Morgen, Mr. Doolittle. Möchten Sie sich nicht hinsetzen?
DOOLITTLE [verdutzt, als er merkt, dass er die Gastgeberin vergessen hat]: Bitte verzeihen Sie, gnä' Frau. [Er nähert sich ihr und schüttelt die Hand, die sie ihm reicht.] Danke. [Er setzt sich auf die Ottomane, zu Pickerings Rechten.] Ich bin so erfüllt von dem, was mir passiert ist, dass ich an nichts anderes denken kann.
HIGGINS: Was zum Teufel ist Ihnen passiert?
DOOLITTLE: Es würde mir nichts ausmachen, wenn es mir nur widerfahren wäre: Alles kann jedem passieren und niemand hat Schuld außer der Vorsehung, wie man so schön sagt. Aber das ist etwas, dass Sie mir angetan haben: ja, Sie, Henry Higgins.
HIGGINS: Haben Sie Eliza gefunden? Das ist der Punkt.
DOOLITTLE: Haben Sie sie verloren?
HIGGINS: Ja.
DOOLITLE: Sie haben das ganze Glück, das haben Sie. Ich habe sie nicht gefunden, aber sie wird mich jetzt schnell genug finden, nachdem, was Sie mir angetan haben.
MRS. HIGGINS: Aber was hat mein Sohn Ihnen angetan, Mr. Doolittle?
DOOLITTLE: Mir angetan! Mich ruiniert. Mein Glück zerstört. Fesselte mich und lieferte mich den Händen der Mittelklassemoral aus.
HIGGINS [steht unduldsam auf und steht vor Doolittle]: Sie fantasieren. Sie sind betrunken. Sie sind verrückt. Ich gab Ihnen fünf Pfund. Danach hatte ich zwei Unterhaltungen mit Ihnen für eine halbe Krone pro Stunde. Ich habe Sie seitdem nicht mehr gesehen.
DOOLITTLE: Oh! Betrunken! Bin ich das? Verrückt! Bin ich das? Sagen Sie es mir. Haben Sie einen Brief an einen alten Kerl in Amerika geschrieben oder haben Sie nicht, der fünf Millionen für die Gründung von Gesellschaften zur Erneuerung der Moral auf der ganzen Welt gestiftet hat und der Sie gebeten hat, eine universelle Sprache für ihn zu entwickeln?
HIGGINS: Was! Ezra D. Wannafeller! Er ist tot. [Er setzt sich wieder nachlässig hin.]
DOOLITTLE: Ja, er ist tot und ich bin erledigt. Haben Sie an ihn einen Brief geschrieben oder haben Sie nicht, um ihm zu sagen, dass derzeit der originellste Moralist Englands, nach Ihrem besten Wissen Alfred Doolittle ist, ein gewöhnlicher Müllmann.
HIGGINS: Oh, ich erinnere mich daran, nach Ihrem letzten Besuch einen dummen Witz dieser Art gemacht zu haben.
DOOLITTLE: Ah! Sie mögen es gern einen dummen Witz nennen. Mich aber, hat es endgültig erledigt. Gib ihm nur die Chance, die er haben wollte, um zu zeigen, dass die Amerikaner nicht wie wir sind; dass sie eine Leistung in jeder Gesellschaftsschicht, egal wie bescheiden, erkennen und respektieren Diese Worte stehen in seinem Testament, Henry Higgins, in dem er mir, dank Ihrer blöden Witze, einen Teil von seinem Pre-digested Cheese Trust im Wert von drei tausend pro Jahr hinterlässt, unter der Bedingung, dass ich für seine Wannafeller Moral Reform World League, wann immer sie mich fragen, bis zu sechs Mal pro Jahr, eine Rede halte.
HIGGINS: Den Teufel tut er! Donnerwetter! [Plötzlich aufgeheitert]: Was für ein Spaß!
PICKERING: Eine sichere Angelegenheit für Sie, Doolittle. Sie werden Sie kein zweites Mal fragen.
DOOLITTLE: Eine Rede zu halten, macht mir nichts aus. Ich kann so lange reden, bis sie die Nase voll haben, das kann ich ohne Problem. Es ist, dass aus mir ein Gentleman gemacht wird, das ist es, was ich ablehne. Wer hat ihn gebeten, aus mir einen Gentleman zu machen? Ich war doch glücklich. Ich war frei. Ich habe fast jeden um Geld angepumpt, wenn ich es wollte, Henry Higgins, genau wie ich Sie um Geld angepumpt habe. Jetzt bin ich beunruhigt; eng anliegender Kragen und Absätze; und jeder pumpt mich um Geld an. Mein Anwalt sagt, dass es eine feine Sache für Sie ist. Ist es das? sage ich. Sie meinen eher, dass es für Sie etwas Gutes ist, sage ich. When I was a poor man and had a solicitor once when they found a pram in the dust cart, he got me off, and got shut of me and got me shut of him as quick as he could. Das gleiche gilt für Ärzte; sie haben mich aus dem Krankenhaus geworfen, bevor ich kaum auf meinen Beinen stehen konnte, und kein Geld hatte. Nun fanden sie heraus, dass ich kein gesunder Mann bin und ich nicht leben kann, es sei denn, sie schauen zweimal am Tag nach mir. Im Haus darf ich für mich selbst keinen Finger krumm machen: Jemand anderes muss es tun und pumpt mich dafür um Geld an. Vor einem Jahr hatte ich keinen Verwandten auf der Welt außer zwei oder drei, die nicht mit mir sprechen wollten. Jetzt sind es fünfzig, und keine vernünftige Wochenlohn unter denen. Ich muss für andere leben und nicht für mich selbst: Das ist die Moral der Mittelklasse. Sie sprechen davon, Eliza zu verlieren. Don't you be anxious: I bet she's on my doorstep by this: she that could support herself easy by selling flowers if I wasn't respectable. And the next one to touch me will be you, Henry Higgins. I'll have to learn to speak middle class language from you, instead of speaking proper English. That's where you'll come in; and I daresay that's what you done it for.
MRS. HIGGINS: Aber mein lieber Mr. Doolittle, Sie müssen all das nicht erdulden, wenn Sie es wirklich ernst meinen. Niemand kann Sie zwingen, dieses Erbe zu akzeptieren. Sie können es aussschlagen. Ist es nicht so, Colonel Pickering?
PICKERING: Ich denke schon.
DOOLITTLE [seine Art abmildern, aus Rücksicht auf ihr Geschlecht]: Das ist die Tragödie bei dem Ganzen, gnä' Frau. Es ist einfach zu sagen, nimm es nicht an, aber ich habe nicht den Mut. Wer von uns hat den schon? Wir sind alle eingeschüchtert. Eingeschüchtert, gnä' Frau, das ist es, was wir sind. Was bleibt mir in meinem hohen Alter außer das Armenhaus, wenn ich es nicht annehme? Ich muss mir meine Haare schon färben, um meine Arbeit als Müllmann zu behalten. Wenn ich zu den wirklich Armen gehörte und ein bisschen vorgespielt hätte, könnte ich es ablehnen. Aber warum sollte ich, denn die wirklich Armen könnten genauso gut Millionäre sein, für all das Glück, das sie jemals haben. Sie wissen gar nicht, was Glück ist. Aber mich, als einer der unwürdigen Armen, unterscheidet nichts von dem Dasein der Armen, außer diesen verdammten Dreitausend pro Jahr, die mich in die mittlere Gesellschaftsschicht schieben. (Verzeihen Sie mir diesen Ausdruck gnä' Frau. Sie würden ihn selbst benutzen, wenn Sie so herausgefordert würden. Egal was du machst, sie haben dich: es ist eine Wahl zwischen Skylla, dem Armenhaus und Charybdis, der Mittelklasse; und ich habe nicht die Nerven für das Armenhaus. Eingeschüchtert: das bin ich. Pleite. Gekauft. Glucklichere Männer als ich werden meinen Müll abholen und mich um ihr Trinkgeld angehen; und ich werde hilflos zuschauen und sie beneiden. Und das ist es, wozu mich Ihr Sohn gebracht hat. [Er wird von Gefühlen überwältigt].
MRS. HIGGINS: Nun, ich bin sehr froh, dass Sie nichts Unvernünftiges tun werden, Mr. Doolittle. Denn das löst das Problem von Elizas Zukunft. Sie können jetzt für sie sorgen.
DOOLITTLE: [mit melancholischer Resignation] Ja, gnä' Frau; von mir wird jetzt erwartet, dass ich von dreitausend pro Jahr für alle sorge.
HIGGINS [hochspringend] Unfug! Er kann nicht für sie sorgen. Er soll nicht für sie sorgen. Sie gehört ihm nicht. Ich habe ihm fünf Pfund für sie gezahlt. Doolittle: Entweder sind Sie ein ehrlicher Mann oder ein Schurke.
DOOLITTLE: [tolerant] Ein bisschen von beidem, Henry, wie der Rest von uns: ein bisschen von beidem.
HIGGINS: Nun, Sie haben das Geld für das Mädchen genommen; und Sie haben kein Recht, sie obendrein noch zu nehmen.
MRS. HIGGINS: Henry : Sei nicht albern. Wenn du wirklich wissen willst, wo Eliza ist, sie ist oben.
HIGGINS: [erstaunt] Oben!!! Dann werde ich sie doch gleich herunterbringen. [Er strebt entschlossen zur Tür].
MRS. HIGGINS[erhebt sich und folgt ihm] Ruhe bewahren, Henry. Setz dich!
HIGGINS: Ich- MRS. HIGGINS: Setz dich, mein Lieber; und hör mir zu.
HIGGINS: Oh, also gut, na gut, na gut. [Er wirft sich ungnädig auf die Ottomane, mit dem Gesicht zu den Fenstern]. Aber ich denke, du hättest mir das vor einer halben Stunde sagen können.
MRS. HIGGINS: Eliza kam heute Morgen zu mir. Sie verbrachte die Nacht, indem sie teils wütend herumlief und versuchte, sich in den Fluss zu stürzen und davor zurückschreckte und teils im Carlton Hotel. Sie erzählte mir, auf welche brutale Weise ihr beide sie behandelt habt.
HIGGINS:[springt wieder auf] Wie bitte!
PICKERING:[erhebt sich auch] Meine liebe Mrs. Higgins, da hat sie Ihnen Geschichten erzählt. Wir haben sie nicht brutal behandelt. Wir haben kaum ein Wort zu ihr gesagt, und wir trennten uns vor allem im Guten. [Geht auf Higgins los]. Higgins: Hast du sie schikaniert, nachdem ich ins Bett gegangen bin?
HIGGINS: Es war genau andersrum. Sie schmiss mir meine Pantoffeln ins Gesicht. Sie benahm sich auf die ungeheuerlichste Weise. Ich habe sie niemals auch nur im geringsten herausgefordert. Die Pantoffeln sind mir voll ins Gesicht geflogen, als ich den Raum betrat - bevor ich ein Wort von mir gegeben hatte. Und benutzte eine vollkommen schreckliche Sprache.
PICKERING [erstaunt]: Aber warum? Was haben wir ihr angetan?
MRS. HIGGINS: Ich denke, ich weiß genau, was ihr gemacht habt. Das Mädchen ist natürlich ziemlich liebevoll, denke ich. Ist sie, oder, Mr. Doolittle?
DOOLITTLE: Sehr liebevoll, gnä Frau. Kommt nach mir.
MRS. HIGGINS: Genau so. Sie war an euch beide gebunden. Sie hat sehr hart für dich gearbeitet, Henry! Ich glaube, es ist dir nicht ganz bewusst, was irgendwas, wie Gehirnarbeit, einem solchen Mädchen ausmacht. Nun, anscheinend, als der große Tag der Prüfung kam und sie, ohne einen einzigen Fehler zu machen, diese großartige Sache für Euch bestanden hat, habt Ihr zwei dort gesessen und mit ihr kein Wort gesprochen, sondern nur miteinander darüber geredet, wie froh Ihr wart, dass alles vorbei war und wie gelangweilt von dem ganzen Ihr wart. Und dann wunderst du dich, weil sie deine Pantoffeln nach dir wirft! Ich hätte das Bügeleisen nach dir geworfen.
HIGGINS: Wir haben nichts anderes gesagt, außer dass wir müde sind und ins Bett gehen wollen. Oder, Pick?
PICKERING [mit den Schulter zuckend]: Das war alles.
MRS. HIGGINS [ironisch]: Ganz sicher?
PICKERING: Absolut. Wirklich, das war alles.
MRS. HIGGINS: Ihr habt ihr nicht gedankt, sie gelobt, ihr Bewunderung gezeigt oder ihr gesagt, wie großartig sie war.
HIGGINS [ungeduldig]: Aber das weiß sie doch alles. Wir haben ihr keine Reden gehalten, wenn es das ist, was du meinst.
PICKERING [reuevoll]: Vielleicht waren wir ein wenig rücksichtslos. Ist sie sehr verärgert?
MRS. HIGGINS [returning to her place at the writing-table] Well, I'm afraid she won't go back to Wimpole Street, especially now that Mr. Doolittle is able to keep up the position you have thrust on her; but she says she is quite willing to meet you on friendly terms and to let bygones be bygones.
HIGGINS [furious] Is she, by George? Ho!
MRS. HIGGINS: Wenn du versprichst, dich zu benehmen, Henry, werde ich sie bitten herunterzukommen. Falls nicht, geh nach Hause; du hast schon genug meiner Zeit verschwendet.
HIGGINS: Oh, na gut! In Ordnung. Pick: Benehmen Sie sich gut. Lassen Sie uns unsere besten Sonntagsmanieren für diese Kreatur, die wir aus der Gosse aufgesammelt haben, an den Tag legen. [Er wirft sich mürrisch in den elisabethanischen Stuhl.]
DOOLITTLE [ protestiert]: Nun, nun, Henry Higgins! Nehmen Sie etwas Rücksicht auf meine Gefühle als Mittelklassemann.
MRS. HIGGINS: Erinnere dich an dein Versprechen, Henry. [ Sie drückt den Klingelknopf am Schreibtisch]. Mr. Doolittle: Sind Sie so gut und treten für einen Moment hinaus auf den Balkon. Ich möchte nicht, dass Eliza einen Schock für Ihre Neuigkeiten bekommt bis sie sich mit diesen beiden Herren versöhnt hat. Gestatten?
DOOLITTLE: Wie Sie wünschen, meine Dame. Alles, um Henry zu helfen, sie von mir fernzuhalten. [ Er verschwindet durch das Fenster ].
Das Stubenmädchen antwortet auf die Glocke. Pickering setzt sich auf Doolittles Platz.
MRS. HIGGINS: Bitten Sie Miss Doolittle herunterzukommen, bitte.
DAS STUBENMÄDCHEN: Ja, gnä' Frau. [ Sie geht hinaus ].
MRS. HIGGINS: Nun, Henry: Sei gut.
HIGGINS: Ich verhalte mich perfekt.
PICKERING: Er tut sein Bestes, Mrs. Higgins.
Eine Pause. Higgins wirft den Kopf zurück, streckt die Beine aus und beginnt zu pfeifen.
MRS. HIGGINS: Henry, mein Lieber, du siehst in dieser Haltung überhaupt nicht schön aus.
HIGGINS:[reißt sich zusammen] Ich habe nicht versucht, schön auszusehen, Mutter.
MRS. HIGGINS: Das tut nichts zur Sache, mein Lieber. Ich wollte dich nur dazu bringen, dass du sprichst.
HIGGINS: Warum denn das?
MRS. HIGGINS: Weil du nicht zur gleichen Zeit sprechen und pfeifen kannst.
Higgins stöhnt. Eine weitere, richtig ermüdende Pause.
HIGGINS: [springt auf, wird ungeduldig] Wo zum Teufel ist dieses Mädchen? Sind wir hier, um den ganzen Tag zu warten?
Eliza tritt ein, heiter, selbstbeherrscht und bietet eine erstaunlich überzeugende Zuschaustellung von ungezwungenem Verhalten. Sie trägt ein Nähkästchen und fühlt sich richtig zu Hause. Pickering ist zu sehr verdutzt, um sich zu erheben.
LIZA: Wie geht es Ihnen, Professor Higgins? Geht es Ihnen gut?
HIGGINS [würgt]: Bin ich - [ er kann nichts mehr sagen].
LIZA: Aber natürlich sind Sie es: Sie sind nie krank. Bin so froh, Sie wiederzusehen, Colonel Pickering. [ Er steht hastig auf und sie schütteln die Hände]. Ziemlich kühl heute Morgen, nicht wahr? [ Sie setzt sich zu seiner Linken. Er sitzt neben ihr].
HIGGINS: Wagen Sie nicht, dieses Spiel an mir auszuprobieren. Ich habe es dir beigebracht; und leg mich damit nicht rein. Steh auf und komm nach Hause; und sei kein Dummkopf.
[Eliza nimmt eine Näharbeit aus ihrem Korb und beginnt, daran zu nähen, ohne die geringste Notiz von diesem Ausbruch zu nehmen.]
MRS. HIGGINS: Sehr schön gesagt, Henry. Keine Frau könnte einer solchen Einladung widerstehen.
HIGGINS: Lass sie in Ruhe, Mutter. Lass sie für sich selbst sprechen. Du wirst sehr schnell sehen, ob sie einen Gedanken hat, den ich ihr nicht in den Kopf gesetzt oder ein Wort, das ich nicht in den Mund gelegt habe. Ich sage dir, ich habe dieses Ding aus zermatschten Kohlblättern von Covent Garden erschaffen; und jetzt gibt sie vor, bei mir die feine Dame zu spielen.
MRS. HIGGIINS [selenruhig]: Ja, Lieber; aber du wirst dich hinsetzen, nicht wahr?
[Higgins setzt sich hin, wild.]
LIZA [zu Pickering, sie nimmt keine Notiz von Higgins und arbeitet geschickt weiter]: Werden Sie mich jetzt ganz fallen lassen, da das Experiment vorbei ist, Colonel Pickering?
PICKERING: Oh, nicht doch. Sie dürfen es nicht als ein Experiment betrachten. Es bestürzt mich, irgendwie.
LIZA: Oh, ich bin nur ein zermatschtes Kohlblatt.
PICKERING [spontan]: Nein.
LIZA [weiterhin ruhig]: - aber ich verdanke Ihnen so viel, dass ich sehr unglücklich wäre, wenn Sie mich vergäßen.
PICKERING: Es ist sehr freundlich von Ihnen, das zu sagen, Miss Doolittle.
LIZA: Es ist nicht so, weil Sie meine Kleider bezahlt haben. Ich weiß, dass Sie mit Ihrem Geld zu jedem großzügig sind. Aber Sie waren es, von dem ich wirklich gute Manieren gelernt habe; und das macht eine Lady aus, nicht wahr? Sie sehen, es war sehr schwierig für mich ständig mit dem Beispiel von Professor Higgins vor mir. Ich wurde erzogen, genau wie er zu sein, unfähig mich zu beherrschen und bei der gringsten Provokation Flüche zu benutzen. Und ich hätte nie gewusst, dass sich Damen und Herren sich so nicht benehmen, wenn Sie nicht da gewesen wären.
HIGGINS: Gut!!
PICKERING: Oh. das ist nur seine Art, wissen Sie. Er meint es nicht so.
LIZA: Oh, ich meinte es auch nicht so, als ich ein Blumenmädchen war. Es war nur meine Art. Aber Sie sehen, ich habe es geschafft; und das macht schließlich den Unterschied aus.
PICKERING: Kein Zweifel. Trotzdem lehrte er Sie zu sprechen; und das hätte ich nicht tun können, wissen Sie.
LIZA [leichthin]: Natürlich, das ist sein Beruf.
HIGGINS: Verdammt!
LIZA [fortfahrend]: Es war nur wie das Erlernen auf moderne Art zu tanzen; mehr war nicht dabei. Aber wissen Sie, womit meine echte Erziehung begann?
PICKERING: Womit?
LIZA [unterbricht für einen Augenblick ihre Arbeit]: Sie haben mich an dem Tag, als ich zum ersten Mal in die Wimpole Street kam, Miss Doolittle genannt. Das war der Beginn meiner Selbstachtung. [Sie setzt ihre Näherei fort.] Und es gab hundert kleine Dinge, die Sie nie beachteten, weil sie für Sie selbstverstänlich waren. Dinge wie aufstehen, den Hut ziehen und Türen öffnen - PICKERING: Oh, das war nichts.
LIZA: Ja, Dinge, die zeigten, dass Sie an mich dachten und betrachteten, als sei ich etwas besseres als ein Spülmädchen; obwohl ich weiß, Sie wären genauso zu einem Spülmädchen, falls man sie in den Salon ließe. Sie haben niemals die Stiefel im Esszimmer ausgezogen, wenn ich anwesend war.
PICKERING: Das sollte Ihnen nichts ausmachen. Higgins zieht seine Stiefel überall aus.
LIZA: Ich weiß. Ich mache ihm keine Vorwürfe. Es ist seine Art, nicht wahr? Aber es hat einen solchen Unterschied für mich gemacht, dass Sie es nicht getan haben. Und Sie sehen, wirklich und wahrhaftig, dass außer an den Dingen, die sich jeder aneignen kann (die Kleidung, die richtige Art zu sprechen und so weiter), der Unterschied zwischen einer Dame und einem Blumenmädchen nicht an der Art liegt, wie sie sich verhält, sondern daran, wie sie behandelt wird. Für Professor Higgins werde ich immer ein Blumenmädchen sein, weil er mich immer wie ein Blumenmädchen behandelt und immer behandeln wird; aber ich weiß, für Sie kann ich eine Dame sein, weil Sie mich immer wie eine Dame behandeln und immer behandeln werden.
MRS. HIGGINS: Bitte knirsch nicht mit den Zähnen, Henry.
PICKERING: Nun, das ist wirklich sehr nett von Ihnen, Miss Doolittle.
LIZA: Ich fände es schön, wenn Sie mich jetzt Eliza nennen würden, falls Sie möchten.
PICKERING: Danke. Eliza, natürlich.
LIZA: Und ich möchte, dass Professor Higgins mich Miss Doolittle nennt.
HIGGINS: Dazu müsste erst die Hölle zufrieren.
MRS. HIGGINS: Henry! Henry!
PICKERING: [lachend] Warum gibst du ihm keinen Slangausdruck zurück? Lass es dir nicht bieten. Es würde ihm sehr gut tun.
LIZA: Ich kann nicht. Früher hätte ich es tun können, aber jetzt kann ich das nicht mehr. Letzte Nacht, als ich so herumlief, sprach mich ein Mädchen an; und ich versuchte mit ihr, auf die alte Weise zu sprechen; aber es ging nicht. Sie haben mir erzählt, Sie wissen schon, dass ein Kind, das in ein fremdes Land gebracht wird, sich die Sprache in wenigen Wochen aneignet und die eigene vergisst. Nun, ich bin ein Kind in Ihrem Land. Ich habe meine eigene Sprache vergessen und kann keine andere sprechen, als Ihre. Das ist der wirkliche Bruch mit der Ecke an der Tottenham Court Road. Die Wimpole Street zu verlassen, beendet es.
PICKERING [sehr beunruhigt]: Oh! Aber Sie werden in die Wimpole Street zurückkehren, oder? Werden Sie Higgins vergeben?
HIGGINS [steht auf]: Vergeben! Wird sie das tun, bei George! Lassen Sie sie gehen. Lassen Sie sie herausfinden, wie sie ohne uns zurechtkommt. Sie wird ohne mich am Arm in drei Wochen in die Gosse zurückkehren.
Doolittle taucht am mittleren Fenster auf. Mit einem würdevollen, vorwurfsvollem Blick auf Higgins, kommt er langsam und leise zu seiner Tochter, die, da sie mit dem Rücken zum Fenster steht, sich seiner Annäherung nicht bewusst ist.
Pickering: Er wird sich nie ändern, Eliza. Du wirst nicht rückfällig, oder?
LIZA: Nein, jetzt nicht mehr. Niemals wieder. Ich habe meine Lektion gelernt. Ich glaube nicht, dass ich einen der alten Laute aussprechen könnte, selbst wenn ich es versuchen würde. [Doolittle berührt sie an ihrer linken Schulter. Sie lässt ihre Arbeit fallen und verliert ihre Selbstbeherrschung völlig beim Anblick des Prunkes bei ihrem Vater] A-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-ah-ow-ow-ooh!
HIGGINS [ mit Triumphgeheul]: Aha! Einfach so. A—a—a—a—ahowooh! A—a—a—a—ahowooh! A—a—a—a—ahowooh! Sieg! Sieg! [Er wirft sich auf den Diwan, verschränkt seine Arme und streckt sich arrogant aus.
DOOLITTLE: Können Sie dem Mädchen einen Vorwurf machen? Schau mich nicht so an, Eliza. Es ist nicht meine Schuld. Ich bin zu Geld gekommen.
LIZA: Du musst dieses Mal einen Millionär angefasst haben, Dad.
DOOLITTLE: Das stimmt. Aber ich habe heute etwas Besonderes angezogen. Ich gehe in die St. George's, Hanover Square. Deine Stiefmutter wird mich heiraten.
LIZA (wütend) Du wirst dich herablassen, um diese Frau von derartig niedrigem Rang zu heiraten!
PICKERING: [ ruhig] Das sollte er tun, Eliza. [Zu Doolittle] Warum hat sie ihre Meinung geändert?
DOOLITTLE :[betrübt] Einschüchtert, Gouverneur. Eingeschüchtert. Die Moral des Bürgertums fordert ihr Opfer. Willst du nicht deinen Hut aufsetzen, Liza, und mitkommen und zuschauen, wie ich verheiratet werde?
Liza: Wenn der Colonel sagt, ich muss es tun, werde ich - werde ich [fast schluchzend] mich benehmen. Und mich für meine Qualen beleidigen lassen, als ob es nicht schon genug wäre.
DOOLITTLE: Keine Angst: sie legt sich jetzt mit niemand mehr an, die arme Frau! Die Ehrbarkeit hat ihr jedes Feuer genommen.
Pickering: (drückt Elizas Ellbogen sacht) Sei nett zu ihnen, Eliza. Mach das Beste daraus.
LIZA:[zwingt sich für ihn zu einem kleinen Lächeln in ihrem Ärger] Oh ja, einfach um zu zeigen, dass es kein böses Blut gibt. Ich werde in einem Moment wieder zurück sein. [Sie geht hinaus].
DOOLITTLE: (setzt sich neben Pickering) Ich bin ungewöhnlich nervös wegen der Zeremonie, Colonel. Ich wünschte, Sie würden mitkommen und mir beistehen.
PICKERING: Aber Sie haben das schon einmal mitgemacht, Mann. Sie waren mit Elizas Mutter verheiratet.
DOOLITTLE: Wer hat Ihnen das gesagt, Colonel?
PICKERING: Nun, niemand hat es mir gesagt. Aber ich kam natürlich zu dem Schluss - DOOLITTLE. Nein: Das ist nicht der selbstverständliche Weg, Colonel: Es ist nur der bürgerliche Weg. Mein Weg war immer der unwürdige Weg. Aber sagen Sie Eliza nichts davon. Sie weiß es nicht: Es war mir immer etwas heikel, es ihr zu sagen.
PICKERING: Völlig richtig. Wir belassen es dabei, wenn Sie nichts dagegen haben.
DOOLITTLE: Und Sie kommen in die Kirche, Colonel und bringen mich da durch?
PICKERING: Ist mir ein Vergnügen. So weit es ein Junggeselle kann.
MRS. HIGGINS: Darf ich kommen, Mr. Doolittle? Es würde mir leid tun, Ihre Hochzeit zu verpassen.
DOOLITTLE: Ich wäre tatsächlich geehrt, wenn Sie sich dazu herabließen, gnä' Frau; und meine arme alte Frau sähe es als riesiges Kompliment an. Sie ist ziemlich niedergeschlagen und denkt über die glücklichen Tagen, die es nicht mehr gibt.
MRS. HIGGINS [steht auf]: Ich werde die Kutsche bestellen und mich fertig machen. [Die Männer stehen auf, außer Higgins.] Ich werde nicht länger als fünfzehn Minuten benötigen. [Als sie zur Tür geht, kommt Eliza herein, den Hut auf und knöpft ihr Handschuhe zu.] Ich werde in die Kirche gehen, um zu sehen, wie dein Vater heiratet, Eliza. Du solltest besser im Brougham mit mir kommen. Colonel Pickering kann mit dem Bräutigam fahren.
Mrs. Higgins geht hinaus. Eliza kommt in die Mitte des Raumes zwischen dem mittleren Fenster und der Ottomane. Pickering gesellt sich zu ihr.
DOOLITTLE: Bräutigam! Was für ein Wort! Es lässt einen Mann irgendwie seine Stellung erkennen. [Er nimmt seinen Hut und geht zur Tür.]
PICKERING: Bevor ich gehe, Eliza, vergeben Sie ihm und kommen Sie zu uns zurück.
LIZA: Ich denke, Papa wird mir das nicht erlauben. Würdest du das, Papa?
DOOLITTLE [traurig, aber großherzig]: Sie haben dich sehr gerissen ausgespielt, Eliza, die beiden Sportler. Wäre es nur einer von ihnen gewesen, hättest du ihn festnageln können. Aber wie du siehst, es gab zwei; und einer hat die Anstandsdame für den anderen gespielt, wie man zu sagen pflegt. [To Pickering] It was artful of you, Colonel; but I bear no malice: I should have done the same myself. Ich bin nach und nach mein ganzes Leben das Opfer von Frauen gewesen; und ich hege keinen Groll, dass ihr zwei Eliza übers Ohr haut. Ich werde mich nicht einmischen. Es ist Zeit für uns zu gehen, Colonel. Bis dann, Henry. Ich seh dich in St. George, Eliza. [Er geht hinaus.]
PICKERING [will sie überreden]: Bleiben Sie bei uns, Eliza. [Er folgt Doolittle.]
[Eliza geht hinaus auf den Balkon, um zu vermeiden, dass sie mit Higgins allein ist. Er steht auf und geht zu ihr. Sie kommt sofort zurück ins Zimmer und will zur Tür gehen; aber er geht schnell über den Balkon und steht mit seinem Rücken zur Tür, bevor sie sie erreicht.
HIGGINS: Nun, Eliza, du hast dich ein wenig revanchiert, wie du es nennst. Haben Sie genug gehabt? Und werden Sie vernünftig? Oder wollen Sie noch mehr?
LIZA: Du willst mich nur zurückhaben, damit ich deine Hausschuhe aufhebe und mit deinen Stimmungen klarkomme und dein Handlanger für dich bin.
HIGGINS. Ich habe überhaupt nicht gesagt, dass ich dich zurück haben will.
LIZA. Oh, zugegebenermaßen. Worüber sprechen wir dann?
HIGGINS: Über dich, nicht über mich. Wenn du zurückkommst, werde ich dich genauso behandeln, wie ich dich immer behandelt habe. Ich kann meine Natur nicht verändern; und ich habe nicht die Absicht, mein Betragen zu verändern. Mein Betragen ist genau dasselbe wie das von Colonel Pickering.
LIZA: Das stimmt nicht. Er behandelt ein Blumenmädchen, als wäre sie eine Herzogin.
HIGGINS: Und ich behandele eine Herzogin, als wäre sie ein Blumenmädchen.
LIZA: Aha. [Sie wendet sich gelassen ab, und setzt sich auf die Ottomane, mit Blick auf das Fenster]. Alle gleichbehandeln.
HIGGINS: Genauso.
LIZA: Wie der Vater.
HIGGINS [grinsend, etwas unzusammenhängend] Ohne dass ich dem Vergleich in allen Punkten zustimme, Eliza, es stimmt schon, dass dein Vater kein Snob ist, und dass er mit jeder Lebenssituation klarkommt, zu welcher ihn sein exzentrisches Schicksal rufen wird. [Ernsthaft] Das große Geheimnis, Eliza, besteht nicht darin, schlechtes oder gutes Benehmen zu haben, sondern das gleiche Benehmen gegenüber allen Menschen zu haben: Kurz gesagt, sich so zu verhalten, als ob man im Himmel wäre, wo es keine Dritte-Klasse-Abteile gibt, und wo alle Seelen gleich wertvoll sind.
LIZA: Amen. Sie sind ein geborener Prediger.
HIGGINS [gereizt] Die Frage ist nicht, ob ich Sie unhöflich behandle, sondern ob Sie je gehört haben, dass ich jemand anders besser behandelt habe.
LIZA: [mit plötzlicher Aufrichtigkeit] Es ist mir egal, wie du mich behandelst. Meinetwegen kannst du mich wüst beschimpfen. Ich habe nichts dagegen, ein blaues Auge zu bekommen: Ich habe schon früher eines gehabt. Aber [aufstehend und ihn ansehend] ich werde nicht zulassen, dass ich übergangen werde.
HIGGINS. Dann geh mir aus dem Weg, denn ich werde nicht auf dich warten. Sie reden von mir, als ob ich ein Bus wäre.
LIZA: Du bist also ein Autobus: immer forsch drauf los, nur keine Rücksicht auf irgendjemand. Aber ich kann ohne dich auskommen: glaub nicht, dass ich es nicht kann.
HIGGINS. Ich weiß, du kannst es. Ich habe es dir gesagt, dass du es kannst.
LIZA: [ist verletzt, sie ist von ihm weg auf die andere Seite des Ottomanen gegangen, mit dem Gesicht zum Herd] Ich weiß, dass du es gesagt hast, du brutaler Kerl. Du wolltest mich los werden.
HIGGINS. Lügnerin.
LIZA: Danke schön. [Sie setzt sich würdevoll hin].
HIGGINS: Ich vermute, du hast dich nie gefragt, ob ich ohne DICH auskommen könnte.
LIZA (ernsthaft) Versuch nicht, zu mir zu kommen. Du wirst ohne mich auskommen MÜSSEN.
HIGGINS [arrogant] Ich brauche niemand. Ich habe meine eigene Seele: meinen eigenen Funken des göttlichen Feuers. Aber [mit plötzlicher Demut] Ich werde dich vermissen, Eliza. [Er setzt sich neben sie auf die Ottomane.] Ich habe etwas aus deinen idiotischen Ansichten gelernt: Ich gestehe das demütig und dankbar. Und ich habe mich an deine Stimme und an deine Erscheinung gewöhnt. Ich mag sie, ziemlich.
Liza: Nun, Sie haben beides auf Ihrem Grammophon und in Ihrem Fotoalbum. Wenn Sie sich ohne mich allein fühlen, können Sie die Maschine anmachen. Sie hat keine Gefühle, die verletzt werden können.
HIGGINS: Deine Seele kann ich nicht anmachen. Lass mir diese Gefühle; und du kannst die Stimme und das Gesicht wegnehmen. Sie sind nicht du.
LIZA: Oh, Sie SIND ein Teufel. Sie können einem Mädchen so einfach das Herz brechen, wie irgendjemand die Arme eine Mädchens verdrehen kann, um sie zu verletzen. Mrs. Pearce hat mich gewarnt. Immer wieder wollte sie Sie verlassen; und jedesmal haben Sie sie in der letzten Minute herumgekriegt. Und Sie machen sich kein bisschen aus ihr. Und Sie machen sich kein bisschen aus mir.
HIGGINS: Ich mache mir etwas aus dem Leben, der Menschlichkeit; und du bist ein Teil dessen, was meinen Weg gekreuzt hat und Teil meines Lebens wurde. Was kannst du oder jemand anderes sonst verlangen?
LIZA: Ich mache mir nichts aus jemandem, der sich nicht für mich interessiert.
HIGGINS: Kommerzielle Grundsätze, Eliza. Like [reproducing her Covent Garden pronunciation with professional exactness] s'yollin voylets [selling violets], isn't it?
LIZA: Spotten Sie nicht über mich. Es ist gemein, über mich spotten.
HIGGINS: Ich habe niemals in meinem Leben gespottet. Spotten ist weder angemessen für das menschliche Gesicht noch für die menschliche Seele. Ich drücke meine aufrichtige Verachtung für den Kommerzialismus aus. Ich habe und werde keine Zuneigung eintauschen. Du nennst mich einen brutalen Kerl, nur weil du keine Ansprüche an mir geltend machen kannst, indem du meine Pantoffeln holst und meine Brille suchst. Du warst eine Närrin: Ich denke, eine Frau, die die Pantoffeln eines Mannes holt, ist ein abstoßender Anblick: Habe ich jemals DEINE Pantoffeln geholt? Ich halte viel mehr von dir dafür, dass du sie mir ins Gesicht geworfen hast. Es nützt nichts, sich für mich abzuplagen und dann zu sagen, dass du willst, dass ich dich lieb habe: wer kümmert sich schon um einen Sklaven? Wenn du zurückkommst, komm zurück wegen der guten Gemeinschaft; denn du wirst nichts anderes bekommen. Du hast tausend Mal so viel von mir gehabt wie ich von dir; und wenn du es wagst, deine kleinen Hundetricks, Pantoffeln zu holen und zu tragen, gegen meine Erschaffung einer Herzogin Eliza aufzustellen, werde ich dir die Tür vor deiner dummen Nase zuschlagen.
LIZA: Warum hast du es getan, wenn ich dir egal war?
HIGGINS: [herzlich] Warum, weil das mein Beruf war.
LIZA: Du hast nie daran gedacht, was für Schwierigkeiten es mir bereiten würde.
HIGGINS: Wäre die Welt je erschaffen worden, wenn ihr Schöpfer Angst gehabt hatte, Unruhe zu stiften? Das Leben zu schaffen, bedeutet Unruhe zu stiften. Es gibt nur einen Weg, Ärger zu vermeiden; und das ist, Dinge zu töten. Es fällt Ihnen sicher auf, dass Feiglinge immer danach schreien, dass Menschen, die Ärger machen, getötet werden müssen.
LIZA: Ich bin kein Prediger: Ich merke solche Dinge nicht. Ich merke, dass Sie mich nicht bemerken.
HIGGINS [springt auf und läuft ihre Meinung nicht geltend lassend herum ] Eliza: Sie sind eine Idiotin. Ich verschwende die Schätze meines erhabenen Geistes, indem ich sie vor Ihnen ausbreite. Once for all, understand that I go my way and do my work without caring twopence what happens to either of us. I am not intimidated, like your father and your stepmother. Sie können also zurückkommen, oder zum Teufel gehen: was auch immer Ihnen mehr Spaß macht.
Liza: Aus welchem Grund sollte ich zurückkommen?
HIGGINS [bouncing up on his knees on the ottoman and leaning over it to her] For the fun of it. That's why I took you on.
LIZA [with averted face] And you may throw me out tomorrow if I don't do everything you want me to?
HIGGINS. Yes; and you may walk out tomorrow if I don't do everything YOU want me to.
LIZA: Und mit meiner Stiefmutter wohnen?
HIGGINS: Ja, oder Blumen verkaufen.
LIZA: Oh! Wenn ich doch nur zurück zu meinem Blumenkorb KÖNNTE! Ich wäre unabhängig von Ihnen, von Vater und der ganzen Welt! Warum haben Sie mir meine Unabhängigkeit genommen? Warum habe ich sie aufgegeben? Ich bin jetzt eine Sklavin, trotz all meiner feinen Kleider.
HIGGINS: Überhaupt nicht. Ich werde dich als meine Tochter adoptieren und dir Geld vermachen, falls du möchtest. Oder möchtest du lieber Pickering heiraten?
LIZA [sie schaut ihn wütend an]: Ich würde SIE nicht heiraten, falls Sie mich fragten; und Sie sind meinem Alter näher wie er.
HIGGINS [sanft]: Als er, nicht "wie er".
Liza [ihr Temperament geht mit ihr durch und sie steht auf]: Ich werde reden, wie es mir gefällt. Sie sind jetzt nicht mehr mein Lehrer.
HIGGINS: [nachdenklich] Allerdings nehme ich nicht an, dass Pickering das machen würde. Er ist genauso ein eingefleischter Junggeselle wie ich.
LIZA: Das ist nicht das, was ich möchte und du solltest es nicht glauben.. Ich habe mehr als genug Kerle gehabt, die das von mir wollten. Freddy Hill schreibt mir drei oder viermal am Tag, viele Seiten.
HIGGINS: [unangenehm überrascht] Verdammt sei seine Dreistigkeit! [Er zuckt zurück und ertappt sich dabei, wie er auf den Fersen sitzt.]
LIZA: Er hat das Recht dazu, wenn er mag, der arme Kerl. Und er liebt mich wirklich.
HIGGINS: [geht von der Ottomane runter) Du hast kein Recht dazu, ihn zu bestärken.
LIZA: Jedes Mädchen hat das Recht, geliebt zu werden.
HIGGINS: Was! Von solchen Narren?
LIZA: Freddy ist kein Narr. Und wenn er schwach und arm ist, und mich will, würde er mich vielleicht glücklicher mache, als Personen, die in der Gesellschaft über mir stehen, die mich schickanieren und die mich nicht haben wollen.
HIGGINS: Kann er irgendwas aus dir MACHEN? Das ist der Punkt.
LIZA: Vielleicht könnte ich etwas aus ihm machen. But I never thought of us making anything of one another; and you never think of anything else. Ich möchte einfach nur natürlich sein.
HIGGINS: Kurz gesagt, du willst, dass ich so in dich vernarrt bin, wie Freddy? Ist es das?
LIZA: Nein, das will ich nicht. Das ist nicht die Art Gefühl, die ich von dir will. And don't you be too sure of yourself or of me. Ich hätte ein böses Mädchen sein können, wenn ich gewollt hätte. Ich habe mehr von manchen Dingen gesehen als du, trotz all deiner Bildung. Mädchen wie ich, können leicht den Ruf von Gentlemen schädigen, wenn sie zärtlich zu ihnen werden. Und in der nächsten Minute wünschen sich beide, dass der andere tot wäre.
HIGGINS: Natürlich können sie das. Worüber, zum Donner, streiten wir dann?
LIZA: sehr beunruhigt) Ich will ein bisschen Freundlichkeit. Ich weiß, ich bin ein gewöhnliches, unwissendes Mädchen, und du bist ein gelehrsamer Gentleman; aber ich bin kein Dreck unter deinen Füßen. Was ich tu [korrigiert sich] was ich getan habe, habe ich nicht für Kleider und Taxis getan; ich habe es gemacht, weil wir freundlich zueinader waren und ich anfange - anfing - Sie zu mögen; nicht um Sie in mich verliebt zu machen und nicht um den Standesunterschied zwischen uns zu vergessen, sondern um freundlicher miteinander zu sein.
HIGGINS: Ja, natürlich. Das ist genau das, was ich fühle. Und wie Pickering fühlt. Eliza, du bist ein Dummkopf.
LIZA: Das ist keine ordentliche Antwort für mich [sie sinkt in Tränen auf den Stuhl am Schreibtisch].
HIGGINS: Es ist alles, was du bekommst, wenn du nicht aufhörst, eine gewöhnliche Idiotin zu sein. Wenn du eine Lady wirst, musst du aufhören, dich vernachlässigt zu fühlen, wenn die Männer, die du kennst, nicht die Hälfte ihrer Zeit damit verbringen, dir nachzuweinen und die andere Hälfte damit, dir blaue Augen zu verpassen. Wenn du die Kühle meiner Art zu leben und die Beanspruchung davon nicht erträgst, geh zurück in die Gosse. Arbeite bis du mehr Tier als Mensch bist; und dann kuschel, zanke und trinke bis du einschläfst. Oh, es ist ein hervorragendes Leben, das Leben in der Gosse. Es ist echt; es ist warm; es ist gewaltätig; du kannst es durch die dickste Haut spüren; du kannst es schmecken und riechen, ohne Übung oder Arbeit. Nicht wie Wissenschaft, Literatur, klassische Musik, Philosophie und Kunst. Du findest, ich bin kalt, ohne Gefühl, selbstsüchtig, ist es nicht so? Sehr gut; scher dich zu der Art von Leuten, die du magst. Heirate irgendein gefühlsduseliges Schwein mit viel Geld und mit einem dicken Lippenpaar, um dich zu küssen und einem dicken Stiefelpaar, um dich zu treten. Wenn du nicht schätzen kannst, was du hast, solltest du besser bekommen, was du schätzen kannst.
LIZA [verzweifelt]: Oh, Sie sind ein grausamer Tyrann. Mit Ihnen kann ich nicht reden; Sie verdrehen mir jedes Wort; immer setzen Sie mich ins Unrecht. Aber Sie wissen die ganze Zeit sehr gut, dass Sie nichts anderes sind als ein Rüpel. Sie wissen, dass ich nicht zurück in die Gosse gehen kann, wie Sie es nennen, und dass ich keinen wirklichen Freund in der Welt habe, außer Ihnen und dem Colonel. You know well I couldn't bear to live with a low common man after you two; and it's wicked and cruel of you to insult me by pretending I could. You think I must go back to Wimpole Street because I have nowhere else to go but father's. But don't you be too sure that you have me under your feet to be trampled on and talked down. Ich werde Freddy heiraten, ja, das werde ich, sobald er in der Lage ist, mich zu versorgen.
HIGGINS [neben ihr sitzend]: Unfug! Du solltest einen Botschafter heiraten. You shall marry the Governor-General of India or the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, or somebody who wants a deputy-queen. Ich werde nicht zulassen, dass mein Meisterwerk an Freddy weggeworfen wird.
LIZA: Sie denken, ich mag es, wenn Sie das sagen. Aber ich habe nicht vergessen, was Sie vor einer Minute gesagt haben; und ich werde mich nicht überreden lassen, als wäre ich ein Baby oder ein Welpen. Wenn ich keine Freundlichkeit haben kann, werde ich Unabhängigkeit haben.
HIGGINS: Unabhängigkeit? Das ist Mittelklasseblasphemie. Wir sind alle voneinander abhängig, jede unserer Seel auf Erden.
LIZA [erhebt sich entschlossen]: Ich lasse Sie wissen, ob ich von Ihnen abhängig bin. Wenn Sie predigen können, kann ich unterrichten. Ich werde gehen und eine Lehrerin sein.
HIGGINS: Um Himmels willen, was werden Sie lehren?
LIZA: Was Sie mir beigebracht haben. Ich werde Phonetik unterrichten.
HIGGINS: Ha! Ha! Ha!
LIZA: Ich werde mich als Assistentin von Professor Nepean anbieten.
HIGGINS [erhebt sich in Wut]: Was? Dieser Hochstapler! Dieser Schwindler! Dieser speichelleckende Ignorant! Bringe ihm meine Methoden bei. Meine Entdeckungen! Du gehst einen Schritt in seine Richtung und ich drehe dir den Hals um. [Er legt seine Hände auf sie]. Hören Sie?
LIZA [trotzig, widerstandslos]: Erwürge mich doch! Was kümmert es mich? Ich wusste, dass Sie mich eines Tages schlagen würden. [Er lässt sie gehen, aufstampfend vor Wut, weil er sich selbst vergessen hat, und springt so hastig zurück, dass er auf seinen Sitz auf die Ottomane zurückstolpert]. Aha! Jetzt weiß ich, wie ich mit Ihnen umgehen muss. Was für ein Dummkopf war ich, dass ich nicht vorher daran gedacht habe! Sie können mir das Wissen, das sie mir beigebracht haben, nicht mehr wegnehmen. Sie sagten, ich hätte ein feineres Ohr als Sie. Und ich kann zu Leuten freundlich und zivilisiert sein, das ist mehr, als Sie können. Aha! Das war es für dich, Henry Higgins, das war es. Ich geb nicht so viel [schnippt mit den Fingern] auf Ihre Schikane und Ihr großes Gerede. Ich werde es in die Zeitung setzen, dass Ihre Herzogin nur ein Blumenmädchen ist, dass Sie unterrichtet haben und dass sie jedem für tausend Guineen genauso beibringt, in sechs Monaten eine Herzogin zu werden. Oh, when I think of myself crawling under your feet and being trampled on and called names, when all the time I had only to lift up my finger to be as good as you, I could just kick myself.
HIGGINS [wundert sich über sie ]: Du verdammte, unverschämte Schlampe, du! Aber es ist besser als zu weinen, besser als Pantoffeln zu werfen und eine Brille zu suchen, ist es nicht so? [Steht auf] Bei George, Eliza, ich habe gesagt, ich mache eine Frau aus dir und das habe ich. Ich mag dich, so wie du bist.
LIZA. Yes: you turn round and make up to me now that I'm not afraid of you, and can do without you.
HIGGINS: Natürlich tu ich das, du kleiner Dummkopf. Vor fünf Minuten warst du wie ein Mühlstein um meinen Hals. Jetzt bist du ein Turm an Stärke, ein Schlachtschiff von einer Gefährtin. Du, ich und Pickering werden zusammen drei alte Junggesellen sein, anstatt nur zwei alte Männer und ein verrücktes Mädchen.
[Mrs. Higgins kommt zurück, umgezogen für die Hochzeit. Eliza wird sofort kühl und elegant.]
MRS. HIGGINS: Die Kutsche wartet, Eliza. Bist du fertig?
LIZA: Vollständig. Kommt der Professor mit?
MRS. HIGGINS: Sicherlich nicht. Er kann sich in der Kirche nicht benehmen. Er macht andauernd laute Kommentare über die Aussprache des Geistlichen.
LIZA: Dann werde ich Sie nicht wieder sehen, Professor. Auf Wiedersehen. [Sie geht zur Tür].
MRS. HIGGINS: [kommt zu Higgins] Auf Wiedersehen, Liebes.
HIGGINS: Auf Wiedersehen, Mutter. [Er ist im Begriff, sie zu küssen, als er sich auf etwas besinnt]. Ach, übrigens, Eliza, bestellst du einen Schinken und einen Stilton-Käse, bitte? Und kauf mir bei Eale & Binman’s ein Paar Rentierhandschuhe, Nummer acht und eine Krawatte, die zu meinem neuen Anzug passt. Du kannst die Farbe auswählen. [Seine fröhliche, nachlässige, kraftvolle Stimme zeigt, dass er unverbesserlich ist].
Liza [verächtlich] : Kaufen Sie sie selbst. [Sie stürmt raus].
MRS. HIGGINS: Ich fürchte, du hast das Mädchen verdorben, Henry. Aber egal, Lieber, ich werde dir die Krawatte und die Handschuhe kaufen.
HIGGINS [sonnig]: Oh, mach dir keine Umstände. Sie wird sie schon kaufen. Auf Wiedersehen.
[Sie küssen sich. Mrs. Higgins eilt hinaus. Higgins, allein gelassen, klimpert mit seinem Geld in der Tasche; kichert und amüsiert in höchst selbstzufriedener Art.]


________________ Der Rest der Geschichte muss nicht dargestellt werden und müsste eigentlich nicht erzählt werden, wenn unsere Vorstellungen nicht durch die träge Abhängigkeit von der Stangenware und Griffware in den Schundläden geschwächt wäre, die Liebesgeschichten enthalten, deren Vorrat an "Happy Ends" alle Geschichten verderben. Nun, die Geschichte von Eliza Doolittle, obwohl sie wegen der Verwandlung eine Liebesgeschichte genannt, äußerst unwahrscheinlich erscheint, ist häufig genug. Solche Verwandlungen haben sich bei Hunderter entschlossener, ehrgeiziger junger Frauen verwirklicht, seit Nell Gwynne ihnen ein Beispiel gab, indem sie in dem Theater, in dem sie mit dem Verkauf von Orangen anfing, Königinnen spielte und Könige faszinierte. Trotzdem haben Leute aus allen Richtungen angenommen, dass sie, aus keinem anderen Grund, als dass sie die Heldin einer Liebesgeschichte geworden ist, den Helden den Held davon heiraten muss. This is unbearable, not only because her little drama, if acted on such a thoughtless assumption, must be spoiled, but because the true sequel is patent to anyone with a sense of human nature in general, and of feminine instinct in particular.
Eliza kokettierte nicht, als sie Higgins sagte, dass sie ihn nicht heiraten würde, wenn er ihr einen Antrag machen würde; sie verkündete eine wohlüberlegte Entscheidung. Wenn ein Junggeselle für eine Junggesellin interessant ist, und sie beherrscht, und unterrichtet, und wichtig für sie wird, wie Higgins es für Eliza war, wird sie immer, wenn sie genug Charakter hat, dazu fähig zu sein, tatsächlich ernsthaft in Erwägung zu ziehen, ob sie sich darauf einlassen wird, die Frau des Junggesellen zu werde, besonders dann, wenn er ein so geringes Interesse hat, zu heiraten, dass eine entschlossene und hingebungsvolle Frau ihn einfangen könnte, wenn sie sich entschlossen daran machen würde, es zu tun. Ihre Entscheidung wird zu einem großen Teil davon abhängen, ob sie wirklich eine freie Wahl hat; und das wiederrum wird von ihrem Altern und Einkommen abhängen. Ist sie am Ende ihrer Jugend und hat keine Sicherheit für ihren Lebensunterhalt, wird sie ihn heiraten, weil sie irgendjemanden heiraten muss, der sie versorgt. Aber in Elizas Alter spürt ein hübsches Mädchen diesen Druck nicht; sie fühlt sich frei, wählerisch zu sein. Daher lässt sie sich in dieser Angelegenheit von ihrem Instinkt leiten. Elizas Instinkt sagt ihr, Higgins nicht zu heiraten. Er sagt ihr nicht, ihn aufzugeben. Es gibt nicht den geringsten Zweifel, dass er einer der stärksten persönlichen Interessen in ihrem Leben bleibt. Wenn es eine andere Frau gäbe, die geeignet wäre, an ihre Stelle zu treten, wäre es sehr angespannt. Aber da sie sich in diesem letzten Punkt seiner sicher fühlt, hat sie überhaupt keinen Zweifel, was ihren Weg betrifft, und sie würde auch keinen haben, selbst wenn der zwanzigjährige Altersunterschied, welcher der Jugend so groß erscheint, nicht zwischen ihnen existiert hätte.
As our own instincts are not appealed to by her conclusion, let us see whether we cannot discover some reason in it. Als Higgins seine Gleichgültigkeit gegenüber jungen Frauen damit begründete, dass sie in seiner Mutter eine unwiderstehliche Rivalin hätten, gab er den Hinweis auf sein eingefleischtes Junggesellendasein. Der Fall ist nur dahingehend ungewöhnlich, dass bemerkenswerte Mütter ungewöhnlich sind. Wenn ein einfallsreicher Junge eine ausreichend reiche Mutter hat, die intelligent ist, persönliche Anmut besitzt, einen erhabenen Charakter ohne Härte hat, und ein kultiviertes Gespür für die beste Kunst ihrer Zeit hat, um sie zu befähigen, ihr Haus wunderschön zu machen, legt sie einen Standard für ihn fest, gegen den nur sehr wenige Frauen ankommen können, und darüber hinaus bewirkt sie für ihn, eine Abkopplung seiner Gefühle, seines Sinns für Schönheit, und seines Idealismus von seinen speziell sexuellen Trieben. This makes him a standing puzzle to the huge number of uncultivated people who have been brought up in tasteless homes by commonplace or disagreeable parents, and to whom, consequently, literature, painting, sculpture, music, and affectionate personal relations come as modes of sex if they come at all. Das Wort Leidenschaft bedeutet nichts anderes für sie; und dass Higgins eine Leidenschaft für die Phonetik haben, und seine Mutter, statt Eliza, idealisieren könnte, würde ihnen absurd und unnatürlich erscheinen. Nevertheless, when we look round and see that hardly anyone is too ugly or disagreeable to find a wife or a husband if he or she wants one, whilst many old maids and bachelors are above the average in quality and culture, we cannot help suspecting that the disentanglement of sex from the associations with which it is so commonly confused, a disentanglement which persons of genius achieve by sheer intellectual analysis, is sometimes produced or aided by parental fascination.
Now, though Eliza was incapable of thus explaining to herself Higgins's formidable powers of resistance to the charm that prostrated Freddy at the first glance, she was instinctively aware that she could never obtain a complete grip of him, or come between him and his mother (the first necessity of the married woman). Um es kurz zu sagen, sie wusste, dass er, laut ihrer Vorstellung eines Ehemanns, als jemand für den sie sein nächstes und liebstes und wärmstes Interesse sein würde, aus einem mysteriösen Grund nicht nicht das Zeug für eine Ehe hatte, Selbst wenn es keine Mutterrivalin gegeben hätte, hätte sie sich trotzdem geweigert, ein Interesse an sich selbst zu akzeptieren, das zweitrangig zu den philosophischen Interessen war. Wenn Mrs. Higgins gestorben wäre, hätte es immer noch Milton und das Universal Alphabet gegeben. Landor's remark that to those who have the greatest power of loving, love is a secondary affair, would not have recommended Landor to Eliza. Put that along with her resentment of Higgins's domineering superiority, and her mistrust of his coaxing cleverness in getting round her and evading her wrath when he had gone too far with his impetuous bullying, and you will see that Eliza's instinct had good grounds for warning her not to marry her Pygmalion.
Und wen heiratete Eliza nun? Denn wenn Higgins ein prädestinierter alter Junggeselle war, war sie ganz sicher keine prädestinierte alte Jungfer. Nun, das kann man denen, die es aus den Hinweisen, die sie ihnen selbst gegeben hat, nicht erraten haben, kurz sagen.
Almost immediately after Eliza is stung into proclaiming her considered determination not to marry Higgins, she mentions the fact that young Mr. Frederick Eynsford Hill is pouring out his love for her daily through the post. Nun, Freddy ist jung, praktisch zwanzig Jahre jünger als Higgins: er ist ein Gentleman (oder, wie Eliza in bezeichnen würde, "ein feiner Pinkel"), und spricht wie einer; er trägt feine Kleidung, wird vom Colonel wie ein Ebenbürtiger behandelt, liebt sie in ungekünstelter Weise,, und ist nicht ihr Herr und Gebieter, noch ist es wahrscheinlich, dass er sie je beherrschen wird, trotz des Vorteils seiner sozialen Stellung. Eliza kann mit der dummen, romantischen Tradition, dass alle Frauen es lieben beherrscht, wenn nicht sogar schickaniert und geschlagen zu werden, nichts anfangen. "Wenn du zum Weibe gehst", sagt Nietzsche, "vergiss die Peitsche nicht." Vernünftige Despoten haben diese Vorsichtsmaßnahme nie auf Frauen beschränkt: sie haben ihre Peitschen mitgenommen, wenn sie es mit Männern zu tun hatten, und sie sind viel öfter sklavisch von Männern, die sie mit der Peitsche traktierten, idealisiert worden, als von Frauen. Zweifellos gibt es sowohl sklavische Frauen wie auch sklavische Männer; und Frauen wie Männer bewundern diejenigen, die stärker sind als sie selbst. Aber eine starke Person zu bewundern, und unter der Knute einer starken Person zu leben, sind zwei verschiedene Dinge. The weak may not be admired and hero-worshipped; but they are by no means disliked or shunned; and they never seem to have the least difficulty in marrying people who are too good for them. They may fail in emergencies; but life is not one long emergency: it is mostly a string of situations for which no exceptional strength is needed, and with which even rather weak people can cope if they have a stronger partner to help them out. Accordingly, it is a truth everywhere in evidence that strong people, masculine or feminine, not only do not marry stronger people, but do not show any preference for them in selecting their friends. Wenn ein Löwe einen anderen mit einem lauteren Gebrüll trifft, "denkt der erste Löwe, dass der letztere ein Langweiler ist.“ Der Mann oder die Frau, der oder die sich stark genug für zwei fühlt, sucht nach jedem anderen Wert in einem Partner als Stärke.
Umgekehrt gilt es auch. Schwache Menschen wollen starke Menschen heiraten, die sie nicht allzu sehr ängstigen; und das führt oft dazu, dass sie den Fehler machen, den wir bildlich als: „mehr abbeißen, als sie kauen können“ beschreiben. They want too much for too little; and when the bargain is unreasonable beyond all bearing, the union becomes impossible: it ends in the weaker party being either discarded or borne as a cross, which is worse. Menschen, die nicht nur schwach, sondern auch dumm oder begriffsstutzig sind, befinden sich oft in derartigen Schwierigkeiten.
Da dies der Stand der menschlichen Belange ist, was wird Eliza ziemlich sicher tun, wenn sie zwischen Freddy und Higgins platziert wird? Wird sie ein Leben erwarten, in dem sie Higgins Pantoffeln holt oder ein Leben, in dem Freddy ihre holt? Es besteht kein Zweifel an der Antwort. Sofern Freddy nicht biologisch abstoßend für sie ist und Higgins nicht in einem Maße biologisch attraktiv ist, dass alle ihre anderen Instinkte überwältigt werden, wird sie, wenn sie einen von beiden heiratet, Freddy heiraten.
Und das ist auch genau das, was Eliza tat.
Es haben sich Komplikationen ergeben; aber sie waren wirtschaftlich bedingt, nicht romantisch. Freddy hatte kein Geld und keine Anstellung. Das Wittum seiner Mutter, ein letztes Überbleibsel des Reichtums von Largelady Park, hatte ihr ermöglicht sich in Earlscourt mit einem Anschein von Vornehmheit durchzuschlagen, aber es reichte nicht aus, ihren Kindern irgendeine ernsthafte Schulausbildung zu vermitteln, geschweige denn dem Jungen einen Beruf zu geben. Eine Anstellung für dreißig Shilling die Woche war unter Freddys Würde und abgesehen davon extrem geschmacklos. Seine Aussichten bestanden aus der Hoffnung, dass irgendjemand etwas für ihn tun würde, wenn er den Schein wahren würde. Das Etwas erschien vage in seiner Vorstellung eine Anstellung als Privatsekretär oder ein müheloses Amt irgendeiner Art zu sein. Seiner Mutter erschien es vielleicht die Hochzeit mit einer Dame von Rang, die der Nettigkeit ihres Jungens nicht widerstehen konnte. Stellen Sie sich ihre Gefühle vor als er ein Blumenmädchen heiratete, das unter außergewöhnlichen Umständen, die jetzt anrüchig erscheinen, sozial abgestiegen war.
Es ist wahr, dass Elizas Lage nicht gänzlich ungünstig war. Ihr Vater, obwohl vormals ein Müllmann und nun traumhaft aufgestiegen, ist durch seine gesellschaftliche Begabung, die über jedes Vorurteil und jede Benachteiligung den Sieg davon trug, in der elegantesten Gesellschaft äußerst beliebt geworden. Abgelehnt von der Mittelklasse, die er verabscheute, war er durch seinen Witz, seine Herkunft als Müllmann (die er wie ein Banner vor sich her trug) und seine Transzendenz über Gut und Böse gemäß Nietzsche im Nu in die höchsten Kreise gelangt. Bei intimen herzoglichen Abendessen saß er zur rechten Hand neben der Herzogin und in Landhäusern rauchte er in der Vorratskammer und bekam Essen vom Butler, wenn er nicht im Esszimmer speiste und von einem Kabinettsminister um Rat gefragt wurde. Aber er fand es fast so schwer, dies alles zu tun mit viertausend im Jahr wie Mrs. Eynsford Hill in Earlscourt mit einem so kläglich kleineren Einkommen, dass ich nicht das Herz habe, die genaue Zahl offen zu legen. Er weigerte sich absolut, seiner Last einen letzten Strohhalm hinzuzufügen, indem er zu Elizas Unterstützung beitrug.
So hätten Freddy und Eliza, jetzt Mr. und Mrs. Eynsdord Hill, mittellose Flitterwochen verbracht, wenn sie nicht das Hochzeitsgeschenk in Höhe von 500 Pfund vom Colonel gehabt hätten. It lasted a long time because Freddy did not know how to spend money, never having had any to spend, and Eliza, socially trained by a pair of old bachelors, wore her clothes as long as they held together and looked pretty, without the least regard to their being many months out of fashion. Dennoch werden 500 Pfund zwei jungen Leuten nicht für immer reichen und die beiden wussten das und Eliza fühlte wohl, dass sie sich am Ende verändern mussten. Sie könnte in sie Wimpole Street ziehen, weil es zu ihrem Zuhause geworden war; aber sie war sich durchaus bewusst, dass sie Freddy dort nicht unterbringen sollte und dass es nicht gut für Freddys Charakter wäre, wenn sie es täte.
Nicht dass die Junggesellen Widerspruch erhoben hätten. Als sie sie um Rat fragten, lehnte Higgins es ab, sich um ihr Wohnungsproblem zu kümmern, wenn die Lösung so einfach war. Elizas Wunsch, Freddy bei sich im Haus zu haben, schien nicht wichtiger zu sein, als wenn sie ein zusätzliches Möbelstück für das Schlafzimmer hätte haben wollen. Pleas as to Freddy's character, and the moral obligation on him to earn his own living, were lost on Higgins. He denied that Freddy had any character, and declared that if he tried to do any useful work some competent person would have the trouble of undoing it: a procedure involving a net loss to the community, and great unhappiness to Freddy himself, who was obviously intended by Nature for such light work as amusing Eliza, which, Higgins declared, was a much more useful and honorable occupation than working in the city. Als Eliza wieder auf ihr Projekt Phonetik zu unterrichten verwies, verminderte Higgins seinen heftigen Widerstand nicht um ein Iota. He said she was not within ten years of being qualified to meddle with his pet subject; and as it was evident that the Colonel agreed with him, she felt she could not go against them in this grave matter, and that she had no right, without Higgins's consent, to exploit the knowledge he had given her; for his knowledge seemed to her as much his private property as his watch: Eliza was no communist. Außerdem war sie den beiden abergläubisch ergeben, vollkommener und offener nach ihrer Heirat als vor ihr.
Es war der Colonel, der schließlich das Problem löste, das ihn viel verwirrtes Nachdenken gekostet hatte. Eines Tages fragte er Eliza, ziemlich scheu, ob sie ihre Idee, einen Blumenshop zu führen, völlig aufgegeben habe. Sie antwortete, dass sie daran gedacht hätte, aber sie habe es sich aus dem Kopf geschlagen, weil der Colonel an diesem Tag bei Mrs. Higgins gesagt hatte, dass es niemals funktionieren würde. Als er das gesagt hatte, gestand der Colonel, hatte er sich noch nicht ganz von dem überwältigenden Eindruck des Vortages erholt. Am Abend erzählten sie die Angelegenheit Higgins. Der einzige gnädig gewährte Kommentar von ihm führte beinahe zu einem Streit mit Eliza. Es war dahingehend, dass sie an Freddy einen idealen Laufburschen hätte.
Als nächstes wurde Freddy zu dem Thema angehört. Er sagte, er habe selbst an ein Geschäft gedacht; obwohl er sich wegen seines Geldmagels einen kleinen Ort vorgestellt hatte, wo Eliza Tabak an dem einen Ladentisch verkaufen könnte, während er an dem gegenüberliegenden Zeitungen verkaufen würde. Aber er stimmte zu, dass es außerordentlich lustig wäre, jeden Morgen mit Eliza nach Covent Garden zu gehen und Blumen an dem Ort zu kaufen, wo sie sich zum ersten Mal begegnet sind; eine Empfindung, womit er viele Küsse von seiner Frau verdiente. He added that he had always been afraid to propose anything of the sort, because Clara would make an awful row about a step that must damage her matrimonial chances, and his mother could not be expected to like it after clinging for so many years to that step of the social ladder on which retail trade is impossible.
Diese Schwierigkeit wurde von Freddys Mutter durch ein sehr unerwartetes Ereignis beseitigt. Clara entdeckte im Laufe ihres Eindringens in diese Künstlerkreise, die die höchsten waren, die sie erreichen konnte, dass von ihren Konversationsfähigkeiten erwartet wurde, dass sie Grundkenntnisse der Romane von H.G. Wells aufwiesen. Sie borgte sie so energisch aus unterschiedlichen Richtungen, dass sie innerhalb von Monaten alle verschlungen hatte. Das Ergebnis war eine Umstellung, wie sie heute durchaus üblich ist. Eine moderne Apostelgeschichte würde fünfzig ganze Bibeln füllen, wäre jemand in der Lage sie zu schreiben.
Die arme Clara, die Higgins und seiner Mutter als eine unangenehme und lächerliche Person erschien und ihrer eigenen Mutter in unerklärlicher Weise als eine soziale Versagerin, hatte sich nie weder so noch so gesehen; denn, obwohl sie in West Kensington zum Teil verspottet und nachgeahmt wurde, wie jeder andere auch, war sie als rationaler und normaler - oder sollen wir sagen unvermeidbarer - Mensch akzeptiert. Im schlimmsten Fall nannten sie sie 'die Drückerin'; aber bezogen auf sich nicht so sehr wie auf sie selbst, kam es eher vor, dass sie nur die Luft drückte und sie in die falsche Richtung drückte. Nun, sie war nicht glücklich. Sie verzweifelte immer mehr. Ihr einziges Kapital, die Tatsache, dass ihre Mutter das war, was der Gemüsehändler aus Epsom eine Dame mit Kutsche nannte, hatte offensichtlich keinen Gegenwert. Es hatte verhindert, dass sie eine schulische Bildung bekam, denn die einzige Erziehung, die sie sich leisten konnte, war eine Erziehung mit der Tochter des Gemüsehändlers von Earlscourt. Es hatte sie dazu veranlasst, sie Gesellschaft der Klasse ihrer Mutter zu suchen; und diese Klasse wollte sie schlicht nicht haben, weil sie viel ärmer als der Gemüsehändler war und weit davon entfernt sich ein Dienstmädchen leisten zu können, konnte sie sich nicht einmal eine Haushaltshilfe leisten und musste sich mehr schlecht als recht mit einem schlecht bezahlten allgemeinen Diener durchschlagen. Unter solchen Umständen konnte ihr nichts das Gefühl geben, ein unverfälschtes Exemplar des Largelady Parks zu sein. Und doch sah sie es in ihrer Tradition: eine Ehe mit jedem, der für sie erreichbar war, als unerträgliche Erniedrigung an. Gewerbetreibende und Berufstätige in nur geringem Umfang waren ihr verhasst. Sie war hinter Malern und Schriftstellern her; aber sie konnte sie nicht entzücken; und ihre kühnen Versuche die Sprache der Kunst und Literatur zu übernehmen, irritierte jene. Sie war, um es kurz zu sagen, eine völlige Versagerin, ein ignoranter, inkompetenter, anmaßender, unwillkommener, bettelarmer, nutzloser kleiner Snob; und obwohl sie sich diese Disqualifizierungen nicht eingestand (denn niemand ist jemals bereit, sich solchen unangenehmen Wahrheiten zu stellen, außer sie haben eine Ahnung, wie sie aus dieser Lage herauskommen können) spürte sie ihren Effekt zu sehr, um mit ihrer Lage zufrieden zu sein.
Clara had a startling eyeopener when, on being suddenly wakened to enthusiasm by a girl of her own age who dazzled her and produced in her a gushing desire to take her for a model, and gain her friendship, she discovered that this exquisite apparition had graduated from the gutter in a few months' time. It shook her so violently, that when Mr. H. G. Wells lifted her on the point of his puissant pen, and placed her at the angle of view from which the life she was leading and the society to which she clung appeared in its true relation to real human needs and worthy social structure, he effected a conversion and a conviction of sin comparable to the most sensational feats of General Booth or Gypsy Smith. Claras Snobismus endete schlagartig. Plötzlich begann sich ihr Leben zu bewegen. Ohne zu wissen wie oder warum, begann sie sich Freunde und Feinde zu machen. Einige der Bekanntschaften, denen sie ein ermüdendes, gleichgültiges oder lächerliches Leiden war, ließen sie fallen, andere wurden herzlich. Zu ihrer Überraschung fand sie heraus, dass einige "recht nette Leute durchtränkt waren von Wells und dass diese Zugänglichkeit zu Ideen das Geheimnis ihrer Freundlichkeit war. Leute, die sie für tief religiös gehalten hatte, und mit katastrophalem Ergebnis versucht hatte, sie in dieser Richtung für sich zu gewinnen, interessierten sich plötzlich für sie und offenbarten eine Feindseligkeit gegen konventionelle Religion, die sie sich nie für möglich gehalten hätte, außer bei den verzweifeltesten Charakteren. Sie brachten sie dazu, Galsworthy zu lesen; und Galsworthy entlarvte die Eitelkeit von Largelady Park und gab ihr den Rest. Es verärgerte sie, wenn sie daran dachte, dass der Kerker, in dem sie so viele Jahre geschmachtet hatte, die ganze Zeit offen war und dass die Impulse, die sie so sorgfältig dem guten Umgang mit der Gesellschaft zuliebe bekämpft und unterdrückt hatte, genau diese waren, durch die allein sie in irgendeine Art von aufrichtigem, menschlichen Kontakt hätte kommen können. In the radiance of these discoveries, and the tumult of their reaction, she made a fool of herself as freely and conspicuously as when she so rashly adopted Eliza's expletive in Mrs. Higgins's drawing-room; for the new-born Wellsian had to find her bearings almost as ridiculously as a baby; but nobody hates a baby for its ineptitudes, or thinks the worse of it for trying to eat the matches; and Clara lost no friends by her follies. Sie lachten ihr diesmal ins Gesicht, und sie musste sich verteidigen und es ausfechten, so gut wie es ihr möglich war.
When Freddy paid a visit to Earlscourt (which he never did when he could possibly help it) to make the desolating announcement that he and his Eliza were thinking of blackening the Largelady scutcheon by opening a shop, he found the little household already convulsed by a prior announcement from Clara that she also was going to work in an old furniture shop in Dover Street, which had been started by a fellow Wellsian. Diese Anstellung verdankt Clara schließlich ihrer alten sozialen Fähigkeit durch einen Anstoß. Sie hatte sich entschieden, dass sie, kostete was es wolle, Mr. Wells höchstpersönlich treffen wollte; und bei einer Gartenparty hatte sie ihr Ziel erreicht. Sie hatte mehr Glück, als dass sie so voreilig ein solches Vorhaben verdient hätte. Mr. Wells entsprach ihren Erwartungen. Das Alter hatte ihn nicht verwelken lassen, noch hat Gewohnheit all seine unendliche Vielfalt in einer halben Stunde verblassen lassen. His pleasant neatness and compactness, his small hands and feet, his teeming ready brain, his unaffected accessibility, and a certain fine apprehensiveness which stamped him as susceptible from his topmost hair to his tipmost toe, proved irresistible. Clara redete danach wochenlang von nichts anderem. And as she happened to talk to the lady of the furniture shop, and that lady also desired above all things to know Mr. Wells and sell pretty things to him, she offered Clara a job on the chance of achieving that end through her.
And so it came about that Eliza's luck held, and the expected opposition to the flower shop melted away. The shop is in the arcade of a railway station not very far from the Victoria and Albert Museum; and if you live in that neighborhood you may go there any day and buy a buttonhole from Eliza.
Now here is a last opportunity for romance. Would you not like to be assured that the shop was an immense success, thanks to Eliza's charms and her early business experience in Covent Garden? Alas! the truth is the truth: the shop did not pay for a long time, simply because Eliza and her Freddy did not know how to keep it. True, Eliza had not to begin at the very beginning: she knew the names and prices of the cheaper flowers; and her elation was unbounded when she found that Freddy, like all youths educated at cheap, pretentious, and thoroughly inefficient schools, knew a little Latin. It was very little, but enough to make him appear to her a Porson or Bentley, and to put him at his ease with botanical nomenclature. Unfortunately he knew nothing else; and Eliza, though she could count money up to eighteen shillings or so, and had acquired a certain familiarity with the language of Milton from her struggles to qualify herself for winning Higgins's bet, could not write out a bill without utterly disgracing the establishment. Freddy's power of stating in Latin that Balbus built a wall and that Gaul was divided into three parts did not carry with it the slightest knowledge of accounts or business: Colonel Pickering had to explain to him what a cheque book and a bank account meant. And the pair were by no means easily teachable. Freddy backed up Eliza in her obstinate refusal to believe that they could save money by engaging a bookkeeper with some knowledge of the business. How, they argued, could you possibly save money by going to extra expense when you already could not make both ends meet? But the Colonel, after making the ends meet over and over again, at last gently insisted; and Eliza, humbled to the dust by having to beg from him so often, and stung by the uproarious derision of Higgins, to whom the notion of Freddy succeeding at anything was a joke that never palled, grasped the fact that business, like phonetics, has to be learned.
On the piteous spectacle of the pair spending their evenings in shorthand schools and polytechnic classes, learning bookkeeping and typewriting with incipient junior clerks, male and female, from the elementary schools, let me not dwell. There were even classes at the London School of Economics, and a humble personal appeal to the director of that institution to recommend a course bearing on the flower business. He, being a humorist, explained to them the method of the celebrated Dickensian essay on Chinese Metaphysics by the gentleman who read an article on China and an article on Metaphysics and combined the information. He suggested that they should combine the London School with Kew Gardens. Eliza, to whom the procedure of the Dickensian gentleman seemed perfectly correct (as in fact it was) and not in the least funny (which was only her ignorance) took his advice with entire gravity. But the effort that cost her the deepest humiliation was a request to Higgins, whose pet artistic fancy, next to Milton's verse, was calligraphy, and who himself wrote a most beautiful Italian hand, that he would teach her to write. He declared that she was congenitally incapable of forming a single letter worthy of the least of Milton's words; but she persisted; and again he suddenly threw himself into the task of teaching her with a combination of stormy intensity, concentrated patience, and occasional bursts of interesting disquisition on the beauty and nobility, the august mission and destiny, of human handwriting. Eliza ended by acquiring an extremely uncommercial script which was a positive extension of her personal beauty, and spending three times as much on stationery as anyone else because certain qualities and shapes of paper became indispensable to her. She could not even address an envelope in the usual way because it made the margins all wrong.
Their commercial school days were a period of disgrace and despair for the young couple. They seemed to be learning nothing about flower shops. At last they gave it up as hopeless, and shook the dust of the shorthand schools, and the polytechnics, and the London School of Economics from their feet for ever. Besides, the business was in some mysterious way beginning to take care of itself. They had somehow forgotten their objections to employing other people. They came to the conclusion that their own way was the best, and that they had really a remarkable talent for business. The Colonel, who had been compelled for some years to keep a sufficient sum on current account at his bankers to make up their deficits, found that the provision was unnecessary: the young people were prospering. It is true that there was not quite fair play between them and their competitors in trade. Their week-ends in the country cost them nothing, and saved them the price of their Sunday dinners; for the motor car was the Colonel's; and he and Higgins paid the hotel bills. Mr. F. Hill, florist and greengrocer (they soon discovered that there was money in asparagus; and asparagus led to other vegetables), had an air which stamped the business as classy; and in private life he was still Frederick Eynsford Hill, Esquire. Not that there was any swank about him: nobody but Eliza knew that he had been christened Frederick Challoner. Eliza herself swanked like anything.
That is all. That is how it has turned out. It is astonishing how much Eliza still manages to meddle in the housekeeping at Wimpole Street in spite of the shop and her own family. And it is notable that though she never nags her husband, and frankly loves the Colonel as if she were his favorite daughter, she has never got out of the habit of nagging Higgins that was established on the fatal night when she won his bet for him. She snaps his head off on the faintest provocation, or on none. He no longer dares to tease her by assuming an abysmal inferiority of Freddy's mind to his own. He storms and bullies and derides; but she stands up to him so ruthlessly that the Colonel has to ask her from time to time to be kinder to Higgins; and it is the only request of his that brings a mulish expression into her face. Nothing but some emergency or calamity great enough to break down all likes and dislikes, and throw them both back on their common humanity—and may they be spared any such trial!—will ever alter this. Sie weiß, dass Higgins sie nicht braucht, genauso wie ihr Vater sie nicht braucht. The very scrupulousness with which he told her that day that he had become used to having her there, and dependent on her for all sorts of little services, and that he should miss her if she went away (it would never have occurred to Freddy or the Colonel to say anything of the sort) deepens her inner certainty that she is "no more to him than them slippers", yet she has a sense, too, that his indifference is deeper than the infatuation of commoner souls. She is immensely interested in him. She has even secret mischievous moments in which she wishes she could get him alone, on a desert island, away from all ties and with nobody else in the world to consider, and just drag him off his pedestal and see him making love like any common man. We all have private imaginations of that sort. But when it comes to business, to the life that she really leads as distinguished from the life of dreams and fancies, she likes Freddy and she likes the Colonel; and she does not like Higgins and Mr. Doolittle. Galatea never does quite like Pygmalion: his relation to her is too godlike to be altogether agreeable.
unit 1
ACT V. Mrs. Higgins's drawing-room.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 2
She is at her writing-table as before.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 3
The parlor-maid comes in.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 4
THE PARLOR-MAID [at the door] Mr. Henry, mam, is downstairs with Colonel Pickering.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 5
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 6
Well, show them up.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 7
THE PARLOR-MAID.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 8
They're using the telephone, mam.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 9
Telephoning to the police, I think.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 10
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 11
What!
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 12
THE PARLOR-MAID [coming further in and lowering her voice] Mr. Henry's in a state, mam.
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 13
I thought I'd better tell you.
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 14
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 15
If you had told me that Mr. Henry was not in a state it would have been more surprising.
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 16
Tell them to come up when they've finished with the police.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 17
I suppose he's lost something.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 18
THE PARLOR-MAID.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 19
Yes, maam [going].
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 20
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 21
Go upstairs and tell Miss Doolittle that Mr. Henry and the Colonel are here.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 22
Ask her not to come down till I send for her.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 23
THE PARLOR-MAID.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 24
Yes, mam.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 25
Higgins bursts in.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 26
He is, as the parlor-maid has said, in a state.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 27
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 28
Look here, mother: here's a confounded thing!
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 29
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 30
Yes, dear.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 31
Good-morning.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 32
[He checks his impatience and kisses her, whilst the parlor-maid goes out].
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 33
What is it?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 34
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 35
Eliza's bolted.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 36
MRS. HIGGINS [calmly continuing her writing] You must have frightened her.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 37
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 38
Frightened her!
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 39
nonsense!
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 42
What am I to do?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 43
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 3 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 44
Do without, I'm afraid, Henry.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 45
The girl has a perfect right to leave if she chooses.
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 46
HIGGINS [wandering distractedly across the room] But I can't find anything.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 47
I don't know what appointments I've got.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 48
I'm— [Pickering comes in.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 49
Mrs. Higgins puts down her pen and turns away from the writing-table].
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 50
PICKERING [shaking hands] Good-morning, Mrs. Higgins.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 51
Has Henry told you?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 52
[He sits down on the ottoman].
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 53
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 54
What does that ass of an inspector say?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 55
Have you offered a reward?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 56
unit 57
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 58
Of course.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 59
What are the police for?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 60
What else could we do?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 61
[He sits in the Elizabethan chair].
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 62
PICKERING.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 63
The inspector made a lot of difficulties.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 64
I really think he suspected us of some improper purpose.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 65
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 66
Well, of course he did.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 68
Really!
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 69
[She sits down again, deeply vexed].
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 70
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 71
But we want to find her.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 72
PICKERING.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 73
We can't let her go like this, you know, Mrs. Higgins.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 74
What were we to do?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 75
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 76
You have no more sense, either of you, than two children.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 77
Why— The parlor-maid comes in and breaks off the conversation.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 78
THE PARLOR-MAID.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 79
Mr. Henry: a gentleman wants to see you very particular.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 80
He's been sent on from Wimpole Street.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 81
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 82
Oh, bother!
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 83
I can't see anyone now.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 84
Who is it?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 85
THE PARLOR-MAID.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 86
A Mr. Doolittle, Sir.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 87
PICKERING.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 88
Doolittle!
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 89
Do you mean the dustman?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 90
THE PARLOR-MAID.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 91
Dustman!
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 92
Oh no, sir: a gentleman.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 93
HIGGINS [springing up excitedly] By George, Pick, it's some relative of hers that she's gone to.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 94
Somebody we know nothing about.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 95
[To the parlor-maid] Send him up, quick.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 96
THE PARLOR-MAID.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 97
Yes, Sir.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 98
[She goes].
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 99
HIGGINS [eagerly, going to his mother] Genteel relatives!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 100
now we shall hear something.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 101
[He sits down in the Chippendale chair].
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 102
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 103
Do you know any of her people?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 104
PICKERING.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 105
Only her father: the fellow we told you about.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 106
THE PARLOR-MAID [announcing] Mr. Doolittle.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 107
[She withdraws].
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 108
Doolittle enters.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 109
He is brilliantly dressed in a new fashionable frock-coat, with white waistcoat and grey trousers.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 110
A flower in his buttonhole, a dazzling silk hat, and patent leather shoes complete the effect.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 111
He is too concerned with the business he has come on to notice Mrs. Higgins.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 112
He walks straight to Higgins, and accosts him with vehement reproach.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 113
DOOLITTLE [indicating his own person] See here!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 114
Do you see this?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 115
You done this.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 116
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 117
Done what, man?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 118
DOOLITTLE.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 119
This, I tell you.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 120
Look at it.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 121
Look at this hat.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 122
Look at this coat.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 123
PICKERING.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 124
Has Eliza been buying you clothes?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 125
DOOLITTLE.
1 Translations, 3 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 126
Eliza!
1 Translations, 3 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 127
not she.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 128
Not half.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 129
Why would she buy me clothes?
1 Translations, 3 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 130
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 131
Good-morning, Mr. Doolittle.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 132
Won't you sit down?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 134
[He approaches her and shakes her proffered hand].
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 135
Thank you.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 136
[He sits down on the ottoman, on Pickering's right].
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 137
I am that full of what has happened to me that I can't think of anything else.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 138
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 139
What the dickens has happened to you?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 140
DOOLITTLE.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 142
But this is something that you done to me: yes, you, Henry Higgins.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 143
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 144
Have you found Eliza?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 145
That's the point.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 146
DOOLITTLE.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 147
Have you lost her?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 148
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 149
Yes.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 150
DOOLITTLE.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 151
You have all the luck, you have.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 152
I ain't found her; but she'll find me quick enough now after what you done to me.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 153
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 154
But what has my son done to you, Mr. Doolittle?
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 155
DOOLITTLE.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 156
Done to me!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 157
Ruined me.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 158
Destroyed my happiness.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 159
Tied me up and delivered me into the hands of middle class morality.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 160
HIGGINS [rising intolerantly and standing over Doolittle] You're raving.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 161
You're drunk.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 162
You're mad.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 163
I gave you five pounds.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 164
After that I had two conversations with you, at half-a-crown an hour.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 165
I've never seen you since.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 166
DOOLITTLE.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 167
Oh!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 168
Drunk!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 169
am I?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 170
Mad!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 171
am I?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 172
Tell me this.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 174
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 175
What!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 176
Ezra D. Wannafeller!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 177
He's dead.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 178
[He sits down again carelessly].
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 179
DOOLITTLE.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 180
Yes: he's dead; and I'm done for.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 182
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 183
Oh, after your last visit I remember making some silly joke of the kind.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 184
DOOLITTLE.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 185
Ah!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 186
you may well call it a silly joke.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 187
It put the lid on me right enough.
2 Translations, 3 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 190
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 191
The devil he does!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 192
Whew!
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 193
[Brightening suddenly] What a lark!
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 194
PICKERING.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 195
A safe thing for you, Doolittle.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 196
They won't ask you twice.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 197
DOOLITTLE.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 198
It ain't the lecturing I mind.
2 Translations, 3 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 199
I'll lecture them blue in the face, I will, and not turn a hair.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 200
It's making a gentleman of me that I object to.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 201
Who asked him to make a gentleman of me?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 202
I was happy.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 203
I was free.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 204
I touched pretty nigh everybody for money when I wanted it, same as I touched you, Henry Higgins.
1 Translations, 3 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 205
Now I am worrited; tied neck and heels; and everybody touches me for money.
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 206
It's a fine thing for you, says my solicitor.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 207
Is it?
2 Translations, 3 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 208
says I.
1 Translations, 3 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 209
You mean it's a good thing for you, I says.
2 Translations, 4 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 212
Now they finds out that I'm not a healthy man and can't live unless they looks after me twice a day.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 213
In the house I'm not let do a hand's turn for myself: somebody else must do it and touch me for it.
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 214
A year ago I hadn't a relative in the world except two or three that wouldn't speak to me.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 215
Now I've fifty, and not a decent week's wages among the lot of them.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 216
I have to live for others and not for myself: that's middle class morality.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 217
You talk of losing Eliza.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 219
And the next one to touch me will be you, Henry Higgins.
0 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity None
unit 221
That's where you'll come in; and I daresay that's what you done it for.
0 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity None
unit 222
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 223
But, my dear Mr. Doolittle, you need not suffer all this if you are really in earnest.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 224
Nobody can force you to accept this bequest.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 225
You can repudiate it.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 226
Isn't that so, Colonel Pickering?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 227
PICKERING.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 228
I believe so.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 229
DOOLITTLE [softening his manner in deference to her sex] That's the tragedy of it, ma'am.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 230
It's easy to say chuck it; but I haven't the nerve.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 231
Which one of us has?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 232
We're all intimidated.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 233
Intimidated, ma'am: that's what we are.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 234
What is there for me if I chuck it but the workhouse in my old age?
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 235
I have to dye my hair already to keep my job as a dustman.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 237
They don't know what happiness is.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 239
(Excuse the expression, ma'am: you'd use it yourself if you had my provocation).
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 241
Intimidated: that's what I am.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 242
Broke.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 243
Bought up.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 245
And that's what your son has brought me to.
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 246
[He is overcome by emotion].
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 247
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 248
Well, I'm very glad you're not going to do anything foolish, Mr. Doolittle.
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 249
For this solves the problem of Eliza's future.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 250
You can provide for her now.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 252
HIGGINS [jumping up] Nonsense!
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 253
he can't provide for her.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 254
He shan't provide for her.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 255
She doesn't belong to him.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 256
I paid him five pounds for her.
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 257
Doolittle: either you're an honest man or a rogue.
2 Translations, 4 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 258
DOOLITTLE [tolerantly] A little of both, Henry, like the rest of us: a little of both.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 259
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 260
Well, you took that money for the girl; and you have no right to take her as well.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 261
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 262
Henry: don't be absurd.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 263
If you really want to know where Eliza is, she is upstairs.
2 Translations, 3 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 264
HIGGINS [amazed] Upstairs!!!
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 265
Then I shall jolly soon fetch her downstairs.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 266
[He makes resolutely for the door].
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 267
MRS. HIGGINS [rising and following him] Be quiet, Henry.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 268
Sit down.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 269
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 270
I— MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 271
Sit down, dear; and listen to me.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 272
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 273
Oh very well, very well, very well.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 274
[He throws himself ungraciously on the ottoman, with his face towards the windows].
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 275
But I think you might have told me this half an hour ago.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 276
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 277
Eliza came to me this morning.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 279
She told me of the brutal way you two treated her.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 280
HIGGINS [bounding up again] What!
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 281
PICKERING [rising also] My dear Mrs. Higgins, she's been telling you stories.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 282
We didn't treat her brutally.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 283
We hardly said a word to her; and we parted on particularly good terms.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 284
[Turning on Higgins].
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 285
Higgins: did you bully her after I went to bed?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 286
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 287
Just the other way about.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 288
She threw my slippers in my face.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 289
She behaved in the most outrageous way.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 290
I never gave her the slightest provocation.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 291
The slippers came bang into my face the moment I entered the room—before I had uttered a word.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 292
And used perfectly awful language.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 293
PICKERING [astonished] But why?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 294
What did we do to her?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 295
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 296
I think I know pretty well what you did.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 297
The girl is naturally rather affectionate, I think.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 298
Isn't she, Mr. Doolittle?
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 299
DOOLITTLE.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 300
Very tender-hearted, ma'am.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 301
Takes after me.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 302
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 303
Just so.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 304
She had become attached to you both.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 305
She worked very hard for you, Henry!
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 306
I don't think you quite realize what anything in the nature of brain work means to a girl like that.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 308
And then you were surprised because she threw your slippers at you!
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 309
I should have thrown the fire-irons at you.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 310
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 311
We said nothing except that we were tired and wanted to go to bed.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 312
Did we, Pick?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 313
PICKERING [shrugging his shoulders] That was all.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 314
MRS. HIGGINS [ironically] Quite sure?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 315
PICKERING.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 316
Absolutely.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 317
Really, that was all.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 318
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 319
You didn't thank her, or pet her, or admire her, or tell her how splendid she'd been.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 320
HIGGINS [impatiently] But she knew all about that.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 321
We didn't make speeches to her, if that's what you mean.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 322
PICKERING [conscience stricken] Perhaps we were a little inconsiderate.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 323
Is she very angry?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 325
HIGGINS [furious] Is she, by George?
0 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity None
unit 326
Ho!
0 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity None
unit 327
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 328
If you promise to behave yourself, Henry, I'll ask her to come down.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 329
If not, go home; for you have taken up quite enough of my time.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 330
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 331
Oh, all right.
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 332
Very well.
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 333
Pick: you behave yourself.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 334
Let us put on our best Sunday manners for this creature that we picked out of the mud.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 335
[He flings himself sulkily into the Elizabethan chair].
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 336
DOOLITTLE [remonstrating] Now, now, Henry Higgins!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 337
have some consideration for my feelings as a middle class man.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 338
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 339
Remember your promise, Henry.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 340
[She presses the bell-button on the writing-table].
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 341
Mr. Doolittle: will you be so good as to step out on the balcony for a moment.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 342
I don't want Eliza to have the shock of your news until she has made it up with these two gentlemen.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 343
Would you mind?
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 344
DOOLITTLE.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 345
As you wish, lady.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 346
Anything to help Henry to keep her off my hands.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 347
[He disappears through the window].
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 348
The parlor-maid answers the bell.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 349
Pickering sits down in Doolittle's place.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 350
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 351
Ask Miss Doolittle to come down, please.
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 352
THE PARLOR-MAID.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 353
Yes, mam.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 354
[She goes out].
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 355
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 356
Now, Henry: be good.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 357
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 358
I am behaving myself perfectly.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 359
PICKERING.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 360
He is doing his best, Mrs. Higgins.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 361
A pause.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 362
Higgins throws back his head; stretches out his legs; and begins to whistle.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 363
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 364
Henry, dearest, you don't look at all nice in that attitude.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 365
HIGGINS [pulling himself together] I was not trying to look nice, mother.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 366
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 367
It doesn't matter, dear.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 368
I only wanted to make you speak.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 369
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 370
Why?
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 371
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 372
Because you can't speak and whistle at the same time.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 373
Higgins groans.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 374
Another very trying pause.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 375
HIGGINS [springing up, out of patience] Where the devil is that girl?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 376
Are we to wait here all day?
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 377
unit 378
She carries a little work-basket, and is very much at home.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 379
Pickering is too much taken aback to rise.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 380
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 381
How do you do, Professor Higgins?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 382
Are you quite well?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 383
HIGGINS [choking] Am I— [He can say no more].
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 384
LIZA.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 385
But of course you are: you are never ill.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 386
So glad to see you again, Colonel Pickering.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 387
[He rises hastily; and they shake hands].
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 388
Quite chilly this morning, isn't it?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 389
[She sits down on his left.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 390
He sits beside her].
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 391
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 392
Don't you dare try this game on me.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 393
I taught it to you; and it doesn't take me in.
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 394
Get up and come home; and don't be a fool.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 396
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 397
Very nicely put, indeed, Henry.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 398
No woman could resist such an invitation.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 399
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 400
You let her alone, mother.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 401
Let her speak for herself.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 404
MRS. HIGGINS [placidly] Yes, dear; but you'll sit down, won't you?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 405
Higgins sits down again, savagely.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 407
PICKERING.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 408
Oh don't.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 409
You mustn't think of it as an experiment.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 410
It shocks me, somehow.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 411
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 412
Oh, I'm only a squashed cabbage leaf.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 413
PICKERING [impulsively] No.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 414
LIZA [continuing quietly]—but I owe so much to you that I should be very unhappy if you forgot me.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 415
PICKERING.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 416
It's very kind of you to say so, Miss Doolittle.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 417
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 418
It's not because you paid for my dresses.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 419
I know you are generous to everybody with money.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 420
But it was from you that I learnt really nice manners; and that is what makes one a lady, isn't it?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 421
You see it was so very difficult for me with the example of Professor Higgins always before me.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 423
unit 424
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 425
Well!!
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 426
PICKERING.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 427
Oh, that's only his way, you know.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 428
He doesn't mean it.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 429
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 430
Oh, I didn't mean it either, when I was a flower girl.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 431
It was only my way.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 432
But you see I did it; and that's what makes the difference after all.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 433
PICKERING.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 434
No doubt.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 435
Still, he taught you to speak; and I couldn't have done that, you know.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 436
LIZA [trivially] Of course: that is his profession.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 437
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 438
Damnation!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 440
But do you know what began my real education?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 441
PICKERING.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 442
What?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 444
That was the beginning of self-respect for me.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 445
[She resumes her stitching].
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 446
And there were a hundred little things you never noticed, because they came naturally to you.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 447
Things about standing up and taking off your hat and opening doors— PICKERING.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 448
Oh, that was nothing.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 449
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 451
You never took off your boots in the dining room when I was there.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 452
PICKERING.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 453
You mustn't mind that.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 454
Higgins takes off his boots all over the place.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 455
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 456
I know.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 457
I am not blaming him.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 458
It is his way, isn't it?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 459
But it made such a difference to me that you didn't do it.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 462
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 463
Please don't grind your teeth, Henry.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 464
PICKERING.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 465
Well, this is really very nice of you, Miss Doolittle.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 466
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 467
I should like you to call me Eliza, now, if you would.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 468
PICKERING.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 469
Thank you.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 470
Eliza, of course.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 471
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 472
And I should like Professor Higgins to call me Miss Doolittle.
2 Translations, 3 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 473
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 474
I'll see you damned first.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 475
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 476
Henry!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 477
Henry!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 478
PICKERING [laughing] Why don't you slang back at him?
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 479
Don't stand it.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 480
It would do him a lot of good.
2 Translations, 5 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 481
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 482
I can't.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 483
I could have done it once; but now I can't go back to it.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 486
Well, I am a child in your country.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 487
I have forgotten my own language, and can speak nothing but yours.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 488
That's the real break-off with the corner of Tottenham Court Road.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 489
Leaving Wimpole Street finishes it.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 490
PICKERING [much alarmed] Oh!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 491
but you're coming back to Wimpole Street, aren't you?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 492
You'll forgive Higgins?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 493
HIGGINS [rising] Forgive!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 494
Will she, by George!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 495
Let her go.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 496
Let her find out how she can get on without us.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 497
She will relapse into the gutter in three weeks without me at her elbow.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 498
Doolittle appears at the centre window.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 500
PICKERING.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 501
He's incorrigible, Eliza.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 502
You won't relapse, will you?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 503
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 504
No: Not now.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 505
Never again.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 506
I have learnt my lesson.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 507
I don't believe I could utter one of the old sounds if I tried.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 508
[Doolittle touches her on her left shoulder.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 510
HIGGINS [with a crow of triumph] Aha!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 511
Just so.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 512
A—a—a—a—ahowooh!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 513
A—a—a—a—ahowooh !
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 514
A—a—a—a—ahowooh!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 515
Victory!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 516
Victory!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 517
[He throws himself on the divan, folding his arms, and spraddling arrogantly].
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 518
DOOLITTLE.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 519
Can you blame the girl?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 520
Don't look at me like that, Eliza.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 521
It ain't my fault.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 522
I've come into money.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 523
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 524
You must have touched a millionaire this time, dad.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 525
DOOLITTLE.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 526
I have.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 527
But I'm dressed something special today.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 528
I'm going to St. George's, Hanover Square.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 529
Your stepmother is going to marry me.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 530
LIZA [angrily] You're going to let yourself down to marry that low common woman!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 531
PICKERING [quietly] He ought to, Eliza.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 532
[To Doolittle] Why has she changed her mind?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 533
DOOLITTLE [sadly] Intimidated, Governor.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 534
Intimidated.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 535
Middle class morality claims its victim.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 536
Won't you put on your hat, Liza, and come and see me turned off?
2 Translations, 3 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 537
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 538
If the Colonel says I must, I—I'll [almost sobbing] I'll demean myself.
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 539
And get insulted for my pains, like enough.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 540
DOOLITTLE.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 541
Don't be afraid: she never comes to words with anyone now, poor woman!
1 Translations, 4 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 542
respectability has broke all the spirit out of her.
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 543
PICKERING [squeezing Eliza's elbow gently] Be kind to them, Eliza.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 544
Make the best of it.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 545
unit 546
I'll be back in a moment.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 547
[She goes out].
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 548
DOOLITTLE [sitting down beside Pickering] I feel uncommon nervous about the ceremony, Colonel.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 549
I wish you'd come and see me through it.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 550
PICKERING.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 551
But you've been through it before, man.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 552
You were married to Eliza's mother.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 553
DOOLITTLE.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 554
Who told you that, Colonel?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 555
PICKERING.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 556
Well, nobody told me.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 557
But I concluded naturally— DOOLITTLE.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 558
No: that ain't the natural way, Colonel: it's only the middle class way.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 559
My way was always the undeserving way.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 560
But don't say nothing to Eliza.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 561
She don't know: I always had a delicacy about telling her.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 562
PICKERING.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 563
Quite right.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 564
We'll leave it so, if you don't mind.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 565
DOOLITTLE.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 566
And you'll come to the church, Colonel, and put me through straight?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 567
PICKERING.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 568
With pleasure.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 569
As far as a bachelor can.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 570
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 571
May I come, Mr. Doolittle?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 572
I should be very sorry to miss your wedding.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 573
DOOLITTLE.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 575
She's been very low, thinking of the happy days that are no more.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 576
MRS. HIGGINS [rising] I'll order the carriage and get ready.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 577
[The men rise, except Higgins].
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 578
I shan't be more than fifteen minutes.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 579
[As she goes to the door Eliza comes in, hatted and buttoning her gloves].
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 580
I'm going to the church to see your father married, Eliza.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 581
You had better come in the brougham with me.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 582
Colonel Pickering can go on with the bridegroom.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 583
Mrs. Higgins goes out.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 584
Eliza comes to the middle of the room between the centre window and the ottoman.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 585
Pickering joins her.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 586
DOOLITTLE.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 587
Bridegroom!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 588
What a word!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 589
It makes a man realize his position, somehow.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 590
[He takes up his hat and goes towards the door].
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 591
PICKERING.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 592
Before I go, Eliza, do forgive him and come back to us.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 593
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 594
I don't think papa would allow me.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 595
Would you, dad?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 596
DOOLITTLE [sad but magnanimous] They played you off very cunning, Eliza, them two sportsmen.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 597
If it had been only one of them, you could have nailed him.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 598
But you see, there was two; and one of them chaperoned the other, as you might say.
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 601
I shan't interfere.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 602
It's time for us to go, Colonel.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 603
So long, Henry.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 604
See you in St. George's, Eliza.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 605
[He goes out].
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 606
PICKERING [coaxing] Do stay with us, Eliza.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 607
[He follows Doolittle].
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 608
Eliza goes out on the balcony to avoid being alone with Higgins.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 609
He rises and joins her there.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 611
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 612
Well, Eliza, you've had a bit of your own back, as you call it.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 613
Have you had enough?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 614
and are you going to be reasonable?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 615
Or do you want any more?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 616
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 617
unit 618
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 619
I haven't said I wanted you back at all.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 620
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 621
Oh, indeed.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 622
Then what are we talking about?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 623
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 624
About you, not about me.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 625
If you come back I shall treat you just as I have always treated you.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 626
I can't change my nature; and I don't intend to change my manners.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 627
My manners are exactly the same as Colonel Pickering's.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 628
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 629
That's not true.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 630
He treats a flower girl as if she was a duchess.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 631
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 632
And I treat a duchess as if she was a flower girl.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 633
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 634
I see.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 635
[She turns away composedly, and sits on the ottoman, facing the window].
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 636
The same to everybody.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 637
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 638
Just so.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 639
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 640
Like father.
2 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 643
LIZA.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 644
Amen.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 645
You are a born preacher.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 647
LIZA [with sudden sincerity] I don't care how you treat me.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 648
I don't mind your swearing at me.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 649
I don't mind a black eye: I've had one before this.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 650
But [standing up and facing him] I won't be passed over.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 651
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 652
Then get out of my way; for I won't stop for you.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 653
You talk about me as if I were a motor bus.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 654
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 655
So you are a motor bus: all bounce and go, and no consideration for anyone.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 656
But I can do without you: don't think I can't.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 657
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 658
I know you can.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 659
I told you you could.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 661
You wanted to get rid of me.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 662
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 663
Liar.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 664
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 665
Thank you.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 666
[She sits down with dignity].
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 667
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 668
You never asked yourself, I suppose, whether I could do without YOU.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 669
LIZA [earnestly] Don't you try to get round me.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 670
You'll HAVE to do without me.
2 Translations, 3 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 671
HIGGINS [arrogant] I can do without anybody.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 672
I have my own soul: my own spark of divine fire.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 673
But [with sudden humility] I shall miss you, Eliza.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 674
[He sits down near her on the ottoman].
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 675
I have learnt something from your idiotic notions: I confess that humbly and gratefully.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 676
And I have grown accustomed to your voice and appearance.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 677
I like them, rather.
2 Translations, 4 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 678
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 679
Well, you have both of them on your gramophone and in your book of photographs.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 680
When you feel lonely without me, you can turn the machine on.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 681
It's got no feelings to hurt.
2 Translations, 3 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 682
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 683
I can't turn your soul on.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 684
Leave me those feelings; and you can take away the voice and the face.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 685
They are not you.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 686
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 687
Oh, you ARE a devil.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 688
You can twist the heart in a girl as easy as some could twist her arms to hurt her.
2 Translations, 3 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 689
Mrs. Pearce warned me.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 690
Time and again she has wanted to leave you; and you always got round her at the last minute.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 691
And you don't care a bit for her.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 692
And you don't care a bit for me.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 693
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 694
unit 695
What more can you or anyone ask?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 696
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 697
I won't care for anybody that doesn't care for me.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 698
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 699
Commercial principles, Eliza.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 701
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 702
Don't sneer at me.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 703
It's mean to sneer at me.
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 704
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 705
I have never sneered in my life.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 706
Sneering doesn't become either the human face or the human soul.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 707
I am expressing my righteous contempt for Commercialism.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 708
I don't and won't trade in affection.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 711
I think a good deal more of you for throwing them in my face.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 712
No use slaving for me and then saying you want to be cared for: who cares for a slave?
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 713
If you come back, come back for the sake of good fellowship; for you'll get nothing else.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 715
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 716
What did you do it for if you didn't care for me?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 717
HIGGINS [heartily] Why, because it was my job.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 718
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 719
You never thought of the trouble it would make for me.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 720
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 721
Would the world ever have been made if its maker had been afraid of making trouble?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 722
Making life means making trouble.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 723
There's only one way of escaping trouble; and that's killing things.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 724
Cowards, you notice, are always shrieking to have troublesome people killed.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 725
LIZA.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 726
I'm no preacher: I don't notice things like that.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 727
I notice that you don't notice me.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 728
HIGGINS [jumping up and walking about intolerantly] Eliza: you're an idiot.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 729
I waste the treasures of my Miltonic mind by spreading them before you.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 731
I am not intimidated, like your father and your stepmother.
0 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity None
unit 732
So you can come back or go to the devil: which you please.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 733
LIZA.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 734
What am I to come back for?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 736
That's why I took you on.
0 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity None
unit 738
HIGGINS.
0 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity None
unit 739
unit 740
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 741
And live with my stepmother?
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 742
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 743
Yes, or sell flowers.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 744
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 745
Oh!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 746
if I only COULD go back to my flower basket!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 747
I should be independent of both you and father and all the world!
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 748
Why did you take my independence from me?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 749
Why did I give it up?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 750
I'm a slave now, for all my fine clothes.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 751
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 752
Not a bit.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 753
I'll adopt you as my daughter and settle money on you if you like.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 754
Or would you rather marry Pickering?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 756
HIGGINS [gently] Than he is: not "than what he is."
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 757
LIZA [losing her temper and rising] I'll talk as I like.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 758
You're not my teacher now.
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 759
HIGGINS [reflectively] I don't suppose Pickering would, though.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 760
He's as confirmed an old bachelor as I am.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 761
LIZA.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 762
That's not what I want; and don't you think it.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 763
I've always had chaps enough wanting me that way.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 764
Freddy Hill writes to me twice and three times a day, sheets and sheets.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 765
HIGGINS [disagreeably surprised] Damn his impudence!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 766
[He recoils and finds himself sitting on his heels].
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 767
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 768
He has a right to if he likes, poor lad.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 769
And he does love me.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 770
HIGGINS [getting off the ottoman] You have no right to encourage him.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 771
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 772
Every girl has a right to be loved.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 773
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 774
What!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 775
By fools like that?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 776
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 777
Freddy's not a fool.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 779
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 780
Can he MAKE anything of you?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 781
That's the point.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 782
LIZA.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 783
Perhaps I could make something of him.
1 Translations, 3 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 785
I only want to be natural.
1 Translations, 3 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 786
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 787
In short, you want me to be as infatuated about you as Freddy?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 788
Is that it?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 789
LIZA.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 790
No I don't.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 791
That's not the sort of feeling I want from you.
2 Translations, 4 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 792
And don't you be too sure of yourself or of me.
0 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity None
unit 793
I could have been a bad girl if I'd liked.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 794
I've seen more of some things than you, for all your learning.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 795
Girls like me can drag gentlemen down to make love to them easy enough.
2 Translations, 4 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 796
And they wish each other dead the next minute.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 797
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 798
Of course they do.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 799
Then what in thunder are we quarrelling about?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 800
LIZA [much troubled] I want a little kindness.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 801
unit 803
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 804
Well, of course.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 805
That's just how I feel.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 806
And how Pickering feels.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 807
Eliza: you're a fool.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 808
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 809
That's not a proper answer to give me [she sinks on the chair at the writing-table in tears].
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 810
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 811
It's all you'll get until you stop being a common idiot.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 813
If you can't stand the coldness of my sort of life, and the strain of it, go back to the gutter.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 815
Oh, it's a fine life, the life of the gutter.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 817
Not like Science and Literature and Classical Music and Philosophy and Art.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 818
You find me cold, unfeeling, selfish, don't you?
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 819
Very well: be off with you to the sort of people you like.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 821
If you can't appreciate what you've got, you'd better get what you can appreciate.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 822
LIZA [desperate] Oh, you are a cruel tyrant.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 823
I can't talk to you: you turn everything against me: I'm always in the wrong.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 824
But you know very well all the time that you're nothing but a bully.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 829
I'll marry Freddy, I will, as soon as he's able to support me.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 830
HIGGINS [sitting down beside her] Rubbish!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 831
you shall marry an ambassador.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 833
I'm not going to have my masterpiece thrown away on Freddy.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 834
LIZA.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 835
You think I like you to say that.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 837
If I can't have kindness, I'll have independence.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 838
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 839
Independence?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 840
That's middle class blasphemy.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 841
We are all dependent on one another, every soul of us on earth.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 5 months ago
unit 842
LIZA [rising determinedly] I'll let you see whether I'm dependent on you.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 843
If you can preach, I can teach.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 844
I'll go and be a teacher.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 845
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 846
What'll you teach, in heaven's name?
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 847
LIZA.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 848
What you taught me.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 849
I'll teach phonetics.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 850
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 851
Ha!
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 852
Ha!
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 853
Ha!
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 854
LIZA.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 855
I'll offer myself as an assistant to Professor Nepean.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 856
HIGGINS [rising in a fury] What!
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 857
That impostor!
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 858
that humbug!
2 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 859
that toadying ignoramus!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 860
Teach him my methods!
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 861
my discoveries!
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 862
You take one step in his direction and I'll wring your neck.
2 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 863
[He lays hands on her].
2 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 864
Do you hear?
3 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 865
LIZA [defiantly non-resistant] Wring away.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 866
What do I care?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 867
I knew you'd strike me some day.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 869
Aha!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 870
Now I know how to deal with you.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 871
What a fool I was not to think of it before!
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 872
You can't take away the knowledge you gave me.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 873
You said I had a finer ear than you.
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 874
And I can be civil and kind to people, which is more than you can.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 875
Aha!
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 876
That's done you, Henry Higgins, it has.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 877
Now I don't care that [snapping her fingers] for your bullying and your big talk.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 880
HIGGINS [wondering at her] You damned impudent slut, you!
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 881
But it's better than snivelling; better than fetching slippers and finding spectacles, isn't it?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 882
[Rising] By George, Eliza, I said I'd make a woman of you; and I have.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 883
I like you like this.
3 Translations, 3 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 884
LIZA.
0 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity None
unit 886
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 887
Of course I do, you little fool.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 888
Five minutes ago you were like a millstone round my neck.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 889
Now you're a tower of strength: a consort battleship.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 890
unit 891
Mrs. Higgins returns, dressed for the wedding.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 892
Eliza instantly becomes cool and elegant.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 893
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 894
The carriage is waiting, Eliza.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 895
Are you ready?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 896
LIZA.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 897
Quite.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 898
Is the Professor coming?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 899
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 900
Certainly not.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 901
He can't behave himself in church.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 902
He makes remarks out loud all the time on the clergyman's pronunciation.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 903
LIZA.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 904
Then I shall not see you again, Professor.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 905
Good bye.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 906
[She goes to the door].
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 907
MRS. HIGGINS [coming to Higgins] Good-bye, dear.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 908
HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 909
Good-bye, mother.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 910
[He is about to kiss her, when he recollects something].
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 911
Oh, by the way, Eliza, order a ham and a Stilton cheese, will you?
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 913
You can choose the color.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 914
[His cheerful, careless, vigorous voice shows that he is incorrigible].
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 915
LIZA [disdainfully] Buy them yourself.
2 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 916
[She sweeps out].
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 917
MRS. HIGGINS.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 918
I'm afraid you've spoiled that girl, Henry.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 919
But never mind, dear: I'll buy you the tie and gloves.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 920
HIGGINS [sunnily] Oh, don't bother.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 921
She'll buy em all right enough.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 922
Good-bye.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 923
They kiss.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 924
Mrs. Higgins runs out.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 935
unit 936
She is therefore guided by her instinct in the matter.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 937
Eliza's instinct tells her not to marry Higgins.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 938
It does not tell her to give him up.
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 939
unit 940
It would be very sorely strained if there was another woman likely to supplant her with him.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 944
The case is uncommon only to the extent that remarkable mothers are uncommon.
1 Translations, 3 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 952
Had Mrs. Higgins died, there would still have been Milton and the Universal Alphabet.
2 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 955
And now, whom did Eliza marry?
1 Translations, 3 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 956
For if Higgins was a predestinate old bachelor, she was most certainly not a predestinate old maid.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 961
"When you go to women," says Nietzsche, "take your whip with you."
1 Translations, 2 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 964
But to admire a strong person and to live under that strong person's thumb are two different things.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 968
When a lion meets another with a louder roar "the first lion thinks the last a bore."
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 970
The converse is also true.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 973
People who are not only weak, but silly or obtuse as well, are often in these difficulties.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 976
There can be no doubt about the answer.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 978
And that is just what Eliza did.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 979
Complications ensued; but they were economic, not romantic.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 980
Freddy had no money and no occupation.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 983
unit 984
unit 987
It is true that Eliza's situation did not seem wholly ineligible.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 992
He absolutely refused to add the last straw to his burden by contributing to Eliza's support.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 997
Not that the Wimpole Street bachelors objected.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 1005
It was the Colonel who finally solved the problem, which had cost him much perplexed cogitation.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 1006
unit 1009
They broke the matter to Higgins that evening.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 1010
The sole comment vouchsafed by him very nearly led to a serious quarrel with Eliza.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 1011
It was to the effect that she would have in Freddy an ideal errand boy.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 1012
Freddy himself was next sounded on the subject.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 1016
This difficulty was removed by an event highly unexpected by Freddy's mother.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 1018
Wells.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 1019
unit 1020
The result was a conversion of a kind quite common today.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 1021
A modern Acts of the Apostles would fill fifty whole Bibles if anyone were capable of writing it.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 1024
Still, she was not happy.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 1025
She was growing desperate.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 1029
Under such circumstances nothing could give her an air of being a genuine product of Largelady Park.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 1030
unit 1031
Commercial people and professional people in a small way were odious to her.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 1036
Clara's snobbery went bang.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 1037
Life suddenly began to move with her.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 1038
Without knowing how or why, she began to make friends and enemies.
1 Translations, 1 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 1042
They made her read Galsworthy; and Galsworthy exposed the vanity of Largelady Park and finished her.
2 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 1045
unit 1047
This appointment Clara owed, after all, to her old social accomplishment of Push.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 1049
She had better luck than so rash an enterprise deserved.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 1050
Mr. Wells came up to her expectations.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 1051
Age had not withered him, nor could custom stale his infinite variety in half an hour.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 1053
Clara talked of nothing else for weeks and weeks afterwards.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 1057
Now here is a last opportunity for romance.
0 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity None
unit 1059
Alas!
0 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity None
unit 1065
And the pair were by no means easily teachable.
0 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity None
unit 1072
unit 1079
They seemed to be learning nothing about flower shops.
0 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity None
unit 1082
They had somehow forgotten their objections to employing other people.
0 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity None
unit 1089
Eliza herself swanked like anything.
0 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity None
unit 1090
That is all.
0 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity None
unit 1091
That is how it has turned out.
0 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity None
unit 1094
She snaps his head off on the faintest provocation, or on none.
0 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity None
unit 1098
She knows that Higgins does not need her, just as her father did not need her.
1 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity 6 years, 4 months ago
unit 1100
She is immensely interested in him.
0 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity None
unit 1102
We all have private imaginations of that sort.
0 Translations, 0 Upvotes, Last Activity None

ACT V.
Mrs. Higgins's drawing-room. She is at her writing-table as before. The parlor-maid comes in.
THE PARLOR-MAID [at the door] Mr. Henry, mam, is downstairs with Colonel Pickering.
MRS. HIGGINS. Well, show them up.
THE PARLOR-MAID. They're using the telephone, mam. Telephoning to the police, I think.
MRS. HIGGINS. What!
THE PARLOR-MAID [coming further in and lowering her voice] Mr. Henry's in a state, mam. I thought I'd better tell you.
MRS. HIGGINS. If you had told me that Mr. Henry was not in a state it would have been more surprising. Tell them to come up when they've finished with the police. I suppose he's lost something.
THE PARLOR-MAID. Yes, maam [going].
MRS. HIGGINS. Go upstairs and tell Miss Doolittle that Mr. Henry and the Colonel are here. Ask her not to come down till I send for her.
THE PARLOR-MAID. Yes, mam.
Higgins bursts in. He is, as the parlor-maid has said, in a state.
HIGGINS. Look here, mother: here's a confounded thing!
MRS. HIGGINS. Yes, dear. Good-morning. [He checks his impatience and kisses her, whilst the parlor-maid goes out]. What is it?
HIGGINS. Eliza's bolted.
MRS. HIGGINS [calmly continuing her writing] You must have frightened her.
HIGGINS. Frightened her! nonsense! She was left last night, as usual, to turn out the lights and all that; and instead of going to bed she changed her clothes and went right off: her bed wasn't slept in. She came in a cab for her things before seven this morning; and that fool Mrs. Pearce let her have them without telling me a word about it. What am I to do?
MRS. HIGGINS. Do without, I'm afraid, Henry. The girl has a perfect right to leave if she chooses.
HIGGINS [wandering distractedly across the room] But I can't find anything. I don't know what appointments I've got. I'm— [Pickering comes in. Mrs. Higgins puts down her pen and turns away from the writing-table].
PICKERING [shaking hands] Good-morning, Mrs. Higgins. Has Henry told you? [He sits down on the ottoman].
HIGGINS. What does that ass of an inspector say? Have you offered a reward?
MRS. HIGGINS [rising in indignant amazement] You don't mean to say you have set the police after Eliza?
HIGGINS. Of course. What are the police for? What else could we do? [He sits in the Elizabethan chair].
PICKERING. The inspector made a lot of difficulties. I really think he suspected us of some improper purpose.
MRS. HIGGINS. Well, of course he did. What right have you to go to the police and give the girl's name as if she were a thief, or a lost umbrella, or something? Really! [She sits down again, deeply vexed].
HIGGINS. But we want to find her.
PICKERING. We can't let her go like this, you know, Mrs. Higgins. What were we to do?
MRS. HIGGINS. You have no more sense, either of you, than two children. Why—
The parlor-maid comes in and breaks off the conversation.
THE PARLOR-MAID. Mr. Henry: a gentleman wants to see you very particular. He's been sent on from Wimpole Street.
HIGGINS. Oh, bother! I can't see anyone now. Who is it?
THE PARLOR-MAID. A Mr. Doolittle, Sir.
PICKERING. Doolittle! Do you mean the dustman?
THE PARLOR-MAID. Dustman! Oh no, sir: a gentleman.
HIGGINS [springing up excitedly] By George, Pick, it's some relative of hers that she's gone to. Somebody we know nothing about. [To the parlor-maid] Send him up, quick.
THE PARLOR-MAID. Yes, Sir. [She goes].
HIGGINS [eagerly, going to his mother] Genteel relatives! now we shall hear something. [He sits down in the Chippendale chair].
MRS. HIGGINS. Do you know any of her people?
PICKERING. Only her father: the fellow we told you about.
THE PARLOR-MAID [announcing] Mr. Doolittle. [She withdraws].
Doolittle enters. He is brilliantly dressed in a new fashionable frock-coat, with white waistcoat and grey trousers. A flower in his buttonhole, a dazzling silk hat, and patent leather shoes complete the effect. He is too concerned with the business he has come on to notice Mrs. Higgins. He walks straight to Higgins, and accosts him with vehement reproach.
DOOLITTLE [indicating his own person] See here! Do you see this? You done this.
HIGGINS. Done what, man?
DOOLITTLE. This, I tell you. Look at it. Look at this hat. Look at this coat.
PICKERING. Has Eliza been buying you clothes?
DOOLITTLE. Eliza! not she. Not half. Why would she buy me clothes?
MRS. HIGGINS. Good-morning, Mr. Doolittle. Won't you sit down?
DOOLITTLE [taken aback as he becomes conscious that he has forgotten his hostess] Asking your pardon, ma'am. [He approaches her and shakes her proffered hand]. Thank you. [He sits down on the ottoman, on Pickering's right]. I am that full of what has happened to me that I can't think of anything else.
HIGGINS. What the dickens has happened to you?
DOOLITTLE. I shouldn't mind if it had only happened to me: anything might happen to anybody and nobody to blame but Providence, as you might say. But this is something that you done to me: yes, you, Henry Higgins.
HIGGINS. Have you found Eliza? That's the point.
DOOLITTLE. Have you lost her?
HIGGINS. Yes.
DOOLITTLE. You have all the luck, you have. I ain't found her; but she'll find me quick enough now after what you done to me.
MRS. HIGGINS. But what has my son done to you, Mr. Doolittle?
DOOLITTLE. Done to me! Ruined me. Destroyed my happiness. Tied me up and delivered me into the hands of middle class morality.
HIGGINS [rising intolerantly and standing over Doolittle] You're raving. You're drunk. You're mad. I gave you five pounds. After that I had two conversations with you, at half-a-crown an hour. I've never seen you since.
DOOLITTLE. Oh! Drunk! am I? Mad! am I? Tell me this. Did you or did you not write a letter to an old blighter in America that was giving five millions to found Moral Reform Societies all over the world, and that wanted you to invent a universal language for him?
HIGGINS. What! Ezra D. Wannafeller! He's dead. [He sits down again carelessly].
DOOLITTLE. Yes: he's dead; and I'm done for. Now did you or did you not write a letter to him to say that the most original moralist at present in England, to the best of your knowledge, was Alfred Doolittle, a common dustman.
HIGGINS. Oh, after your last visit I remember making some silly joke of the kind.
DOOLITTLE. Ah! you may well call it a silly joke. It put the lid on me right enough. Just give him the chance he wanted to show that Americans is not like us: that they recognize and respect merit in every class of life, however humble. Them words is in his blooming will, in which, Henry Higgins, thanks to your silly joking, he leaves me a share in his Pre-digested Cheese Trust worth three thousand a year on condition that I lecture for his Wannafeller Moral Reform World League as often as they ask me up to six times a year.
HIGGINS. The devil he does! Whew! [Brightening suddenly] What a lark!
PICKERING. A safe thing for you, Doolittle. They won't ask you twice.
DOOLITTLE. It ain't the lecturing I mind. I'll lecture them blue in the face, I will, and not turn a hair. It's making a gentleman of me that I object to. Who asked him to make a gentleman of me? I was happy. I was free. I touched pretty nigh everybody for money when I wanted it, same as I touched you, Henry Higgins. Now I am worrited; tied neck and heels; and everybody touches me for money. It's a fine thing for you, says my solicitor. Is it? says I. You mean it's a good thing for you, I says. When I was a poor man and had a solicitor once when they found a pram in the dust cart, he got me off, and got shut of me and got me shut of him as quick as he could. Same with the doctors: used to shove me out of the hospital before I could hardly stand on my legs, and nothing to pay. Now they finds out that I'm not a healthy man and can't live unless they looks after me twice a day. In the house I'm not let do a hand's turn for myself: somebody else must do it and touch me for it. A year ago I hadn't a relative in the world except two or three that wouldn't speak to me. Now I've fifty, and not a decent week's wages among the lot of them. I have to live for others and not for myself: that's middle class morality. You talk of losing Eliza. Don't you be anxious: I bet she's on my doorstep by this: she that could support herself easy by selling flowers if I wasn't respectable. And the next one to touch me will be you, Henry Higgins. I'll have to learn to speak middle class language from you, instead of speaking proper English. That's where you'll come in; and I daresay that's what you done it for.
MRS. HIGGINS. But, my dear Mr. Doolittle, you need not suffer all this if you are really in earnest. Nobody can force you to accept this bequest. You can repudiate it. Isn't that so, Colonel Pickering?
PICKERING. I believe so.
DOOLITTLE [softening his manner in deference to her sex] That's the tragedy of it, ma'am. It's easy to say chuck it; but I haven't the nerve. Which one of us has? We're all intimidated. Intimidated, ma'am: that's what we are. What is there for me if I chuck it but the workhouse in my old age? I have to dye my hair already to keep my job as a dustman. If I was one of the deserving poor, and had put by a bit, I could chuck it; but then why should I, acause the deserving poor might as well be millionaires for all the happiness they ever has. They don't know what happiness is. But I, as one of the undeserving poor, have nothing between me and the pauper's uniform but this here blasted three thousand a year that shoves me into the middle class. (Excuse the expression, ma'am: you'd use it yourself if you had my provocation). They've got you every way you turn: it's a choice between the Skilly of the workhouse and the Char Bydis of the middle class; and I haven't the nerve for the workhouse. Intimidated: that's what I am. Broke. Bought up. Happier men than me will call for my dust, and touch me for their tip; and I'll look on helpless, and envy them. And that's what your son has brought me to. [He is overcome by emotion].
MRS. HIGGINS. Well, I'm very glad you're not going to do anything foolish, Mr. Doolittle. For this solves the problem of Eliza's future. You can provide for her now.
DOOLITTLE [with melancholy resignation] Yes, ma'am; I'm expected to provide for everyone now, out of three thousand a year.
HIGGINS [jumping up] Nonsense! he can't provide for her. He shan't provide for her. She doesn't belong to him. I paid him five pounds for her. Doolittle: either you're an honest man or a rogue.
DOOLITTLE [tolerantly] A little of both, Henry, like the rest of us: a little of both.
HIGGINS. Well, you took that money for the girl; and you have no right to take her as well.
MRS. HIGGINS. Henry: don't be absurd. If you really want to know where Eliza is, she is upstairs.
HIGGINS [amazed] Upstairs!!! Then I shall jolly soon fetch her downstairs. [He makes resolutely for the door].
MRS. HIGGINS [rising and following him] Be quiet, Henry. Sit down.
HIGGINS. I—
MRS. HIGGINS. Sit down, dear; and listen to me.
HIGGINS. Oh very well, very well, very well. [He throws himself ungraciously on the ottoman, with his face towards the windows]. But I think you might have told me this half an hour ago.
MRS. HIGGINS. Eliza came to me this morning. She passed the night partly walking about in a rage, partly trying to throw herself into the river and being afraid to, and partly in the Carlton Hotel. She told me of the brutal way you two treated her.
HIGGINS [bounding up again] What!
PICKERING [rising also] My dear Mrs. Higgins, she's been telling you stories. We didn't treat her brutally. We hardly said a word to her; and we parted on particularly good terms. [Turning on Higgins]. Higgins: did you bully her after I went to bed?
HIGGINS. Just the other way about. She threw my slippers in my face. She behaved in the most outrageous way. I never gave her the slightest provocation. The slippers came bang into my face the moment I entered the room—before I had uttered a word. And used perfectly awful language.
PICKERING [astonished] But why? What did we do to her?
MRS. HIGGINS. I think I know pretty well what you did. The girl is naturally rather affectionate, I think. Isn't she, Mr. Doolittle?
DOOLITTLE. Very tender-hearted, ma'am. Takes after me.
MRS. HIGGINS. Just so. She had become attached to you both. She worked very hard for you, Henry! I don't think you quite realize what anything in the nature of brain work means to a girl like that. Well, it seems that when the great day of trial came, and she did this wonderful thing for you without making a single mistake, you two sat there and never said a word to her, but talked together of how glad you were that it was all over and how you had been bored with the whole thing. And then you were surprised because she threw your slippers at you! I should have thrown the fire-irons at you.
HIGGINS. We said nothing except that we were tired and wanted to go to bed. Did we, Pick?
PICKERING [shrugging his shoulders] That was all.
MRS. HIGGINS [ironically] Quite sure?
PICKERING. Absolutely. Really, that was all.
MRS. HIGGINS. You didn't thank her, or pet her, or admire her, or tell her how splendid she'd been.
HIGGINS [impatiently] But she knew all about that. We didn't make speeches to her, if that's what you mean.
PICKERING [conscience stricken] Perhaps we were a little inconsiderate. Is she very angry?
MRS. HIGGINS [returning to her place at the writing-table] Well, I'm afraid she won't go back to Wimpole Street, especially now that Mr. Doolittle is able to keep up the position you have thrust on her; but she says she is quite willing to meet you on friendly terms and to let bygones be bygones.
HIGGINS [furious] Is she, by George? Ho!
MRS. HIGGINS. If you promise to behave yourself, Henry, I'll ask her to come down. If not, go home; for you have taken up quite enough of my time.
HIGGINS. Oh, all right. Very well. Pick: you behave yourself. Let us put on our best Sunday manners for this creature that we picked out of the mud. [He flings himself sulkily into the Elizabethan chair].
DOOLITTLE [remonstrating] Now, now, Henry Higgins! have some consideration for my feelings as a middle class man.
MRS. HIGGINS. Remember your promise, Henry. [She presses the bell-button on the writing-table]. Mr. Doolittle: will you be so good as to step out on the balcony for a moment. I don't want Eliza to have the shock of your news until she has made it up with these two gentlemen. Would you mind?
DOOLITTLE. As you wish, lady. Anything to help Henry to keep her off my hands. [He disappears through the window].
The parlor-maid answers the bell. Pickering sits down in Doolittle's place.
MRS. HIGGINS. Ask Miss Doolittle to come down, please.
THE PARLOR-MAID. Yes, mam. [She goes out].
MRS. HIGGINS. Now, Henry: be good.
HIGGINS. I am behaving myself perfectly.
PICKERING. He is doing his best, Mrs. Higgins.
A pause. Higgins throws back his head; stretches out his legs; and begins to whistle.
MRS. HIGGINS. Henry, dearest, you don't look at all nice in that attitude.
HIGGINS [pulling himself together] I was not trying to look nice, mother.
MRS. HIGGINS. It doesn't matter, dear. I only wanted to make you speak.
HIGGINS. Why?
MRS. HIGGINS. Because you can't speak and whistle at the same time.
Higgins groans. Another very trying pause.
HIGGINS [springing up, out of patience] Where the devil is that girl? Are we to wait here all day?
Eliza enters, sunny, self-possessed, and giving a staggeringly convincing exhibition of ease of manner. She carries a little work-basket, and is very much at home. Pickering is too much taken aback to rise.
LIZA. How do you do, Professor Higgins? Are you quite well?
HIGGINS [choking] Am I— [He can say no more].
LIZA. But of course you are: you are never ill. So glad to see you again, Colonel Pickering. [He rises hastily; and they shake hands]. Quite chilly this morning, isn't it? [She sits down on his left. He sits beside her].
HIGGINS. Don't you dare try this game on me. I taught it to you; and it doesn't take me in. Get up and come home; and don't be a fool.
Eliza takes a piece of needlework from her basket, and begins to stitch at it, without taking the least notice of this outburst.
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—
PICKERING. Oh, that was nothing.
LIZA. Yes: things that showed you thought and felt about me as if I were something better than a scullerymaid; though of course I know you would have been just the same to a scullery-maid if she had been let in the drawing-room. You never took off your boots in the dining room when I was there.
PICKERING. You mustn't mind that. Higgins takes off his boots all over the place.
LIZA. I know. I am not blaming him. It is his way, isn't it? But it made such a difference to me that you didn't do it. You see, really and truly, apart from the things anyone can pick up (the dressing and the proper way of speaking, and so on), the difference between a lady and a flower girl is not how she behaves, but how she's treated. I shall always be a flower girl to Professor Higgins, because he always treats me as a flower girl, and always will; but I know I can be a lady to you, because you always treat me as a lady, and always will.
MRS. HIGGINS. Please don't grind your teeth, Henry.
PICKERING. Well, this is really very nice of you, Miss Doolittle.
LIZA. I should like you to call me Eliza, now, if you would.
PICKERING. Thank you. Eliza, of course.
LIZA. And I should like Professor Higgins to call me Miss Doolittle.
HIGGINS. I'll see you damned first.
MRS. HIGGINS. Henry! Henry!
PICKERING [laughing] Why don't you slang back at him? Don't stand it. It would do him a lot of good.
LIZA. I can't. I could have done it once; but now I can't go back to it. Last night, when I was wandering about, a girl spoke to me; and I tried to get back into the old way with her; but it was no use. You told me, you know, that when a child is brought to a foreign country, it picks up the language in a few weeks, and forgets its own. Well, I am a child in your country. I have forgotten my own language, and can speak nothing but yours. That's the real break-off with the corner of Tottenham Court Road. Leaving Wimpole Street finishes it.
PICKERING [much alarmed] Oh! but you're coming back to Wimpole Street, aren't you? You'll forgive Higgins?
HIGGINS [rising] Forgive! Will she, by George! Let her go. Let her find out how she can get on without us. She will relapse into the gutter in three weeks without me at her elbow.
Doolittle appears at the centre window. With a look of dignified reproach at Higgins, he comes slowly and silently to his daughter, who, with her back to the window, is unconscious of his approach.
PICKERING. He's incorrigible, Eliza. You won't relapse, will you?
LIZA. No: Not now. Never again. I have learnt my lesson. I don't believe I could utter one of the old sounds if I tried. [Doolittle touches her on her left shoulder. She drops her work, losing her self-possession utterly at the spectacle of her father's splendor] A—a—a—a—a—ah—ow—ooh!
HIGGINS [with a crow of triumph] Aha! Just so. A—a—a—a—ahowooh! A—a—a—a—ahowooh ! A—a—a—a—ahowooh! Victory! Victory! [He throws himself on the divan, folding his arms, and spraddling arrogantly].
DOOLITTLE. Can you blame the girl? Don't look at me like that, Eliza. It ain't my fault. I've come into money.
LIZA. You must have touched a millionaire this time, dad.
DOOLITTLE. I have. But I'm dressed something special today. I'm going to St. George's, Hanover Square. Your stepmother is going to marry me.
LIZA [angrily] You're going to let yourself down to marry that low common woman!
PICKERING [quietly] He ought to, Eliza. [To Doolittle] Why has she changed her mind?
DOOLITTLE [sadly] Intimidated, Governor. Intimidated. Middle class morality claims its victim. Won't you put on your hat, Liza, and come and see me turned off?
LIZA. If the Colonel says I must, I—I'll [almost sobbing] I'll demean myself. And get insulted for my pains, like enough.
DOOLITTLE. Don't be afraid: she never comes to words with anyone now, poor woman! respectability has broke all the spirit out of her.
PICKERING [squeezing Eliza's elbow gently] Be kind to them, Eliza. Make the best of it.
LIZA [forcing a little smile for him through her vexation] Oh well, just to show there's no ill feeling. I'll be back in a moment. [She goes out].
DOOLITTLE [sitting down beside Pickering] I feel uncommon nervous about the ceremony, Colonel. I wish you'd come and see me through it.
PICKERING. But you've been through it before, man. You were married to Eliza's mother.
DOOLITTLE. Who told you that, Colonel?
PICKERING. Well, nobody told me. But I concluded naturally—
DOOLITTLE. No: that ain't the natural way, Colonel: it's only the middle class way. My way was always the undeserving way. But don't say nothing to Eliza. She don't know: I always had a delicacy about telling her.
PICKERING. Quite right. We'll leave it so, if you don't mind.
DOOLITTLE. And you'll come to the church, Colonel, and put me through straight?
PICKERING. With pleasure. As far as a bachelor can.
MRS. HIGGINS. May I come, Mr. Doolittle? I should be very sorry to miss your wedding.
DOOLITTLE. I should indeed be honored by your condescension, ma'am; and my poor old woman would take it as a tremenjous compliment. She's been very low, thinking of the happy days that are no more.
MRS. HIGGINS [rising] I'll order the carriage and get ready. [The men rise, except Higgins]. I shan't be more than fifteen minutes. [As she goes to the door Eliza comes in, hatted and buttoning her gloves]. I'm going to the church to see your father married, Eliza. You had better come in the brougham with me. Colonel Pickering can go on with the bridegroom.
Mrs. Higgins goes out. Eliza comes to the middle of the room between the centre window and the ottoman. Pickering joins her.
DOOLITTLE. Bridegroom! What a word! It makes a man realize his position, somehow. [He takes up his hat and goes towards the door].
PICKERING. Before I go, Eliza, do forgive him and come back to us.
LIZA. I don't think papa would allow me. Would you, dad?
DOOLITTLE [sad but magnanimous] They played you off very cunning, Eliza, them two sportsmen. If it had been only one of them, you could have nailed him. But you see, there was two; and one of them chaperoned the other, as you might say. [To Pickering] It was artful of you, Colonel; but I bear no malice: I should have done the same myself. I been the victim of one woman after another all my life; and I don't grudge you two getting the better of Eliza. I shan't interfere. It's time for us to go, Colonel. So long, Henry. See you in St. George's, Eliza. [He goes out].
PICKERING [coaxing] Do stay with us, Eliza. [He follows Doolittle].
Eliza goes out on the balcony to avoid being alone with Higgins. He rises and joins her there. She immediately comes back into the room and makes for the door; but he goes along the balcony quickly and gets his back to the door before she reaches it.
HIGGINS. Well, Eliza, you've had a bit of your own back, as you call it. Have you had enough? and are you going to be reasonable? Or do you want any more?
LIZA. You want me back only to pick up your slippers and put up with your tempers and fetch and carry for you.
HIGGINS. I haven't said I wanted you back at all.
LIZA. Oh, indeed. Then what are we talking about?
HIGGINS. About you, not about me. If you come back I shall treat you just as I have always treated you. I can't change my nature; and I don't intend to change my manners. My manners are exactly the same as Colonel Pickering's.
LIZA. That's not true. He treats a flower girl as if she was a duchess.
HIGGINS. And I treat a duchess as if she was a flower girl.
LIZA. I see. [She turns away composedly, and sits on the ottoman, facing the window]. The same to everybody.
HIGGINS. Just so.
LIZA. Like father.
HIGGINS [grinning, a little taken down] Without accepting the comparison at all points, Eliza, it's quite true that your father is not a snob, and that he will be quite at home in any station of life to which his eccentric destiny may call him. [Seriously] The great secret, Eliza, is not having bad manners or good manners or any other particular sort of manners, but having the same manner for all human souls: in short, behaving as if you were in Heaven, where there are no third-class carriages, and one soul is as good as another.
LIZA. Amen. You are a born preacher.
HIGGINS [irritated] The question is not whether I treat you rudely, but whether you ever heard me treat anyone else better.
LIZA [with sudden sincerity] I don't care how you treat me. I don't mind your swearing at me. I don't mind a black eye: I've had one before this. But [standing up and facing him] I won't be passed over.
HIGGINS. Then get out of my way; for I won't stop for you. You talk about me as if I were a motor bus.
LIZA. So you are a motor bus: all bounce and go, and no consideration for anyone. But I can do without you: don't think I can't.
HIGGINS. I know you can. I told you you could.
LIZA [wounded, getting away from him to the other side of the ottoman with her face to the hearth] I know you did, you brute. You wanted to get rid of me.
HIGGINS. Liar.
LIZA. Thank you. [She sits down with dignity].
HIGGINS. You never asked yourself, I suppose, whether I could do without YOU.
LIZA [earnestly] Don't you try to get round me. You'll HAVE to do without me.
HIGGINS [arrogant] I can do without anybody. I have my own soul: my own spark of divine fire. But [with sudden humility] I shall miss you, Eliza. [He sits down near her on the ottoman]. I have learnt something from your idiotic notions: I confess that humbly and gratefully. And I have grown accustomed to your voice and appearance. I like them, rather.
LIZA. Well, you have both of them on your gramophone and in your book of photographs. When you feel lonely without me, you can turn the machine on. It's got no feelings to hurt.
HIGGINS. I can't turn your soul on. Leave me those feelings; and you can take away the voice and the face. They are not you.
LIZA. Oh, you ARE a devil. You can twist the heart in a girl as easy as some could twist her arms to hurt her. Mrs. Pearce warned me. Time and again she has wanted to leave you; and you always got round her at the last minute. And you don't care a bit for her. And you don't care a bit for me.
HIGGINS. I care for life, for humanity; and you are a part of it that has come my way and been built into my house. What more can you or anyone ask?
LIZA. I won't care for anybody that doesn't care for me.
HIGGINS. Commercial principles, Eliza. Like [reproducing her Covent Garden pronunciation with professional exactness] s'yollin voylets [selling violets], isn't it?
LIZA. Don't sneer at me. It's mean to sneer at me.
HIGGINS. I have never sneered in my life. Sneering doesn't become either the human face or the human soul. I am expressing my righteous contempt for Commercialism. I don't and won't trade in affection. You call me a brute because you couldn't buy a claim on me by fetching my slippers and finding my spectacles. You were a fool: I think a woman fetching a man's slippers is a disgusting sight: did I ever fetch YOUR slippers? I think a good deal more of you for throwing them in my face. No use slaving for me and then saying you want to be cared for: who cares for a slave? If you come back, come back for the sake of good fellowship; for you'll get nothing else. You've had a thousand times as much out of me as I have out of you; and if you dare to set up your little dog's tricks of fetching and carrying slippers against my creation of a Duchess Eliza, I'll slam the door in your silly face.
LIZA. What did you do it for if you didn't care for me?
HIGGINS [heartily] Why, because it was my job.
LIZA. You never thought of the trouble it would make for me.
HIGGINS. Would the world ever have been made if its maker had been afraid of making trouble? Making life means making trouble. There's only one way of escaping trouble; and that's killing things. Cowards, you notice, are always shrieking to have troublesome people killed.
LIZA. I'm no preacher: I don't notice things like that. I notice that you don't notice me.
HIGGINS [jumping up and walking about intolerantly] Eliza: you're an idiot. I waste the treasures of my Miltonic mind by spreading them before you. Once for all, understand that I go my way and do my work without caring twopence what happens to either of us. I am not intimidated, like your father and your stepmother. So you can come back or go to the devil: which you please.
LIZA. What am I to come back for?
HIGGINS [bouncing up on his knees on the ottoman and leaning over it to her] For the fun of it. That's why I took you on.
LIZA [with averted face] And you may throw me out tomorrow if I don't do everything you want me to?
HIGGINS. Yes; and you may walk out tomorrow if I don't do everything YOU want me to.
LIZA. And live with my stepmother?
HIGGINS. Yes, or sell flowers.
LIZA. Oh! if I only COULD go back to my flower basket! I should be independent of both you and father and all the world! Why did you take my independence from me? Why did I give it up? I'm a slave now, for all my fine clothes.
HIGGINS. Not a bit. I'll adopt you as my daughter and settle money on you if you like. Or would you rather marry Pickering?
LIZA [looking fiercely round at him] I wouldn't marry YOU if you asked me; and you're nearer my age than what he is.
HIGGINS [gently] Than he is: not "than what he is."
LIZA [losing her temper and rising] I'll talk as I like. You're not my teacher now.
HIGGINS [reflectively] I don't suppose Pickering would, though. He's as confirmed an old bachelor as I am.
LIZA. That's not what I want; and don't you think it. I've always had chaps enough wanting me that way. Freddy Hill writes to me twice and three times a day, sheets and sheets.
HIGGINS [disagreeably surprised] Damn his impudence! [He recoils and finds himself sitting on his heels].
LIZA. He has a right to if he likes, poor lad. And he does love me.
HIGGINS [getting off the ottoman] You have no right to encourage him.
LIZA. Every girl has a right to be loved.
HIGGINS. What! By fools like that?
LIZA. Freddy's not a fool. And if he's weak and poor and wants me, may be he'd make me happier than my betters that bully me and don't want me.
HIGGINS. Can he MAKE anything of you? That's the point.
LIZA. Perhaps I could make something of him. But I never thought of us making anything of one another; and you never think of anything else. I only want to be natural.
HIGGINS. In short, you want me to be as infatuated about you as Freddy? Is that it?
LIZA. No I don't. That's not the sort of feeling I want from you. And don't you be too sure of yourself or of me. I could have been a bad girl if I'd liked. I've seen more of some things than you, for all your learning. Girls like me can drag gentlemen down to make love to them easy enough. And they wish each other dead the next minute.
HIGGINS. Of course they do. Then what in thunder are we quarrelling about?
LIZA [much troubled] I want a little kindness. I know I'm a common ignorant girl, and you a book-learned gentleman; but I'm not dirt under your feet. What I done [correcting herself] what I did was not for the dresses and the taxis: I did it because we were pleasant together and I come—came—to care for you; not to want you to make love to me, and not forgetting the difference between us, but more friendly like.
HIGGINS. Well, of course. That's just how I feel. And how Pickering feels. Eliza: you're a fool.
LIZA. That's not a proper answer to give me [she sinks on the chair at the writing-table in tears].
HIGGINS. It's all you'll get until you stop being a common idiot. If you're going to be a lady, you'll have to give up feeling neglected if the men you know don't spend half their time snivelling over you and the other half giving you black eyes. If you can't stand the coldness of my sort of life, and the strain of it, go back to the gutter. Work til you are more a brute than a human being; and then cuddle and squabble and drink til you fall asleep. Oh, it's a fine life, the life of the gutter. It's real: it's warm: it's violent: you can feel it through the thickest skin: you can taste it and smell it without any training or any work. Not like Science and Literature and Classical Music and Philosophy and Art. You find me cold, unfeeling, selfish, don't you? Very well: be off with you to the sort of people you like. Marry some sentimental hog or other with lots of money, and a thick pair of lips to kiss you with and a thick pair of boots to kick you with. If you can't appreciate what you've got, you'd better get what you can appreciate.
LIZA [desperate] Oh, you are a cruel tyrant. I can't talk to you: you turn everything against me: I'm always in the wrong. But you know very well all the time that you're nothing but a bully. You know I can't go back to the gutter, as you call it, and that I have no real friends in the world but you and the Colonel. You know well I couldn't bear to live with a low common man after you two; and it's wicked and cruel of you to insult me by pretending I could. You think I must go back to Wimpole Street because I have nowhere else to go but father's. But don't you be too sure that you have me under your feet to be trampled on and talked down. I'll marry Freddy, I will, as soon as he's able to support me.
HIGGINS [sitting down beside her] Rubbish! you shall marry an ambassador. You shall marry the Governor-General of India or the Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland, or somebody who wants a deputy-queen. I'm not going to have my masterpiece thrown away on Freddy.
LIZA. You think I like you to say that. But I haven't forgot what you said a minute ago; and I won't be coaxed round as if I was a baby or a puppy. If I can't have kindness, I'll have independence.
HIGGINS. Independence? That's middle class blasphemy. We are all dependent on one another, every soul of us on earth.
LIZA [rising determinedly] I'll let you see whether I'm dependent on you. If you can preach, I can teach. I'll go and be a teacher.
HIGGINS. What'll you teach, in heaven's name?
LIZA. What you taught me. I'll teach phonetics.
HIGGINS. Ha! Ha! Ha!
LIZA. I'll offer myself as an assistant to Professor Nepean.
HIGGINS [rising in a fury] What! That impostor! that humbug! that toadying ignoramus! Teach him my methods! my discoveries! You take one step in his direction and I'll wring your neck. [He lays hands on her]. Do you hear?
LIZA [defiantly non-resistant] Wring away. What do I care? I knew you'd strike me some day. [He lets her go, stamping with rage at having forgotten himself, and recoils so hastily that he stumbles back into his seat on the ottoman]. Aha! Now I know how to deal with you. What a fool I was not to think of it before! You can't take away the knowledge you gave me. You said I had a finer ear than you. And I can be civil and kind to people, which is more than you can. Aha! That's done you, Henry Higgins, it has. Now I don't care that [snapping her fingers] for your bullying and your big talk. I'll advertize it in the papers that your duchess is only a flower girl that you taught, and that she'll teach anybody to be a duchess just the same in six months for a thousand guineas. Oh, when I think of myself crawling under your feet and being trampled on and called names, when all the time I had only to lift up my finger to be as good as you, I could just kick myself.
HIGGINS [wondering at her] You damned impudent slut, you! But it's better than snivelling; better than fetching slippers and finding spectacles, isn't it? [Rising] By George, Eliza, I said I'd make a woman of you; and I have. I like you like this.
LIZA. Yes: you turn round and make up to me now that I'm not afraid of you, and can do without you.
HIGGINS. Of course I do, you little fool. Five minutes ago you were like a millstone round my neck. Now you're a tower of strength: a consort battleship. You and I and Pickering will be three old bachelors together instead of only two men and a silly girl.
Mrs. Higgins returns, dressed for the wedding. Eliza instantly becomes cool and elegant.
MRS. HIGGINS. The carriage is waiting, Eliza. Are you ready?
LIZA. Quite. Is the Professor coming?
MRS. HIGGINS. Certainly not. He can't behave himself in church. He makes remarks out loud all the time on the clergyman's pronunciation.
LIZA. Then I shall not see you again, Professor. Good bye. [She goes to the door].
MRS. HIGGINS [coming to Higgins] Good-bye, dear.
HIGGINS. Good-bye, mother. [He is about to kiss her, when he recollects something]. Oh, by the way, Eliza, order a ham and a Stilton cheese, will you? And buy me a pair of reindeer gloves, number eights, and a tie to match that new suit of mine, at Eale & Binman's. You can choose the color. [His cheerful, careless, vigorous voice shows that he is incorrigible].
LIZA [disdainfully] Buy them yourself. [She sweeps out].
MRS. HIGGINS. I'm afraid you've spoiled that girl, Henry. But never mind, dear: I'll buy you the tie and gloves.
HIGGINS [sunnily] Oh, don't bother. She'll buy em all right enough. Good-bye.
They kiss. Mrs. Higgins runs out. Higgins, left alone, rattles his cash in his pocket; chuckles; and disports himself in a highly self-satisfied manner.

________________________________________

The rest of the story need not be shown in action, and indeed, would hardly need telling if our imaginations were not so enfeebled by their lazy dependence on the ready-makes and reach-me-downs of the ragshop in which Romance keeps its stock of "happy endings" to misfit all stories. Now, the history of Eliza Doolittle, though called a romance because of the transfiguration it records seems exceedingly improbable, is common enough. Such transfigurations have been achieved by hundreds of resolutely ambitious young women since Nell Gwynne set them the example by playing queens and fascinating kings in the theatre in which she began by selling oranges. Nevertheless, people in all directions have assumed, for no other reason than that she became the heroine of a romance, that she must have married the hero of it. This is unbearable, not only because her little drama, if acted on such a thoughtless assumption, must be spoiled, but because the true sequel is patent to anyone with a sense of human nature in general, and of feminine instinct in particular.
Eliza, in telling Higgins she would not marry him if he asked her, was not coquetting: she was announcing a well-considered decision. When a bachelor interests, and dominates, and teaches, and becomes important to a spinster, as Higgins with Eliza, she always, if she has character enough to be capable of it, considers very seriously indeed whether she will play for becoming that bachelor's wife, especially if he is so little interested in marriage that a determined and devoted woman might capture him if she set herself resolutely to do it. Her decision will depend a good deal on whether she is really free to choose; and that, again, will depend on her age and income. If she is at the end of her youth, and has no security for her livelihood, she will marry him because she must marry anybody who will provide for her. But at Eliza's age a good-looking girl does not feel that pressure; she feels free to pick and choose. She is therefore guided by her instinct in the matter. Eliza's instinct tells her not to marry Higgins. It does not tell her to give him up. It is not in the slightest doubt as to his remaining one of the strongest personal interests in her life. It would be very sorely strained if there was another woman likely to supplant her with him. But as she feels sure of him on that last point, she has no doubt at all as to her course, and would not have any, even if the difference of twenty years in age, which seems so great to youth, did not exist between them.
As our own instincts are not appealed to by her conclusion, let us see whether we cannot discover some reason in it. When Higgins excused his indifference to young women on the ground that they had an irresistible rival in his mother, he gave the clue to his inveterate old-bachelordom. The case is uncommon only to the extent that remarkable mothers are uncommon. If an imaginative boy has a sufficiently rich mother who has intelligence, personal grace, dignity of character without harshness, and a cultivated sense of the best art of her time to enable her to make her house beautiful, she sets a standard for him against which very few women can struggle, besides effecting for him a disengagement of his affections, his sense of beauty, and his idealism from his specifically sexual impulses. This makes him a standing puzzle to the huge number of uncultivated people who have been brought up in tasteless homes by commonplace or disagreeable parents, and to whom, consequently, literature, painting, sculpture, music, and affectionate personal relations come as modes of sex if they come at all. The word passion means nothing else to them; and that Higgins could have a passion for phonetics and idealize his mother instead of Eliza, would seem to them absurd and unnatural. Nevertheless, when we look round and see that hardly anyone is too ugly or disagreeable to find a wife or a husband if he or she wants one, whilst many old maids and bachelors are above the average in quality and culture, we cannot help suspecting that the disentanglement of sex from the associations with which it is so commonly confused, a disentanglement which persons of genius achieve by sheer intellectual analysis, is sometimes produced or aided by parental fascination.
Now, though Eliza was incapable of thus explaining to herself Higgins's formidable powers of resistance to the charm that prostrated Freddy at the first glance, she was instinctively aware that she could never obtain a complete grip of him, or come between him and his mother (the first necessity of the married woman). To put it shortly, she knew that for some mysterious reason he had not the makings of a married man in him, according to her conception of a husband as one to whom she would be his nearest and fondest and warmest interest. Even had there been no mother-rival, she would still have refused to accept an interest in herself that was secondary to philosophic interests. Had Mrs. Higgins died, there would still have been Milton and the Universal Alphabet. Landor's remark that to those who have the greatest power of loving, love is a secondary affair, would not have recommended Landor to Eliza. Put that along with her resentment of Higgins's domineering superiority, and her mistrust of his coaxing cleverness in getting round her and evading her wrath when he had gone too far with his impetuous bullying, and you will see that Eliza's instinct had good grounds for warning her not to marry her Pygmalion.
And now, whom did Eliza marry? For if Higgins was a predestinate old bachelor, she was most certainly not a predestinate old maid. Well, that can be told very shortly to those who have not guessed it from the indications she has herself given them.
Almost immediately after Eliza is stung into proclaiming her considered determination not to marry Higgins, she mentions the fact that young Mr. Frederick Eynsford Hill is pouring out his love for her daily through the post. Now Freddy is young, practically twenty years younger than Higgins: he is a gentleman (or, as Eliza would qualify him, a toff), and speaks like one; he is nicely dressed, is treated by the Colonel as an equal, loves her unaffectedly, and is not her master, nor ever likely to dominate her in spite of his advantage of social standing. Eliza has no use for the foolish romantic tradition that all women love to be mastered, if not actually bullied and beaten. "When you go to women," says Nietzsche, "take your whip with you." Sensible despots have never confined that precaution to women: they have taken their whips with them when they have dealt with men, and been slavishly idealized by the men over whom they have flourished the whip much more than by women. No doubt there are slavish women as well as slavish men; and women, like men, admire those that are stronger than themselves. But to admire a strong person and to live under that strong person's thumb are two different things. The weak may not be admired and hero-worshipped; but they are by no means disliked or shunned; and they never seem to have the least difficulty in marrying people who are too good for them. They may fail in emergencies; but life is not one long emergency: it is mostly a string of situations for which no exceptional strength is needed, and with which even rather weak people can cope if they have a stronger partner to help them out. Accordingly, it is a truth everywhere in evidence that strong people, masculine or feminine, not only do not marry stronger people, but do not show any preference for them in selecting their friends. When a lion meets another with a louder roar "the first lion thinks the last a bore." The man or woman who feels strong enough for two, seeks for every other quality in a partner than strength.
The converse is also true. Weak people want to marry strong people who do not frighten them too much; and this often leads them to make the mistake we describe metaphorically as "biting off more than they can chew." They want too much for too little; and when the bargain is unreasonable beyond all bearing, the union becomes impossible: it ends in the weaker party being either discarded or borne as a cross, which is worse. People who are not only weak, but silly or obtuse as well, are often in these difficulties.
This being the state of human affairs, what is Eliza fairly sure to do when she is placed between Freddy and Higgins? Will she look forward to a lifetime of fetching Higgins's slippers or to a lifetime of Freddy fetching hers? There can be no doubt about the answer. Unless Freddy is biologically repulsive to her, and Higgins biologically attractive to a degree that overwhelms all her other instincts, she will, if she marries either of them, marry Freddy.
And that is just what Eliza did.
Complications ensued; but they were economic, not romantic. Freddy had no money and no occupation. His mother's jointure, a last relic of the opulence of Largelady Park, had enabled her to struggle along in Earlscourt with an air of gentility, but not to procure any serious secondary education for her children, much less give the boy a profession. A clerkship at thirty shillings a week was beneath Freddy's dignity, and extremely distasteful to him besides. His prospects consisted of a hope that if he kept up appearances somebody would do something for him. The something appeared vaguely to his imagination as a private secretaryship or a sinecure of some sort. To his mother it perhaps appeared as a marriage to some lady of means who could not resist her boy's niceness. Fancy her feelings when he married a flower girl who had become declassee under extraordinary circumstances which were now notorious!
It is true that Eliza's situation did not seem wholly ineligible. Her father, though formerly a dustman, and now fantastically disclassed, had become extremely popular in the smartest society by a social talent which triumphed over every prejudice and every disadvantage. Rejected by the middle class, which he loathed, he had shot up at once into the highest circles by his wit, his dustmanship (which he carried like a banner), and his Nietzschean transcendence of good and evil. At intimate ducal dinners he sat on the right hand of the Duchess; and in country houses he smoked in the pantry and was made much of by the butler when he was not feeding in the dining-room and being consulted by cabinet ministers. But he found it almost as hard to do all this on four thousand a year as Mrs. Eynsford Hill to live in Earlscourt on an income so pitiably smaller that I have not the heart to disclose its exact figure. He absolutely refused to add the last straw to his burden by contributing to Eliza's support.
Thus Freddy and Eliza, now Mr. and Mrs. Eynsford Hill, would have spent a penniless honeymoon but for a wedding present of 500 pounds from the Colonel to Eliza. It lasted a long time because Freddy did not know how to spend money, never having had any to spend, and Eliza, socially trained by a pair of old bachelors, wore her clothes as long as they held together and looked pretty, without the least regard to their being many months out of fashion. Still, 500 pounds will not last two young people for ever; and they both knew, and Eliza felt as well, that they must shift for themselves in the end. She could quarter herself on Wimpole Street because it had come to be her home; but she was quite aware that she ought not to quarter Freddy there, and that it would not be good for his character if she did.
Not that the Wimpole Street bachelors objected. When she consulted them, Higgins declined to be bothered about her housing problem when that solution was so simple. Eliza's desire to have Freddy in the house with her seemed of no more importance than if she had wanted an extra piece of bedroom furniture. Pleas as to Freddy's character, and the moral obligation on him to earn his own living, were lost on Higgins. He denied that Freddy had any character, and declared that if he tried to do any useful work some competent person would have the trouble of undoing it: a procedure involving a net loss to the community, and great unhappiness to Freddy himself, who was obviously intended by Nature for such light work as amusing Eliza, which, Higgins declared, was a much more useful and honorable occupation than working in the city. When Eliza referred again to her project of teaching phonetics, Higgins abated not a jot of his violent opposition to it. He said she was not within ten years of being qualified to meddle with his pet subject; and as it was evident that the Colonel agreed with him, she felt she could not go against them in this grave matter, and that she had no right, without Higgins's consent, to exploit the knowledge he had given her; for his knowledge seemed to her as much his private property as his watch: Eliza was no communist. Besides, she was superstitiously devoted to them both, more entirely and frankly after her marriage than before it.
It was the Colonel who finally solved the problem, which had cost him much perplexed cogitation. He one day asked Eliza, rather shyly, whether she had quite given up her notion of keeping a flower shop. She replied that she had thought of it, but had put it out of her head, because the Colonel had said, that day at Mrs. Higgins's, that it would never do. The Colonel confessed that when he said that, he had not quite recovered from the dazzling impression of the day before. They broke the matter to Higgins that evening. The sole comment vouchsafed by him very nearly led to a serious quarrel with Eliza. It was to the effect that she would have in Freddy an ideal errand boy.
Freddy himself was next sounded on the subject. He said he had been thinking of a shop himself; though it had presented itself to his pennilessness as a small place in which Eliza should sell tobacco at one counter whilst he sold newspapers at the opposite one. But he agreed that it would be extraordinarily jolly to go early every morning with Eliza to Covent Garden and buy flowers on the scene of their first meeting: a sentiment which earned him many kisses from his wife. He added that he had always been afraid to propose anything of the sort, because Clara would make an awful row about a step that must damage her matrimonial chances, and his mother could not be expected to like it after clinging for so many years to that step of the social ladder on which retail trade is impossible.
This difficulty was removed by an event highly unexpected by Freddy's mother. Clara, in the course of her incursions into those artistic circles which were the highest within her reach, discovered that her conversational qualifications were expected to include a grounding in the novels of Mr. H.G. Wells. She borrowed them in various directions so energetically that she swallowed them all within two months. The result was a conversion of a kind quite common today. A modern Acts of the Apostles would fill fifty whole Bibles if anyone were capable of writing it.
Poor Clara, who appeared to Higgins and his mother as a disagreeable and ridiculous person, and to her own mother as in some inexplicable way a social failure, had never seen herself in either light; for, though to some extent ridiculed and mimicked in West Kensington like everybody else there, she was accepted as a rational and normal—or shall we say inevitable?—sort of human being. At worst they called her The Pusher; but to them no more than to herself had it ever occurred that she was pushing the air, and pushing it in a wrong direction. Still, she was not happy. She was growing desperate. Her one asset, the fact that her mother was what the Epsom greengrocer called a carriage lady had no exchange value, apparently. It had prevented her from getting educated, because the only education she could have afforded was education with the Earlscourt green grocer's daughter. It had led her to seek the society of her mother's class; and that class simply would not have her, because she was much poorer than the greengrocer, and, far from being able to afford a maid, could not afford even a housemaid, and had to scrape along at home with an illiberally treated general servant. Under such circumstances nothing could give her an air of being a genuine product of Largelady Park. And yet its tradition made her regard a marriage with anyone within her reach as an unbearable humiliation. Commercial people and professional people in a small way were odious to her. She ran after painters and novelists; but she did not charm them; and her bold attempts to pick up and practise artistic and literary talk irritated them. She was, in short, an utter failure, an ignorant, incompetent, pretentious, unwelcome, penniless, useless little snob; and though she did not admit these disqualifications (for nobody ever faces unpleasant truths of this kind until the possibility of a way out dawns on them) she felt their effects too keenly to be satisfied with her position.
Clara had a startling eyeopener when, on being suddenly wakened to enthusiasm by a girl of her own age who dazzled her and produced in her a gushing desire to take her for a model, and gain her friendship, she discovered that this exquisite apparition had graduated from the gutter in a few months' time. It shook her so violently, that when Mr. H. G. Wells lifted her on the point of his puissant pen, and placed her at the angle of view from which the life she was leading and the society to which she clung appeared in its true relation to real human needs and worthy social structure, he effected a conversion and a conviction of sin comparable to the most sensational feats of General Booth or Gypsy Smith. Clara's snobbery went bang. Life suddenly began to move with her. Without knowing how or why, she began to make friends and enemies. Some of the acquaintances to whom she had been a tedious or indifferent or ridiculous affliction, dropped her: others became cordial. To her amazement she found that some "quite nice" people were saturated with Wells, and that this accessibility to ideas was the secret of their niceness. People she had thought deeply religious, and had tried to conciliate on that tack with disastrous results, suddenly took an interest in her, and revealed a hostility to conventional religion which she had never conceived possible except among the most desperate characters. They made her read Galsworthy; and Galsworthy exposed the vanity of Largelady Park and finished her. It exasperated her to think that the dungeon in which she had languished for so many unhappy years had been unlocked all the time, and that the impulses she had so carefully struggled with and stifled for the sake of keeping well with society, were precisely those by which alone she could have come into any sort of sincere human contact. In the radiance of these discoveries, and the tumult of their reaction, she made a fool of herself as freely and conspicuously as when she so rashly adopted Eliza's expletive in Mrs. Higgins's drawing-room; for the new-born Wellsian had to find her bearings almost as ridiculously as a baby; but nobody hates a baby for its ineptitudes, or thinks the worse of it for trying to eat the matches; and Clara lost no friends by her follies. They laughed at her to her face this time; and she had to defend herself and fight it out as best she could.
When Freddy paid a visit to Earlscourt (which he never did when he could possibly help it) to make the desolating announcement that he and his Eliza were thinking of blackening the Largelady scutcheon by opening a shop, he found the little household already convulsed by a prior announcement from Clara that she also was going to work in an old furniture shop in Dover Street, which had been started by a fellow Wellsian. This appointment Clara owed, after all, to her old social accomplishment of Push. She had made up her mind that, cost what it might, she would see Mr. Wells in the flesh; and she had achieved her end at a garden party. She had better luck than so rash an enterprise deserved. Mr. Wells came up to her expectations. Age had not withered him, nor could custom stale his infinite variety in half an hour. His pleasant neatness and compactness, his small hands and feet, his teeming ready brain, his unaffected accessibility, and a certain fine apprehensiveness which stamped him as susceptible from his topmost hair to his tipmost toe, proved irresistible. Clara talked of nothing else for weeks and weeks afterwards. And as she happened to talk to the lady of the furniture shop, and that lady also desired above all things to know Mr. Wells and sell pretty things to him, she offered Clara a job on the chance of achieving that end through her.
And so it came about that Eliza's luck held, and the expected opposition to the flower shop melted away. The shop is in the arcade of a railway station not very far from the Victoria and Albert Museum; and if you live in that neighborhood you may go there any day and buy a buttonhole from Eliza.
Now here is a last opportunity for romance. Would you not like to be assured that the shop was an immense success, thanks to Eliza's charms and her early business experience in Covent Garden? Alas! the truth is the truth: the shop did not pay for a long time, simply because Eliza and her Freddy did not know how to keep it. True, Eliza had not to begin at the very beginning: she knew the names and prices of the cheaper flowers; and her elation was unbounded when she found that Freddy, like all youths educated at cheap, pretentious, and thoroughly inefficient schools, knew a little Latin. It was very little, but enough to make him appear to her a Porson or Bentley, and to put him at his ease with botanical nomenclature. Unfortunately he knew nothing else; and Eliza, though she could count money up to eighteen shillings or so, and had acquired a certain familiarity with the language of Milton from her struggles to qualify herself for winning Higgins's bet, could not write out a bill without utterly disgracing the establishment. Freddy's power of stating in Latin that Balbus built a wall and that Gaul was divided into three parts did not carry with it the slightest knowledge of accounts or business: Colonel Pickering had to explain to him what a cheque book and a bank account meant. And the pair were by no means easily teachable. Freddy backed up Eliza in her obstinate refusal to believe that they could save money by engaging a bookkeeper with some knowledge of the business. How, they argued, could you possibly save money by going to extra expense when you already could not make both ends meet? But the Colonel, after making the ends meet over and over again, at last gently insisted; and Eliza, humbled to the dust by having to beg from him so often, and stung by the uproarious derision of Higgins, to whom the notion of Freddy succeeding at anything was a joke that never palled, grasped the fact that business, like phonetics, has to be learned.
On the piteous spectacle of the pair spending their evenings in shorthand schools and polytechnic classes, learning bookkeeping and typewriting with incipient junior clerks, male and female, from the elementary schools, let me not dwell. There were even classes at the London School of Economics, and a humble personal appeal to the director of that institution to recommend a course bearing on the flower business. He, being a humorist, explained to them the method of the celebrated Dickensian essay on Chinese Metaphysics by the gentleman who read an article on China and an article on Metaphysics and combined the information. He suggested that they should combine the London School with Kew Gardens. Eliza, to whom the procedure of the Dickensian gentleman seemed perfectly correct (as in fact it was) and not in the least funny (which was only her ignorance) took his advice with entire gravity. But the effort that cost her the deepest humiliation was a request to Higgins, whose pet artistic fancy, next to Milton's verse, was calligraphy, and who himself wrote a most beautiful Italian hand, that he would teach her to write. He declared that she was congenitally incapable of forming a single letter worthy of the least of Milton's words; but she persisted; and again he suddenly threw himself into the task of teaching her with a combination of stormy intensity, concentrated patience, and occasional bursts of interesting disquisition on the beauty and nobility, the august mission and destiny, of human handwriting. Eliza ended by acquiring an extremely uncommercial script which was a positive extension of her personal beauty, and spending three times as much on stationery as anyone else because certain qualities and shapes of paper became indispensable to her. She could not even address an envelope in the usual way because it made the margins all wrong.
Their commercial school days were a period of disgrace and despair for the young couple. They seemed to be learning nothing about flower shops. At last they gave it up as hopeless, and shook the dust of the shorthand schools, and the polytechnics, and the London School of Economics from their feet for ever. Besides, the business was in some mysterious way beginning to take care of itself. They had somehow forgotten their objections to employing other people. They came to the conclusion that their own way was the best, and that they had really a remarkable talent for business. The Colonel, who had been compelled for some years to keep a sufficient sum on current account at his bankers to make up their deficits, found that the provision was unnecessary: the young people were prospering. It is true that there was not quite fair play between them and their competitors in trade. Their week-ends in the country cost them nothing, and saved them the price of their Sunday dinners; for the motor car was the Colonel's; and he and Higgins paid the hotel bills. Mr. F. Hill, florist and greengrocer (they soon discovered that there was money in asparagus; and asparagus led to other vegetables), had an air which stamped the business as classy; and in private life he was still Frederick Eynsford Hill, Esquire. Not that there was any swank about him: nobody but Eliza knew that he had been christened Frederick Challoner. Eliza herself swanked like anything.
That is all. That is how it has turned out. It is astonishing how much Eliza still manages to meddle in the housekeeping at Wimpole Street in spite of the shop and her own family. And it is notable that though she never nags her husband, and frankly loves the Colonel as if she were his favorite daughter, she has never got out of the habit of nagging Higgins that was established on the fatal night when she won his bet for him. She snaps his head off on the faintest provocation, or on none. He no longer dares to tease her by assuming an abysmal inferiority of Freddy's mind to his own. He storms and bullies and derides; but she stands up to him so ruthlessly that the Colonel has to ask her from time to time to be kinder to Higgins; and it is the only request of his that brings a mulish expression into her face. Nothing but some emergency or calamity great enough to break down all likes and dislikes, and throw them both back on their common humanity—and may they be spared any such trial!—will ever alter this. She knows that Higgins does not need her, just as her father did not need her. The very scrupulousness with which he told her that day that he had become used to having her there, and dependent on her for all sorts of little services, and that he should miss her if she went away (it would never have occurred to Freddy or the Colonel to say anything of the sort) deepens her inner certainty that she is "no more to him than them slippers", yet she has a sense, too, that his indifference is deeper than the infatuation of commoner souls. She is immensely interested in him. She has even secret mischievous moments in which she wishes she could get him alone, on a desert island, away from all ties and with nobody else in the world to consider, and just drag him off his pedestal and see him making love like any common man. We all have private imaginations of that sort. But when it comes to business, to the life that she really leads as distinguished from the life of dreams and fancies, she likes Freddy and she likes the Colonel; and she does not like Higgins and Mr. Doolittle. Galatea never does quite like Pygmalion: his relation to her is too godlike to be altogether agreeable.