George Bernard Shaw a penn State Electronic Classics Series Publication

Doolittle and the piano] This is irresistible. Let’s give him ten.
[He offers two notes to the dustman].
DOOLITTLE
. No, Governor. She wouldn’t have the heart
to spend ten; and perhaps I shouldn’t neither. Ten pounds is
a lot of money: it makes a man feel prudent like; and then
goodbye to happiness. You give me what I ask you, Gover-
nor: not a penny more, and not a penny less.
PICKERING
. Why don’t you marry that missus of yours? I
rather draw the line at encouraging that sort of immorality.
DOOLITTLE
. Tell her so, Governor: tell her so. I’m willing.
It’s me that suffers by it. I’ve no hold on her. I got to be agree-
able to her. I got to give her presents. I got to buy her clothes
something sinful. I’m a slave to that woman, Governor, just
because I’m not her lawful husband. And she knows it too.
Catch her marrying me! Take my advice, Governor: marry
Eliza while she’s young and don’t know no better. If you don’t
you’ll be sorry for it after. If you do, she’ll be sorry for it after;
but better you than her, because you’re a man, and she’s only a
woman and don’t know how to be happy anyhow.
HIGGINS
. Pickering: if we listen to this man another
minute, we shall have no convictions left. [To Doolittle] Five
pounds I think you said.
DOOLITTLE
. Thank you kindly, Governor.
HIGGINS
. You’re sure you won’t take ten?
DOOLITTLE
. Not now. Another time, Governor.
HIGGINS 
[handing him a five-pound note] Here you are.
DOOLITTLE
. Thank you, Governor. Good morning.
[He hurries to the door, anxious to get away with his booty.
When he opens it he is confronted with a dainty and exquisitely
clean young Japanese lady in a simple blue cotton kimono printed

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39
Shaw
cunningly with small white jasmine blossoms. Mrs. Pearce is
with her. He gets out of her way deferentially and apologizes].
Beg pardon, miss.
THE JAPANESE LADY
. Garn! Don’t you know your own
daughter?
Exclaiming simultaneously.
DOOLITTLE. 
Bly me! it’s Eliza!
HIGGINS. 
What’s that! This!
PICKERING. 
By Jove!
LIZA
. Don’t I look silly?
HIGGINS
. Silly?
MRS. PEARCE 
[at the door] Now, Mr. Higgins, please don’t
say anything to make the girl conceited about herself.
HIGGINS 
[conscientiously] Oh! Quite right, Mrs. Pearce.
[To Eliza] Yes: damned silly.
MRS. PEARCE
. Please, sir.
HIGGINS 
[correcting himself] I mean extremely silly.
LIZA
. I should look all right with my hat on. [She takes up
her hat; puts it on; and walks across the room to the fireplace
with a fashionable air].
HIGGINS
. A new fashion, by George! And it ought to look
horrible!
DOOLITTLE 
[with fatherly pride] Well, I never thought
she’d clean up as good looking as that, Governor. She’s a
credit to me, ain’t she?
LIZA
. I tell you, it’s easy to clean up here. Hot and cold
water on tap, just as much as you like, there is. Woolly tow-
els, there is; and a towel horse so hot, it burns your fingers.
Soft brushes to scrub yourself, and a wooden bowl of soap
smelling like primroses. Now I know why ladies is so clean.
Washing’s a treat for them. Wish they saw what it is for the
like of me!
HIGGINS
. I’m glad the bath-room met with your approval.
LIZA
. It didn’t: not all of it; and I don’t care who hears me
say it. Mrs. Pearce knows.
HIGGINS
. What was wrong, Mrs. Pearce?
MRS. PEARCE 
[blandly] Oh, nothing, sir. It doesn’t matter.

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40
Pygmalion
LIZA
. I had a good mind to break it. I didn’t know which
way to look. But I hung a towel over it, I did.
HIGGINS
. Over what?
MRS. PEARCE
. Over the looking-glass, sir.
HIGGINS
. Doolittle: you have brought your daughter up
too strictly.
DOOLITTLE
. Me! I never brought her up at all, except to
give her a lick of a strap now and again. Don’t put it on me,
Governor. She ain’t accustomed to it, you see: that’s all. But
she’ll soon pick up your free-and-easy ways.
LIZA
. I’m a good girl, I am; and I won’t pick up no free and
easy ways.
HIGGINS
. Eliza: if you say again that you’re a good girl,
your father shall take you home.
LIZA
. Not him. You don’t know my father. All he come here
for was to touch you for some money to get drunk on.
DOOLITTLE
. Well, what else would I want money for? To
put into the plate in church, I suppose. [She puts out her