Quote 16
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 towels, 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! (2.293)
Here, again, we see how something as small as a well-equipped bathroom can separate "ladies" from women like Eliza; she also implies that washing is a particularly feminine pleasure.
Quote 17
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— (5.137-9)
Eliza's statement seems curiously anti-feminist. (Of course, one has to be careful using these more recent terms when talking about a work like this.) It makes sense that Eliza would feel more special or important after receiving that kind of treatment, but at the same time the sincerity of her words has to be called into question. She does tell Pickering this in the presence of Higgins, perhaps in order to infuriate her teacher?
Quote 18
THE FLOWER GIRL. I want to be a lady in a flower shop stead of selling at the corner of Tottenham Court Road. But they won't take me unless I can talk more genteel. He said he could teach me. Well, here I am ready to pay him—not asking any favor—and he treats me as if I was dirt. (2.34)
Eliza's ambitions are initially very modest and, given Higgins's expertise, not unrealistic. Only Higgins's bet inflates them, turns her small plans into big dreams.