Most of us, too, I think, will agree that, if vanity is to be taxed, the
wearing of an eyeglass cannot be overlooked. It is impossible to dissociate
vanity from the use of the monocle. There are some people, it is true, who
wear an eyeglass naturally and unaffectedly, as though they were really
born with it and had forgotten that it was there. I saw a lady in a bus the
other day who used an eyeglass and yet carried it so well, with such simple
propriety and naturalness, that you could not feel that there was any
vanity in the matter. But that is an exception. Ordinarily the wearing of a
monocle seems like an announcement to the world that you are a person of
consequence. Disraeli knew that. His remark, when Chamberlain made his
first appearance in the House, that "at least he wore his eyeglass like a
gentleman," showed that he knew that, in general, it was an affectation. It
was so in his own case, of course. I hope Sir Edward Clarke will agree that
£5 is a reasonable tariff for an eyeglass.

There are a thousand other vanities more or less innocent, that will occur
to you in looking round. I should put a very stiff tax on painted cheeks
and hair-dyes. Any lady dyeing her hair once would be taxed £5 for the
privilege. If, growing tired of auburn, she decided to change again to a
raven hue, she would pay £10. The tax, in fact, might be doubled for every
change of colour. If rather than pay the tax Mrs. Fitzgibbons Jones
resolves to wear her hair as nature arranged that she should, life will be
simplified for me. The first time I met Mrs. Fitzgibbons Jones she had
black hair. A year later I met her husband with a lady with chestnut hair.
He introduced me to her as his wife, and she said we had met before. I said
I thought she was mistaken, and it was not until we had parted that I
realised that it was the same lady with another head of hair and another
system of coloration altogether.