Even in poetry how often does this occur?
The words used are pretty, well chosen, perhaps musical to the ear, and in that way befitting; but unless the spot has violent characteristics of its own, such as Burley's cave or the waterfall of Lodore, no striking portrait is left.

Nor are we disappointed as we read, because we have not been taught to expect it to be otherwise.

So it is with those word-painted portraits of women, which are so frequently given and so seldom convey any impression.

Who has an idea of the outside look of Sophia Western, or Edith Bellenden, or even of Imogen, though Iachimo, who described her, was so good at words?
A series of pictures,--illustrations,--as we have with Dickens' novels, and with Thackeray's, may leave an impression of a figure,--though even then not often of feminine beauty.

But in this work Thackeray has succeeded in imbuing us with a sense of the outside loveliness of Beatrix by the mere force of words.