One hardly knows how to admire the Portuguese type of beauty. It is undoubtedly striking—though, if I may so express it, the model chosen by Mr. Hoppé seems too unapproachable to make any facile appeal. It is, however, interesting in this portrait to observe traces of the Spanish type, combined with an undoubtedly Moorish influence as seen in the way the eyes are set in the face. The eyes, indeed, are the most fascinating part of the picture. Regard them well, they are uncanny; they are almost unreal. I have seen eyes like that in crudely carved wooden idols—so primitive in their modelling, yet so extraordinarily expressive in their regard: _seeing_ eyes with, as it were, an impenetrable blind drawn close down behind them, shutting out thought. If not the most strictly beautiful, this Portuguese type is one of the most psychologically _interesting_ in the whole pageant of this book of beauty. And yet, how attractive in their variety all these faces are! Could anything be more alluring than the lovely eyes, the perfectly shaped mouth of the Chilian beauty, a beauty also strongly characteristic of the Spanish type? How lovely, too, is the Greek face, with the nose, as it were, a deliberate continuation of the forehead. There is passion and grace in the Indian woman, with her lovely supple body, the expression of melancholy in her face, those exquisite velvet eyes the size of which seem almost completely to dwarf the other features! Among such a galaxy of lovely women each man may surely find one who represents to him his physical ideal. The charm of these portraits is that each beautiful woman, typical of her race, possesses some unique beauty which belongs to her nationality alone. In each face there is a charm which more than compensates us for its deviation from the characteristics we, as Englishmen, most especially admire. He must be prejudiced indeed in favour of one type who can deny a certain loveliness to any one of them. Very few there will surely be malcontent to leave this book to posterity as a portrait‐gallery of some of the loveliest women representative of the world of our day. Naturally, there are other beautiful women in the world who are not included. This is one book—not a whole library! But who will dispute the right of those who do appear therein? No one—surely! And, after all, were a Martian suddenly to descend to Earth and demand of us representatives of the finest examples of the Human Race, should we not parade before him our most beautiful women? RICHARD KING 1922 THIRTY‐TWO PORTRAITS [1. AMERICA—Lady Lavery ] 1. AMERICA—Lady Lavery [2. AMERICA—Mrs. Lydig Hoyt] 2. AMERICA—Mrs. Lydig Hoyt [3. AMERICA—Viscountess Maidstone] 3. AMERICA—Viscountess Maidstone