Welcome

[Eva Elisabeth]

This is not the first time this question occured to me, but this time within one book, in which the claim also serves to base an argument upon.

I often find women labeled as "beautiful" who don't seem more beautiful to me than others or v.v. of whom the opposite is said.

P. 138 reads: After all, she [Fanny] was a shy woman who was also not beautiful."
P.156 reads: "Lucy was the beautiful daughter of NH senator John P. Hale."

So my question is why was Fanny not (considered) beautiful but Lucy Hale was?

Of course, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but is it just to my eyes that none of the two ladies was inferior in this regard (in any case not Fanny IMO)? What was the ideal Lucy Hale matched but Fanny didn't?
    .    
What features make/ made the difference?

Thanks for any thoughts on this!