Her portraits are numerous.  In 1894 she exhibited a portrait of a child at the Exhibition of the Society of American Artists, which was much admired and noticed in the Century Magazine, September, 1894, as follows:  “Few artists have the fresh touch which the child needs and the firm and rapid execution which allows the painter to catch the fleeting expression and the half-forms which make child portraits at once the longing and the despair of portrait painters.  Miss Beaux’s technique is altogether French, sometimes reminding me a little of Carolus Duran and of Sargent; but her individuality has triumphed over all suggestions of her foreign masters, and the combination of refinement and strength is altogether her own.”

Seven years later, in the International Studio, September, 1901, we read:  “The mention of style suggests a reference to the portraits by Miss Cecilia Beaux, while the allusion to characterization suggests at the same time their limitation.  The oftener one sees her ’Mother and Daughter,’ which gained the gold medal at Pittsburg in 1899 and the gold medal also at last year’s Paris Exposition, the less one feels inclined to accept it as a satisfactory example of portraiture.  Magnificent assurance of method it certainly has, controlled also by a fine sobriety of feeling, so that no part of the ensemble impinges upon the due importance of the other parts; it is a balanced, dignified picture.  But in its lack of intimacy it is positively callous.  One has met these ladies on many occasions, but with no increase of acquaintanceship or interest on either side—­our meetings are sterile of any human interest.  So one turns with relief to Miss Beaux’s other picture of ’Dorothea and Francesca’—­an older girl leading a younger one in the steps of a dance.  They are not concerned with us, but at least interested in one another; and we can attach ourselves, if only as outsiders, to the human interest involved.

“These pictures suggest a moment’s consideration of the true meaning of the term ‘style’ as applied to painting.  Is it not more than the mere ableness of method, still more than the audacity of brush work, that often passes for style?  Is it possible to dissociate the manner of a picture from its embodiment of some fact or idea?  For it to have style in the full sense of the word, surely it must embody an expression of life as serious and thorough as the method of record.”—­Charles H. Caffin.

In the International Studio of March, 1903, we read:  “The portrait of Mrs. Roosevelt, by Miss Cecilia Beaux, seemed to me to be one of the happiest of her creations.  Nothing could exceed the skill and daintiness with which the costume is painted, and the characterization of the head is more sympathetic than usual, offering a most winsome type of beautiful, good womanhood.  A little child has been added to the picture—­an afterthought, I understand, and scarcely a fortunate one; at least in the manner of its presentment.  The figure is cleverly merged in half shadow, but the treatment of the face is brusque, and a most unpleasant smirk distorts the child’s mouth.  It is the portrait of the mother that carries the picture, and its superiority to many of Miss Beaux’s portraits consists in the sympathy with her subject which the painter has displayed.”—­Charles H. Caffin.