How does Thomas Mann use imagery in Disorder and Early Sorrow?

Imagery:

Ingrid is brown-eyed, eighteen, and perfectly delightful. She is on the eve of her exams, and will probably pass them, if only because she knows how to wind masters, and even headmasters, round her finger.

Bert is blond and seventeen. He intends to get done with school somehow, anyhow, and fling himself into the arms of life.