Die Galerie der HMS Calcutta (Portsmouth)

Tissot had left Paris for London a few years earlier, after the upheavals of the Commune, and he made his living painting fashionable modern life for a British public. This one carries a joke that only works aloud, and in French. Say the ship's name, Calcutta, in a French accent and it sounds like 'Quel cul tu as', roughly 'what a lovely backside you have.' The scene plays along: a young naval officer and two women in summer muslin lounging on the stern gallery of a warship at Portsmouth, all idle flirtation. One woman leans on the rail and hides behind her fan. In the Victorian language of the fan, held open over the left ear, that gesture meant 'do not betray our secret.'