"They Are Only Collecting the Usual Fans and Gloves"

Gibson stages the post-dinner tableau as low farce: three men in white-tie evening dress scramble on hands and knees beneath a long supper table, retrieving the fans and gloves their female companions shed before sitting down. The women — tall, swan-necked Gibson Girls in off-shoulder gowns — stand in a composed cluster at the far end of the room, studiously ignoring the spectacle. A fourth man at right bends over a chair with equal ungainliness. The caption delivers the punchline deadpan. Gibson's argument is gently bilateral: chivalric ritual, however sincere, reduces well-bred men to absurdity, while the women's serene detachment implies they regard the whole performance as their due.