The Pacific Coast Steamship Company's Steamer Queen is photographed underway at sea in this cabinet card by Taber, 121 Post Street, San Francisco, California, with the vessel identified in a printed caption strip along the lower image border reading "P.C.S.S. Co's Steamer Queen." The horizontal format mount bears Taber's full advertising imprint on the face, identifying this as a souvenir view card from his Yosemite and Pacific Coast Views series, produced for sale to travelers and distributed by mail order.

The steamship is shown in full broadside profile making way through calm open water, smoke rising from her single funnel, two masts with rigging visible fore and aft, and multiple decks of passenger accommodations along her hull. Flags fly from both masts and the vessel's wake is visible at the bow and stern. The image caption and Taber's studio credit appear in a dark printed band below the photograph.

The Steamer Queen was one of the principal vessels of the Pacific Coast Steamship Company, operating passenger and freight routes along the West Coast including service to Alaska, and was among the most photographed commercial steamships on the Pacific Coast during the 1880s and 1890s.

The reverse is printed as a Pacific Coast Steamship Company dining seating card for Steamship Queen, with fields for passenger name, table seat number, purser signature, and date, with handwritten entries including table seat numbers 93 through 98 and a date reading "Jan 21st."