For Mother's Sake

A short silent film produced by Gaston Mèliès in San Antonio.

A young corporal in the United States Cavalry in the Black Hills is very much in love with a young ranchman's daughter who lives near the military barracks. He asks her to marry him and she promises to do so when he has won his third stripe, making him sergeant. It is not long before he receives an assignment from his superior officer to carry an important dispatch to the commanding general at Fort Darrow. In the successful fulfillment of his mission he would be promoted to the office of sergeant, secure his third stripe and his girl.

The stage appeals very strongly to the child of temperamental nature and often it dreams of the glory and fame attending success. Little Alice is a child of this kind and although she is surrounded by the most meager, even poor circumstances she has a great desire to be an actress. Her mother, who takes in washing, sends the little girl to deliver a large basket of clothes. Struggling along the street she stops at the theater to look at a display of photographs of actors and actresses who are appearing there. She loses herself in reverie; while thus engaged the leading lady, whose picture particularly attracts the child's attention, arrives for rehearsal. She speaks to Alice, becomes interested in her and gives her two tickets for the afternoon performance. Pleased and delighted with the gifts she rushes home to her mother who takes the tickets from her, scolds and whips her for not attending to her errand.

Henry Warner (Herbert Rawlinson) is so broke that he has sold his overcoat and now his landlady won't leave him alone about the rent. When he sees a wallet sticking out of a rich man's pocket, he's desperate enough to steal it. The police give pursuit, and Henry winds up in someone's study. The man who lives there, Middleton (Alfred Allen) has been looking for someone with Henry's nerve and offers him a job (along with an overcoat and some cash): He must steal back a will that Middleton's nephew, Craig (Harry Carter) stole from him.

A girl from Paris' underworld fights for love and survival during a time of international turmoil.

Abby Hopkins, the eldest of a small-town newspaper-owner's five daughters, is urged by her family to marry the wealthy, twice-widowed J.B. Hanks. Abby leaves Hank on the night of the wedding and goes to New York, where she supports herself as a waitress and shares an apartment with a co-worker. At the restaurant, Abby meets J. Booth Hunter, a heavy-drinking "ham" actor, and tries to convince him to give up liquor. Hanks shows up one day and during a battle with his estranged wife, Hunter comes to Abby's rescue. Abby finally gets a divorce from Hanks, Hunter conquers his drinking habit, and Abby marries him.

"A senorita. With whom two young matadors, Jose and Pepe, are in love, tries in keep both on the string. She lends each to believe that he is the chosen one, creating a strong jealousy between them. Pepe calls to see the girl and she receives him with a show of great affection and preferment. While they are courting, a caballero, friendly to the other lover, Jose, tells him of the girl's duplicity. In a rage he goes to his inamorata and, demanding an explanation, accuses her of harboring his rival in the house. She cajoles him, and playfully stealing his dagger from him without his knowing it, endeavors to hold his attention by caresses as Pepe tries to make his escape. Unfortunately he is seen and pursued by the enraged Jose, who, coming up with him as he seeks the protection of a priest busy pruning trees in the grounds of the monastery, engages in a terrible struggle in which the priest Is powerless to interfere." - Moving Picture World synopsis excerpt

"Swift Arrow, a lithe and willowy Indian, leaving the encampment of his fellow braves, is well on his journey when he is thrown from his horse and receives a broken leg and injuries from which he is disabled and lies helpless and alone." -Moving Picture World Synopsis excerpt

The cowboys and gamblers of Curzon are very much interested in a placard which appears one day in the saloon, giving the information that the Rev. A.B. Cole is due to arrive from Glue Gulch, and that services will be held in the schoolhouse. The cowboys plan to give the preacher a warm reception, but are surprised and chagrined when the new minister turns out to be a pretty woman. The immediately apologize and agree that religion must be a good thing if taught by such a charming woman. The attendance at the schoolhouse is large, and the barroom is almost deserted. The bartender is in despair and is on the point of closing out his business. He is urged against this, however, by one steady patron, Joe Lane, who tries his best to bring the deserters back into camp.

John Wynn returns to his family after serving time in prison for a crime they believed he didn't commit, or perhaps for an action they had largely moved past. His return creates a "thread" of tension that threatens to unravel the lives his wife, Amelia, and their children have built in his absence. The film focuses on the emotional and societal adjustments required to reintegrate a disgraced family member into a respectable British household.

A Confederate soldier battles with amnesia, vagrants, and tramps as he makes his way back home and to his sweetheart, Virginia.

At his father’s insistence Billy Drake heads to the family’s South American ammunition company as an emissary. Before leaving, however, the movie-struck Billy spots a beautiful woman standing in front of a theater and imagines that she is a film star. To his delight, he finds the woman on board his ship, as well as political agitator Count Von Nuttenburg who has stolen a movie camera, thinking that it is a new brand of machine gun. Von Nuttenburg shows the camera to Billy. Thinking the Count is a director, and the ship a set for a movie melodrama when the boat lands at a port torn by revolution, Billy insists that the guns and soldiers are part of the show. Not until he and the girl are seized by the rebels and threatened with death, does he admit his error. By a clever ruse, he escapes from his captors and with the help of Federal troops defeats the Count and wins the heart of his pretty shipmate.

"Peg" O'Connell, a cheerful, unrefined Irish girl from a fishing village, moves in with her wealthy, haughty aunt, Mrs. Chichester, in England to satisfy the terms of her grandfather's will. Peg faces cold treatment from her aunt and cousin, who are in financial trouble and covet the inheritance, creating a "clash of classes" dynamic. Peg falls for Jerry, a family friend who is actually Sir Gerald Adair, the executor of her estate and her guardian. After overcoming misunderstandings and an attempt to return to her father, Peg finds happiness, love, and acceptance, with the story highlighting the superiority of her honest nature over aristocratic snobbery.

June Arbuthnot tries to make her bored husband jealous by feigning a scandal with another man, which ultimately backfires when the ruse becomes too believable.

John Dowling, a greedy factory owner, cuts his employees' pay while raising their food prices at the company store. The employees strike but to no avail. Mary Garvin visits Dowling to plead the laborers' cause, but because her mother had once refused his marriage proposal, he attacks Mary out of revenge. In the struggle, Dowling is shot, and Mary is tried and convicted of murder. Before the execution, foreman "Bull" Thompson boasts that his bullet killed Dowling during Mary and the factory owner's struggle, and Dowling's son Chester, who has attempted to introduce reforms into the factory, races to the governor's train to secure a pardon for Mary. After Mary's release, she and Chester are married.

Saxophone player Clyde meets a woman named Flowers, and teaches her to dance. He later discovers that gangster boss "Blackjack" is also in love with her. "Blackjack" is also battling gang boss Mike Luego in a violent turf war.

Song of Triumphant Love

Charmian Page has developed a great affection for the child of Sir Richard. When the child is seriously hurt in a car crash that has killed his mother Lady Beverly, who was on her way to see her lover, Charmian persuades her wealthy father to pay for the operation that saves the child. Sir Richard marries Charmian for his child's sake, but remains aloof towards her for the memory of Beverly. When he learns the truth about his late wife's infidelity, he begs for Charmian's forgiveness, realizing she is the better wife.

A forger's arrest shocks his pregnant wife, causing their daughter to suffer strange trances.

Janet Loring is a young widow with a young son. She marries millionaire Malcolm Trask, but doesn't tell him about her previous marriage or her son, Ranny. Abandoned to the streets by Janet, Ranny eventually moves in with a bookseller and her granddaughter Margy. As the years go by Janet comes to regret abandoning her son and takes out ads looking for him. Marcio, a vicious blackmailer, sends Ranny to Janet posing as her son, not knowing that the young boy actually is her son. Complications ensue.