When her husband dies and leaves her penniless, Mrs. Lawrence Evringham moves in with her wealthy but grim father-in-law and schemes to marry Eloise, her daughter, to the rich Dr. Ballard.
While working his way through college, Paul Potter acquires a flock of wealthy friends who encourage him to give up his hometown fiancée, Sylvia Castle, for Muriel Evers, a flirtatious married woman. After Sylvia releases Paul, and Muriel's husband divorces her for infidelity, Paul and Muriel marry. Meanwhile, when Sylvia's father dies after being ruined in the stock market, she goes from one job to another in the city until she tries acting in a stock company. There she befriends Henry Leamington, an alcoholic leading man, who, as he tutors her, falls in love and stops drinking because of her. When Paul discovers Muriel's unfaithfulness, he renews his acquaintance with Sylvia, who still loves him.
The Fountain of Bakhchisaray
Even though he disapproves of the harshness with which his father, the Colonel, treats his employees, Wayne Craighill joins the old man's mining business. Adding to the strain between father and son, Wayne soon falls in love with Jean, the daughter of a small mine owner whom the Colonel wants to put out of business.
Political graft collector, David Power forced by the district attorney to leave New York takes cabaret singer Hebe Norse with him. Showing talent in a variety of professions, Power is eventually hired by a great steel manufacturer, Gail Rogers. He falls in love with Rogers' daughter Rosalie, and they marry happily until Rogers returns home with a new wife…. Hebe Norse. When Rogers discovers Hebe's past, the two men sever ties as does Rosalie. Vengefully Rogers tries to ruin one of Power's companies without success. Ultimately Rosalie forgives Power and they and their young daughter are reunited.
A sheltered young woman began a romance with a playboy, under the mistaken assumption that they'd get married. When she finds this isn't the case, she starts a feud with him which continues even after her marriage to somebody else.
Adele Moore pressured by her father to choose a husband among four men consults a fortune teller for advice. The crystal ball warns none are suitable so Adele does a flit. Settling in Vermont she opens a store. Business is slow but one day a passing salesman walks in and things begin to look up!
Infatuation is based on Caesar's Wife, a story by Somerset Maugham. Dazzlingly British socialite Viola Morgan falls madly in love with professional soldier Sir Arthur Little at a dinner party. The two marry, and before long Viola has relocated to Egypt with her husband. Soon bored by her hothouse existence, Viola succumbs to the attentions of young British attache Ronald Perry.
A young woman who became pregnant from an assault faces legal trouble and scandal after having an abortion.
Donald Gray, living with his mother in Scotland, through the friendship of the family physician, is offered an opportunity to go to America to study medicine. He leaves with his mother's blessings. Five years later, Donald is a physician with a successful practice in New York City. One of his patients has grown very fond of him; at the same time the young physician has grown fond of this gentleman's daughter, and is engaged to be married to her. His mother resolves to pay him an unexpected visit.
A father-and-son team of cons gamble their firm’s assets. The son is caught investing money that doesn't belong to him and is indicted on a swindling charge. The plot gets spicy when the District Attorney handling the case is his former sweetheart's husband. This situation gives the DA an opportunity to prosecute his romantic rival.
The cabaret act of husband-and-wife dancing team Peggy and Joe Blondin is broken up when Joe becomes consumptive and is ordered West to recuperate. Peggy remains in New York to maintain the couple's income but gradually becomes desperate when letters sent her by her husband request more and more money. Joe's letters actually are being intercepted and rewritten by millionaire Harlan Quinn, who has designs on Peggy and wishes to portray Joe's situation as hopeless. After receiving a particularly alarming letter, Peggy consents to sell her honor to Harlan.
On a beach in southern Italy, Gianna Russelli practices her dancing with her devoted brother Russino, looking forward to the day when she will begin formal dance studies. One day the beautiful Countess Michetti comes to the village and engages in a flirtation with Russino, but when her former lover, Prince Viscomte, arrives with his closest friend, Count Paul Trovelli, the countess resumes her affair with the prince.
Muggsy Mulane, a waif who wears boy's clothing, jumps a freight train to the country after Jimmy "the Eel," the leader of the gang of crooks with whom she works, is arrested. In the village of Cottonville, Muggsy befriends Aunt Sarah, whom she later discovers is Jimmy's mother. When Muggsy learns that the greedy Judge Cotton, who holds the mortgage on Aunt Sarah's property, is planning to foreclose, she threatens to blackmail him, and he relents.
In the college play, Tom and his room-mate, "Bunch," take prominent and successful parts, Tom as the hero and "Bunch" as the heroine, in which he is an excellent female impersonator. The day after the performance, "Bunch" makes an engagement to take a real chorus girl to dinner. Unexpectedly his mother comes to college to visit him and he makes Tom take the girl.
To start a little in advance of our story, Lord Rintoul, of the English nobility, finds a little Gypsy girl three years old, who had been deserted by her parents. Fifteen years later, Gavin Dishart, the Little Minister, receives an appointment, his first, at Thrums, Scotland. This was made possible through the self-sacrifices of his widowed mother, to educate him for the ministry. The community of Thrums is made up of weavers, who work hard, have little and accomplish much. They are ultra-religious and look upon their pastor with such reverence that he is a little lower than the angels. While naturally intelligent, they are grounded in dogma and intolerance. Just after the Little Minister takes charge of the "Auld Licht Kirk" and the Manse, the weavers resent a reduction, by the manufacturers, in their pay and a strike is declared.
Before he can avenge a crooked card game, Dan Carrington suffers heart failure and dies in his chair. John Tralee, the cheater, feels a pang of guilt when he discovers that he has taken all of Carrington's money and adopts the dead man's little girl, Lois. The girl grows up and the gambling hall becomes her second home.
Inconsiderate millionaire John Benson, philanthropist Oliver North, courageous Langdon Crane, wealthy idler Robert Curtis and Lydia Benson are among the passengers on an ocean liner that is sunk by a German submarine. Carried away by the currents to a tropical island, the castaways endure hardships which bring out their true natures.
When young inventor Bob Moore fails in his efforts to provide his father, a safe manufacturer, with a lock that is burglar proof, he contacts The "Eel," the most talented safecracker in the city, to offer him a job in his factory. The Eel, deciding to go straight, accepts the offer, but when he later learns that Irene Hardin has been given a valuable necklace by her father, The Eel plans one last job to secure Irene's pearls.
Mrs. Standing, an old-fashioned country mother, sacrifices to put her son John through college so that he might have a better life. Upon completing school, John goes to the city where his financial success blinds him to the basic values taught to him by his mother.