Algie (Billy Quirk) is a high society man, but the father of the girl he wants to marry considers Algie a weakling and not good enough for his daughter. He signs a promise saying that if Algie can prove himself a man inside a year, then Algie can marry his daughter.
Off Algie goes to the west. He tells the ruffians that he meets there his mission, and they put him in the care of "Big Jim", who has Algie bunk with him and teaches him to ride a horse and to prospect. Algie is a quick study, and even fights off a couple of robbers who intrude on the mine, winning Big Jim's respect.
But there is an odd side turn in the plot. Apparently Big Jim is an alcoholic, and Algie is shown tending to Jim when he comes home so drunk he is hallucinating before he passes out. Then Algie tells off anyone who offers Jim a drink when they go to the bar, which makes me wonder - Why would you go to a bar if you intend to not drink? The odd side plot is this rather pro prohibition message before prohibition begins, and so I looked up Alice Guy Blache and the other directors of this film to see if they were pro prohibition, but couldn't find anything on the subject. But there was propaganda in films, even from the beginning, so it could be.
Overall, this film is still studied because, although the leading character is straight, Algie is a very early case of gay stereotyping in film - the loud clothes, his flamboyant gestures, and his tiny toy like gun being just some of those. That is probably why Turner Classic Movies restored it in 2007, and it's a shame they don't have a restoration budget anymore with which to restore more rare gems.
Billy Quirk himself had a rather sad ending. He was a director and actor during the very early days of cinema, but he couldn't cope when films became much longer in the late 1910's and he had a nervous breakdown in 1920. His health continued to deteriorate, and he died in 1926 at only age 53.
