Calumny is one of the most despicable crimes against our neighbor, and while the wife in this story acted conventionally, she nevertheless maligned the other woman simply because of her profession, an actress.
Silas Croft was a kindly old Englishman who had a farm in South Africa. With him resided his two nieces, whom he had taken from their drunken, worthless father when they were of a tender age.
Robert Ffolliott is a young Irish lad who is done out of his land and sent off to a penal colony in Australia following false accusations by the greedy Kinchella.
Out in the farm-lands near Portland, the Widow Walters lives with her daughter Ethel. As far as affections are concerned, those of the widow are confined to her daughter, until Squire Lang, a fat old widower, with his son Harry, moves onto the adjoining farm.
A rich man who finds that there is nothing in life worth living for, is worse off than is a poor man in similar circumstances, for the poor man may he stricken with ambition, and in a last effort to attain fame and fortune, redeems himself.