drama round her. _Anthony_, with family, is
taken to see the show and occupies the best box in the Prince of Wales's
Theatre, from which, after a little critical comment upon us in the
audience, he falls in love with the heroine. It is the typical film of
lurid life on a Californian ranch, and might almost have been modelled on
one of Mr. Punch's cinema burlesques. There are the familiar scenes of a
plot to hang the girl's lover, swiftly alternating with scenes of her
progress on horseback through the primeval forest, and concluding with her
arrival just in time to shoot the villain and untie the noose that
encircles her lover's carotid.

On the return of the party from the cinema, _Mortimer John_ describes to
_Anthony_ the powers of a drug which induces the most vivid of dreams. He,
_John_, had once been in _Anthony's_ pitiful case, and through the services
of this drug had achieved his quest of the ideal woman. _Anthony_, greatly
intrigued, consents to swallow a sample of the potion. It is a simple
narcotic, and under its influence he is conveyed, in a state of coma and a
suitable change of apparel, into the heart of Surrey, where at sunrise he
is restored to animation and has the scenes of the evening's drama
re-enacted before his eyes, as originally filmed for exhibition. Under the
impression that this is merely the vivid dream that he had been promised,
he himself takes part in the living drama, playing the noble _role_ of an
exceptionally white man. In the course of it he exchanges pledges of
eternal love with _Aloney_ the heroine. Finally, in a spasm of heroic
self-sacrifice, he takes poison with the alleged purpose of saving the
heroine's life. We never quite gather how his suicide should serve this
end, but then the whole atmosphere is charged with that obscurity which is
the very breath of the film-drama.

[Illustration: AN IDYLL OF MOVIE-LAND.

_Anthony Silvertree_ MR. CHARLES HAWTREY.

_Aloney_ MISS WINIFRED BARNES.]

The poison is nothing worse than another dose of the narcotic, and under
its spell he is spirited back to London, where, on arrival, he is
confronted with the lady of his "dream," and _Mortimer John_ secures a
colossal fee. In addition, for he has had the happy thought of selecting
his own daughter for the heroine, he secures a plutocrat for his
son-in-law.

The worst of a play in which one is conducted out of ordinary life into the
regions of improbability by processes of which every st