The Fable of the Back-Trackers from the Hot Sidewalks (1917)
Once there was a farm dwelling on a knoll that served as the home for a foundling who was getting his board and keep. Being a relation, he only had to crowd fourteen hours of labor into each day. He slept in an apartment just under the rafters, with the seed corn and medicinal herbs, and was up at four a.m. without leaving a call. The county seat was a boob settlement, but to the adopted waif it looked like four European capitals welded together until he got a book of travel views, and then he was taken with a sudden yearn to zip away in a day coach, with his head out of the window. The call could not be downed, and soon the sturdy specimen was on his way for the incandescent pitfalls determined to take up some vocation that could be practiced while seated in a rocking chair. He started in a livery stable, but in three years we find him employed in a department store in the very heart of the city, and twenty years later was a perfectly good floorwalker, with nearly $80 piled up awaiting investment. He decided to backtrack it to the jungle and let the poor flatheads look at his Palm Beach suit while they were washing up for dinner. But times have changed, and instead of finding the muscle bound yeomen tilling the soil he is informed that the family is just going to the links, and is rebuked with, "You should have brought your clubs along." Moral: It must be dull for the people away out in the country without any fire engines passing in front of the house.
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| Filmmakers | Role |
|---|---|
| Lee Metford | Director |
| George Ade | Writer |
| Charles J. McGuirk | Writer |
| Cast | Role |
|---|---|
| Rod La Rocque | |
| Russell McDermott | |
| Walter Schoeller | |
| Tommy Carey |
