A variety of broad-painted and unlikely characters are trapped in an underground café when a Mississippi River levee breaks and causes flood havoc above and below.
Stratton's café is a popular place with the people of Cottonia, a wealthy cotton town on the banks of the Mississippi, installs flood-proof doors as a safeguard against an overflow of the river; when a flood comes, it appears that the entire town will be submerged. Trapped in Stratton's cafe, amongst others, are Billy Bear, a young broker, and Poppy, a chorus girl with whom he has been in love.
Stationed at the Mexican border, a young lieutenant whose job is to capture a ring of narcotics smugglers, spies his sweetheart, the daughter of a U. S. Customs official, in a cantina suspected of being the headquarters of the dope ring.
John Joyce arrives in Sacramento with his sister, Martha, and aunt to become the editor of a newspaper. He is determined to clear the town of the low-down mining camp types who are flaunting their freewheeling ways. When Joyce meets Faro Sampson, he falls in love, believing that she is the daughter of a minister. Actually she's the daughter of the man who runs a gambling den, "Square Deal" Sampson.
Played mostly for laughs, this silent Western featured the"The Mediator," a drifter who manages to restore peace both within a family and between miners and their powerful employer.
McGee becomes a fireman over the protests of his mother, who doesn't want to see her son sacrifice his life the way his father did. When she dies, McGee adopts little Elizabeth Stevens, who takes care of him instead of vice versa. Along the way he meets Agnes Evans, a chorus girl, and falls in love.