Like many other fallacies that have become identified with motion picture characterization, rich people are invariably represented as being unkind, selfish, penurious, and immoral--oh, always immoral. And the poor are loving, kind, true, surfeited with virtue. The poor mother idolized her children, worked and slaved for them; father always loved mother, never strayed from home. But the rich man, drat him, ah, he had sweethearts galore, he was dishonest on the stock market, he put marble dust in the sugar, his wife was something merely to be exploited, and his children were always “poor little rich boys and girls.” So we were primed for action and quite ready to make our wealthy gentleman sojourning in his winter mansion an utter rake, a miserable specimen of the middle-aged debauchee who treated cruelly a long-suffering wife. But the little poor families were such models of all the virtues, they hadn’t missed one; and their days were full of happiness. The hostess of this charming home with some friends watched our performances. There was no limit to their hospitality. They brought out tables and a tea-service and they loaned us their “bestest” butler--there was a lawn party in the story. When the picture was finished, Mr. Griffith invited the owner and his family and their friends to the studio to see the picture. The projection over, we noticed a strange lack of enthusiasm; and then Monsieur took Mr. Griffith aside and asked him if it would be absolutely necessary for him to release the picture. “Really,” said the gentleman, “we are a very happy family, my wife and I and the children, we like each other a lot. All my friends have been told about the picture and they’ll watch for it--and I just don’t like it, that’s all. You know a person can have money and still be a respectable citizen in the community.” And that was that. But we learned something. And here comes little Jack Pickford in his first leading part, a comedy directed by Frank Powell, and called “The Kid.” It was full of impish pranks of the small boy who does not want his lonely daddy to bring him home a new mama, but he comes across in time and soon is all for her. Two more pictures, “The Converts,” and “The Way of the World,” finished us at San Gabriel. Both were Christian preachments, having repentant Magdalenes as heroines, and were admirably suited for portrayal against the Mission’s mellow walls. Sleepy old San Gabriel, where dwelt, that first winter, but a handful of Mexicans and where no sound but the mocking bird was heard until the jangling trolley arrived and unloaded its cackling tourists! Mission atmosphere got under the skin; so we determined on San Fernando for “Over Silent Paths,” an American Desert story of a lone miner and his daughter who had come by prairie-schooner from their far-away Eastern home.