When a stock company attempts to produce a play which has been a failure in New York and succeeds as well as the players at the St. James Theatre do with "The Faithful Heart", it deserves congratulations. Given a play which contains too little humor for the amount of sentiment, this company makes the emotional scenes bearable by developing the eccentric characterization to a high degree.

In construction "The Faithful Heart" resembles "The Circle", a play which appeared here a few years ago. The prologue introduces us to Miss Gatterscombe and her two nieces, Ginger and Blacky. The latter is in love with a roaming sailor, Waverly Ango, who leaves her to seek his fortune in Africa.

Twenty years later we find this man occupying an important military position and mingling with society. He is about to ally himself with a prominent family by marrying Miss Diana Oughterson, when a great obstacle appears in the form of Blacky II, Ango's illegitimate daughter.

Diana, however, is still willing to marry Ango, if he will send Blacky to live with her aunt in Canada; but he must choose between the two. After much deliberation he refuses to part with his daughter and resolves 'to do the thing he cannot explain, because he knows it's right'.

Hero Atones For Black Past

Ango then accepts the captaincy of a tramp steamer and, accompanied by his daughter, goes to Southampton, its port of departure. While there, he visits the room in the Reindeer Hotel, where he said goodby to Blacky I twenty years before. He plays the old music box, which she was so fond of, and pays old George five pounds, the result of a bet that Ango would never return to Southampton. A few minutes after he leaves the hotel, the audience hears the steamship whistle and knows that Waverly Ango is aboard, atoning for his past indiscretions by sailing straighter than he ever sailed before.

In this play both the leading man and lady are given exceptional chances to show their versatility. In the prologue Waltor Gilbert imitates a reckless youth and in subsequent scenes a settled man of forty. Similarly Ann Mason is called upon to distinguish between the characters of a mother and her daughter. These difficult assignments, however, are very well fulfilled, which helps to keep "The Faithful Heart" from repeating its New York failure.