The Taking of the Moonstone. This scene for artistic realism has never been surpassed. It transports the audience from the commonplace of this workaday world into the mystic pagan symbolism of India. Six Months Later. We travel with our characters to the great city of history and tradition, London, where we see the pleasure loving fiancée of Herncastle with a party of friends at a game of baccarat. Next we see the party of Hindoos at their suite of apartments in the Hotel Cecil. A daughter of one of the faithful is put into a hypnotic sleep and while in this condition describes the present location of the Moonstone. Herncastle is seen in the act of transferring the diamond to his fiancée in a vision. Interest now centers on Herncastle’s sweetheart, who places the diamond under her pillow when she retires for the night. She is a somnambulist, and the weighty responsibility of the “Moonstone’s” care makes her restless; she rises in her sleep, takes the “Moonstone” from beneath her pillow and seeks a more secure hiding place. She mounts the stairs leading to the roof and there secretes the treasure beneath a loose brick in the chimney. Her maid, hearing a noise, follows her. On reaching the head of the stairs and seeing her mistress in a perilous position near the edge of the roof, she screams, waking her suddenly and causing her to stagger and fall, this tragedy depicting clearly, the curse of the “Moonstone.” In a room at Herncastle the master hears the awful fate of his fiancée from a club friend. His next feeling is one of anxiety, fear for the loss of the stone. He goes to her apartment and remembering her fall from the roof he feels certain it is there that she secreted the stone. The Hindoo, with the same idea, is there before him and discovers the jewel just as Herncastle reaches the roof. A struggle follows and Herncastle recovers possession of the stone. He has recognized his antagonist and rushes from the scene in a mad endeavor to escape. The scene shifts to Hampton Roads, where a balloon ascension is in preparation. The owner of one of the balloons is a friend of Herncastle’s, who comes into the scene closely followed by the Hindoo. Herncastle, maddened by pursuit, jumps into the balloon, cuts the rope and rises into space; believing himself free at last, he feverishly throws out ballast to make the balloon rise more rapidly. In his excitement he has not seen the Hindoo grasp the rope and commence a daring hand-over-hand climb in midair. He turns, still laughing exultantly over his effectual escape, to face his fate in the form of the Hindoo just stepping into the basket. For a second of time they look into each other’s eyes, realizing it means life and freedom for only one of them; then, maddened by the desperation of their perilous position, they clinch. The occult power of justice prevails. Herncastle is overcome, the Hindoo secures the Moonstone and Herncastle falls from the balloon, a victim of his own cupidity. Six Months Later. In front of the Moon-God’s sacred temple the prince assists a beautiful girl from the houdah of a magnificently caparisoned elephant. On the steps of the temple, awaiting the prince and his party, we recognize the faithful followers who accompanied him in his search for the recovery of the jewel. From the Moon-God’s forehead blazes the great white diamond men call the Moonstone, and our story picture closes with a pagan ceremony of marriage, for it is thus the prince rewards the maiden through whose occult powers the stone was first traced.