Mary Adams, about to visit relatives in a distant part of the country, is entrusted to the care of Manuel Bond. The girl's beauty inflames Bond, a gambler and a scoundrel. That night, when the stagecoach halts, Mary is horrified to discover that Bond has registered for both as man and wife. The gambler turns a deaf ear to the girl's frantic pleas. After locking her in the room, the scoundrel proceeds to the barroom. Mary escapes by means of the window. The girl comes upon a party of settlers. Mary joins the party. Later, the girl meets Kit, a young backwoodsman. It is a case of love at first sight and the two are married the same day.
Broncho Billy learns that part of his land is occupied by a "squatter." He orders the "squatter" evicted. The latter starts out to kill Billy, but Bessie, the "squatter's" daughter, prevents him. She pleads with Billy to permit them to remain on the land. Billy immediately falls in love with her.
Patsy, the cook of the "Flying U" ranch, is passionately fond of canned corn. Every time he goes to town to buy supplies for the camp, cases of canned corn head the list. Patsy may forget at times to order a special brand of tobacco for the boys, or some of the trimmings that go to make a camp dinner more acceptable, but he never fails to order the canned corn.
Miner John Walsh leaves his wife and baby behind on his barren claim taking their small store of gold to the settlement and gambling it away. He becomes embroiled in a fight with cowpuncher Burns and is killed. Shortly afterwards Mrs. Walsh, weakened by her attempt to work, her husband's claim collapses. The doctor declares only a transfusion can save Mrs. Walsh's life. Burns, now a fugitive, appears and volunteers. Mrs. Walsh's life is saved, but Burns, weakened by hunger and exposure, succumbs, happy in having made amends for his crime.
Broncho Billy, an express rider, is married to Stasia Wynn, daughter of Grant Wynn. John Mackey, a gambler, comes to town and Wynn loses all his money to him. Broncho Billy buys his wife a scarf pin, which her father steals and loses to the gambler. Mackey is caught cheating and is driven from town.
Jim Cameron becomes desperate at his failure to get work, and resolves to hold up the stage in order to provide necessities for his wife and sick child, Mildred.
The earliest surviving film featuring Lon Chaney in a major role, By the Sun's Ray's was but one of several 2-reel westerns starring the florid Murdock MacQuarrie. MacQuarrie plays a detective investigating a series of gold shipment robberies. Along the way, he falls for a mine superintendent's pretty daughter (Agnes Vernon), much to the dismay of a sullen mine office clerk (Chaney), who is also smitten with the girl...
Broncho Billy is a foreman on Roger Newman's ranch and is in love with his daughter, Mae. Newman finds this out, discharges Broncho Billy and sends Mae to visit her brother in the east. Broncho Billy kidnaps Mae from the stage coach and they marry, squatting on Newman's land.
Jan, the hunter, is in love with Marie, a French-Canadian girl. The same charmer has captivated Otto, the driver of the Wilderness Mail, a vengeful and selfish individual. Mane has a half-sister, Joan, a decided contrast to her, a sweet lovable girl not ordinarily bold or aggressive, but when aroused firm to a finish.
Broncho Billy, a cowpuncher, is elected to the office of deputy. The sheriff is in love with Gertrude Scott and fears that his deputy is smitten with her. An outlaw has been terrorizing the town and the sheriff determines to capture him. He meets the outlaw in the woods, gives him money and promises him his release the following day if he will give himself up.
Slippery Slim uses his position as postmaster in order to hold back all the invitations to Sophie's birthday party, except, of course, his own and that of the parson.
John Preston, ranch owner, owes a large sum of money to Don Jose Praz. The Don's rascal son, Raphael, with the aid of an accomplice, steals some of Preston's cattle. Raphael loves Kate Preston and urges his father to press the matter of the notes as a lever to win Preston's consent to the marriage. Kate's heart, however, belongs to the foreman, Jack Deering. Unable to force Preston's consent, Raphael kidnaps the girl and carries her to a lone cabin. Game as every Western girl who has ridden the free plains, Kate fights him, but the villain's strength beats her down. The girl's horse has meanwhile run home. Jack, accompanied by the cowboys, starts on the trail. He arrives at the cabin and, after a death duel with the Mexican, kills him as the cowboys come up.
Drink makes a brute of Broncho Billy and he does not realize what he is doing when under its influence. His wife and children are mortally afraid of him when he is in this condition and keep out of his way. At the saloon one day he provokes a quarrel with the one doctor of the town and wounds him with a shot from his gun.
Raymond is a painter who is very successful in his career. One day, he walks into a saloon and his eyes fall on the beautiful Jennie. She poses for one of his paintings and later runs off with all his money. When they meet again, they fall head over heels in love and get married. She is forced by Apaches to steal from him again, but Jennie refuses. In revenge, they lock her up and go after Raymond themselves. They attack him and lock him up as a living mummy in a sarcophagus. He is eventually rescued and reunited with Jennie, while the Apaches themselves are locked up.
Pete Larson is a brute whose battered wife, Anne, finally finds courage to leave. The woman gets lost in the wilderness and is taken in by a young hunter, who later proposes marriage. Mistakenly believing her husband to be dead, Anne accepts only to find her first husband returning to perform a bit of blackmail.
Broncho Billy had promised Marguerite that he would never drink again. She agreed to marry him. That afternoon, one of the village gossips sees Marguerite with Boy Turner, a surveyor, and hastens to inform Broncho of it. Marguerite's sweetheart threatens to kill the surveyor, but finally suggests a duel to be fought ten minutes later. Marguerite hears of it, hastens to the minister's home, where she gets him and takes him to Kelly's saloon.
Carnos, a greaser, is sent to jail. He is a very refractory prisoner and swears to get even with the sheriff when he is liberated. On the day of the greaser's release, the sheriff had captured Broncho Billy, an outlaw, and was bringing him to justice, when he is suddenly pushed from his horse by the outlaw, and is left to wend his way across the plains afoot. Broncho Billy escapes on the sheriff's horse and unknowingly stops at the sheriff's home for food. Looking through a window he sees the greaser about to take the life of the sheriff's wife.