AustLit

Cyril Maitland, a young clergyman, falls in love with a young woman called Alma Lee, despite already being engaged. When Alma's father finds out that she is pregnant he attacks Maitland but is accidentally killed in a fall. Maitland's closest friend, Dr Henry Everard, is blamed for the death and subsequently spends 20 years in goal. In all that time neither Lee nor Maitland attempt to clear his name. By the time Everard is released Maitland has become a prominent author and bishop. Not surprisingly Everard's only thought upon release is to seek vengance upon the man who ruined his life.

(Source: Australian Screen)

The film is an adaptation of the 1886 novel The Silence of Dean Maitland by English novelist Mary Gleed Tuttiett (11 Dec 1846 - 21 Sep 1923), who wrote under the pen-name Maxwell Gray. The novel, a popular best-seller, had been made into a successful stage play in the late nineteenth century as The Silence of Dean Maitland and had been previously filmed in 1914 in Australia by Raymond Longford (as The Silence of Dean Maitland) and in 1915 in the United States by John Ince (as Sealed Lips).