Joe Cobb is suffering through a toothache as well as having to babysit his little brother Rupert who won't stop crying. Every effort to calm Rupert is undone by an immediate commotion to wake him up. Joe rocks him to sleep, but then the neighbor starts playing his bass fiddle. Joe then rocks the cradle so hard it falls apart, and he trips and stumbles moving Rupert to the baby carriage, which subsequently rolls down hill through traffic with Rupert and a neighbor's monkey enjoying the ride.

Harry, The Odd Fellow, is a tenement worker who lives alone in a shack alongside a warehouse and longs for the companionship of a wife and children like other men. One day he spies a pretty girl in his telescope and sends her by carrier pigeon a note that, alas, is received by the wrong party. The Girl marries and, poverty-striken, leaves her husband during a snowstorm. Harry takes her in, and minutes later her child is born. He works like a slave for the mother and child, pretending they are his own. Meanwhile, the husband finds her and comes to the shack on Christmas Eve as Harry is preparing to play Santa Claus. Not realizing the unhappiness she is causing him, The Girl thanks him profusely and leaves with her husband. Overcome, Harry sits overnight on the doorstep and the next morning is found frozen stiff except for his eyes--with amusing results.