Government officials try to organize a state bawdy house in Victorian England.
Two diverse factions in Victorian England have vowed to do something about the prostitution in London's streets. On the one hand, a delegation of government officials has decided to try the "French system" by sponsoring an official brothel to be situated in an ancestral home belonging to Sir Francis Leybourne; on the other hand, Sir Francis' niece, Josephine Pacefoot, is engaged in starting a rehabilitation center for wayward girls. When Sir Francis is called away to India, where he maintains a large opium plantation, he turns the administration of the government brothel over to his mistress, Babette, who turns it over to her lover, Sir Francis' disinherited son, Walter. Here in this luxurious bordello many famous Victorians, including Charles Dickens, Lord Tennyson, Oscar Wilde, Lord Alfred Douglas, Lady Dilke, Algernon Charles Swinburne, and Elizabeth Barrett Browning, make brief appearances. Benjamin Oakes, a young publicity consultant who has been promoting an airship invented by Count Pandolfo, aligns himself with Josephine's group in order to expose the widespread prostitution. Conversely, Walter is luring Josephine's reformed prostitutes to Babette's establishment. Then the natives on Sir Francis' opium plantation slay him, and Josephine inherits both the ancestral brothel and the plantation. Determined that he shall have control of his father's assets, Walter schemes to get rid of the troublesome Benjamin by framing him on a rape charge and then seducing and marrying Josephine. But his evil plot goes awry when the Chinese trade attaché, disturbed by the sale of Indian-grown opium to his country, kidnaps Josephine and threatens her with a horrible, Oriental-style death unless she turns over the deed to the plantation. Although Benjamin, temporarily released in order to clear himself of the rape charge, attempts to rescue her, he ends up being captured himself. But, with the disclosure of an unlikely filial relationship between the Chinese trade attaché and the Leybournes, and the imminent possibility of a raid, Josephine and Benjamin escape to freedom. Following the confusion that ensues, Josephine converts her uncle's ancestral home into a rehabilitation school, while the former occupants, including Babette, are hired by the French Ambassador to take up residence in Count Pandolfo's newly-invented airship--the first international flying brothel.
