Poldi Sonnleitner had actually wanted to trade the local mountains for the vastness of the open sea. That’s why he had become a sailor. But during a visit home, everything suddenly changes for him, because all he wants is to stay with his girlfriend Dorle, the grocer’s daughter. When he learns that she has long been promised to the village blacksmith Domini—once Poldi’s best friend—he sets out on a life-threatening mountain trek in a fit of rage. As fate would have it, only his friend Domini can save him.

Theater director Falke, dressed as a bat, ends up in prison after a merry carnival night. Director Frank only releases him after some time. Falke decides to take revenge on his friend Gabriel von Eisenstein, to whom he owes the whole affair. The annual masked ball at Prince Orlofsky's provides the opportunity. Falke stages a game of mistaken identity in which Eisenstein does not recognize his own wife and courts her, while maid Adele appears as the countess. Eisenstein is duped, Falke has taken his revenge.

Monika, the only daughter of Maximilian and Fränze Holten, becomes engaged to lawyer Thomas Hesse. Her mother is happy because he is a man like Maximilian, her husband. His father-in-law now gives him the delicate task of protecting singer Alexandra Durran from annoying admirers. Theater director Rother behaves particularly conspicuously in this regard.