The satiric drama was dormant until 1873, when _The Happy Land_ was produced at the Court Theatre by Miss Marie Litton on March 17. It was founded on Gilbert's _Wicked World_, "a fairy comedy," written for Buckstone and the Kendals, and produced at the Haymarket with only moderate success on January 4. _The Happy Land_ was designed by Gilbert himself, but the stage version was mainly worked out by Gilbert Arthur à Beckett. Gilbert's name did not appear on the bill, on which the piece was assigned to F. L. Tomline (i.e., Gilbert) and à Beckett. _The Happy Land_ was a satire on the Gladstonian administration, and three of the principal actors were made up to caricature Gladstone, Lowe and Ayrton--so closely that after a few days the Lord Chamberlain intervened and the make-up was considerably modified. _Punch_ saw the piece before the Lord Chamberlain's order had been issued, and "crabbed" it heavily. Unlike most of those who saw the play, he found little wit in it. There were three or four "palpable hits" in the opening scene, but ten minutes of it were enough: the satire was of the sledge-hammer order, and the slain were hewn over and over again to weariness. "For a short time the First Act was lively; the Second was a faint shadow of the First." _Punch's_ disparagement is rather odd, in view of à Beckett's connexion with the paper: it is hard to avoid the suspicion that the estrangement from Gilbert, referred to elsewhere, may have coloured his judgment. The year 1873 was marked by the passing of Macready, who died on April 27. His services to Art, his high aims and neglect of fashion are recognized in the memorial verses, from which we borrow the last stanza:-- Hail and Farewell--thou last of a great line, Who in ideal art moved as at home! Because you bowed at a now empty shrine Was your faith false? Lo, the believing come! The sentiment is not easily to be reconciled with the generally hopeful view of the theatre expounded by _Punch_, or his comparison of Irving with Macready a few months later. In this personal context it is interesting to find that _Punch's_ misgivings were at least partially removed by the emergence of a new star of the first magnitude. He had already welcomed Ellen Terry as Puck in the revival of _A Midsummer Night's Dream_ at the Queen's Theatre; he now paid an unreserved tribute to her performance in _The Wandering Heir_ at the same theatre in March, 1874:--