After its production at Hamlin’s Theatre,--designated by Belasco as “a big success,”--“Hearts of Oak” was taken on a tour, but was presently brought back to Chicago, and on March 15, 1880, it was presented at Hooley’s Theatre, where it was again received with public favor. In the meantime the fact that it was in a considerable degree a variant of an English play of earlier date had been perceived and made known, and Hamlin, offended and resentful because Herne and Belasco, returning to Chicago, had chosen to appear at Hooley’s instead of coming back to him, announced a revival of the earlier play,--Leslie’s “The Mariner’s Compass,”--with the title of “Hearts of Oak.” A suit at law followed, the ultimate decision being that “The Mariner’s Compass,” unprotected by American copyright, was free to any person in the United States who might choose to use it, irrespective of its author’s moral rights, but that the title of “Hearts of Oak” was owned by Herne and Belasco, in association with their play, and could not lawfully be associated with another. The inimical purpose of Hamlin was thus, in a measure, defeated, but Belasco’s troubles did not stop there. Herne evinced much displeasure on learning that Belasco’s play, on which he had co-labored, was not strictly original. An alleged ground of Herne’s displeasure was the lawsuit. “Why didn’t you tell me about “The Mariner’s Compass’?” he said, reproaching Belasco: “_now_ I’ve a damned lawsuit on my hands!” “Well,” Belasco rejoined, “I don’t see why I should have told you anything about the old play; and, anyway, I don’t see what you have to complain about. You ought to be mighty glad you’ve got a half-interest in something worth a lawsuit to protect,--and you haven’t got the suit on _your_ hands any more than I have on _mine_!” The actual ground of Herne’s dissatisfaction, judging by his subsequent treatment of Belasco, probably was his realization that, if he had, in the first place, been made acquainted with “The Mariner’s Compass,” he could himself have adapted that play to his own use without forming a partnership with anybody. FIRST VENTURE IN NEW YORK. The success gained in Chicago and other cities relieved the Belasco-Herne triumvirate from immediate pecuniary embarrassment, and notwithstanding the existence of a latent and growing antagonism the path to fortune seemed to have opened for them. From Chicago, after two weeks at Hooley’s Theatre, those managers carried their play to New York, an opening having been obtained through the agency of Brooks & Dickson (Joseph Brooks [1849-1916] and James B---- Dickson, now [1917] business manager for Robert B. Mantell), and “Hearts of Oak” was presented, for the first time in the metropolis, March 29, 1880, at the New Fifth Avenue Theatre, then opened under the management of Edward E. Rice and Jacob Nunnemacher. This was the cast: