UPHEAVAL OF BERLIN THEATER WORLD. The Berlin evening papers of the fateful day expressed horror and sympathy over the Chicago catastrophe, comparing the details with those of the Vienna and Paris theater fires. The fire department of the city announced that it would immediately make a fresh study of the protective arrangements of the local theaters, so as to prevent, if possible, a disaster similar to the one at Chicago. Directors of all the Berlin theaters were promptly summoned to police headquarters and apprised of the kaiser's demand that fire protection be made more adequate. The directors of many houses came before their audiences and publicly stated their intention to install the new facilities ordered by the kaiser. These precautions included the lowering of the iron curtain five minutes before each performance and during the intermissions; an increase in the number of firemen on and off the stage, and illuminated exit signs, incapable of extinguishment by smoke or flame. Before each performance the firemen were also to make minute inspection of the building and furnish a formal report that all was right before the curtain was raised. The greatest bomb, however, cast into the theater world of Berlin was Emperor Wilhelm's order summarily closing the Royal Opera House until certain alterations, necessary for protection from fire and possible panic, were made. The kaiser's action attracted the attention of the whole community, which concluded that if the largest and best-equipped playhouse in Prussia was unsafe many minor establishments must be positively dangerous. Berlin, without doubt, contained a dozen music halls and other places of amusement where a fire panic would be deadly, and they followed the fate of the Royal Opera House and were closed until safeguards approved by the proper authorities were provided. In the future proprietors of Berlin theaters will also station special policemen in their houses for the sole purpose of controlling audiences in case of fire, or panic, or both. Thus did the Chicago tragedy profoundly affect one of the great theater centers of the world. MR. SHAVER ON BERLIN THEATERS. Cornelius H. Shaver, president of the Railroad News Company of Chicago, who was in Berlin at the time of the fire, said: "Many of the theaters in Germany strike me as firetraps. Several Berliners assure me that the ushers are the only ones sure of escaping with their lives from at least three of their best houses. The auditoriums in many German theaters are 150 feet back from the street and to reach them one must journey through a labyrinth of courts, corridors and sudden turnings. In the interior the precautions against fire are excellent, including iron curtains, automatic sprinklers and squads of city firemen; but German theaters and hotels are lacking in so essential an equipment as outside fire escapes." VIENNA RECALLS A HORROR OF ITS OWN.