The Express.
London, England, 1867-12-09 00:00:00

HER SIAJESTY'.I THEATRE.

The catastrophe in the Haymarket leads the Times to
insist on the necessity of causing our theatres and all our
public buildings to be made entirely fire-proof. Where •
boarded floor is necessary it can be laid over iron and con-
crete, and in that situation it will only burn very slowly,
and can soon be extinguished. Walls, roofs, staircases,
passages can be wade of uninflammable materials. Clearly
the dependence for the future will be on the plan, con-
struction, and material of the edifice, rather than on any
scheme for drowning ► fire if ever it gets hold of a building.
The Daily News has little doubt that another building
will presently take the dismantled place, and demands
that any such building should not only be fire-proof, but
give the utmost facility of exit. No building incapable of
being emptied of its occupants in a few minutes ought to
be licensed as a place of public amusement. The vomi-
tories, to use the expressive Latin term, should be nume-
rous, direct, and spacious. Over our theatres and concert•
rooms might, in certain contingencies, be inscribed the
line of Dante, " All hope abandon, ye who enter here."
They seem to be constructed so as to make escape im-
possible. Obligation rests on the authorities, to whom
the publics safety I. entrusted where the power of self-
protection necessarily fails, to regulate these matters.
The Post and the Star appeal to the benevolence of the
public on behalf of the subscription which has been opened
for the unfortunate people who have been thrown out of
employment by the fire.

The Telegraph deplores the fact, as eminently prejudicial
to the cause of music, that the destruction of her Majesty's
Theatre may for a time restrict musical performances of
the highest slams to one house, and hopes that the very
necessity will call forth the requisite activity and inven-
tion to supply the suddenly created demand. Every opera
goer, whichever theatre he specially patronises, has a
direct and personal interest in promoting the rivalry that
is the soul of art as it is i f trade—the moat powerful coy-
' rector of injustice and the strongest possible incentive to
exertian.

;8 TOPICS.

The evidence in the Alton murder cave is summarised in
some of the papers, and tbe pleas advanced by the
counsel considered. Despitetheextracrslinary circumstance
that a man should commit such • murderjandl such a
butchery and yet return to his employment and betray
no trace of the crime except by an entry in his own
diary, the Times thinks few readers will be disposed to
contest the justice of the verdict which excludes tbe pre-
sumption that the prisoner was in ommisible for his
actions.

The Herald says if linker had been acquitted, the jury
would have lent their unction to the doctrine, which,
however plausible in theory, is misobievous and inapplioa.
Me in practios, that moral depravity when it becomes suf-
ficiently aggravated is to be denominated insanity, and
dealt with as inch.

The Standard deprecates the um of strong language, or
puerile manifestations of hatred, on the part of Italy
towards France, whose sympathy is of more importance
than that of the rest of the world. In the meantime it must
be acknowledged that a conference could have no other
purpose after these late deelaratione of the French minister
than to impose upon Italy, in the name of Europe, the
prohibition France has pot upon her, and that is a work
in which the other great powers, whatever their opinions
on the Roman question, will take no part.
A letter from " A Catholic Magistrate" appears in the
rime*, complaining that the visiting *nose in so many
instances will give no facilities for the communication of
religions instruction to Roman eatholic prisoners. The
Times says such conduct is a violation of the inteniiiism of
the legislature, and the public are deprived by it of a most