“This is said only of the municipal schools. I do not know when a system of country schools can be established in Cuba. The present problem is to get what is left of the reconcentrado population back into homes in the country, and to raising crops which will support them. Some progress has been made. Next year they may all be back on their farms and on the plantations. Then it will be possible to plan schooling for the children of the fields. In the meantime the education of the few Cuban youths at American colleges does not solve the question. That is praise-worthy in its way, but the mass of children in Cuba cannot be transferred in a body to the States, nor is it desirable that they should be taken away. They have got to be given their schooling in the midst of the surroundings to which they are born. That can only be done by planting the schoolhouse. It will not be a little red one, most likely will not be painted at all, for the bamboo frames and the palm thatching do not need to be painted. When the country schoolmaster (or perhaps under the new conditions it will be the country schoolma’am) becomes part of the rural life of Cuba the future will no longer be blank.”
While it scarcely seems necessary to comment upon matters of the past, which will soon undergo such changes as scarcely to be recognisable, still history is interesting, and a short description of the University of Havana, the chief educational agency of the Island, its purpose and its future, by Dr. Joaquin Lastres, will not be inappropriate. It may be said of the University that it has branches in all the provinces, and numbered before 1898 about 3000 students, 1800 of whom were in Havana. Dr. Lastres writes as follows, under date of September, 1898, in Havana:
“The University of Havana, which is the highest institution of instruction in the Island of Cuba, has, ever since its foundation in 1721, had a personality of its own, and consequently it has never been considered a property, or dependency of the State; but, like municipalities and deputations, has constituted an institution, self-supporting as regards the State. Since its foundation it has occupied buildings that have not been State property. At the beginning, its own property and income maintained it; but in 1842, without removing its own judicial individuality, the State undertook its maintenance in exchange for the confiscation of its property and income. The Instituto de 2ª Enseñanza (The Institution of Elementary Instruction) is only a dependency of the University under the same judicial conception, owing to its having substituted the old College of the University, which in its turn was formed of several schools teaching different branches of learning, which were within the sphere of the University’s jurisdiction at the time of its foundation in 1721. Consequently, this elementary school has to-day the same judicial character as the University.
“The property and estate seized by the State in exchange for the obligation to maintain this institution were numerous and important; a full statement is to be found in the Treasury Department of this city. Among the properties may be mentioned quit-rents in favour of the University, the building occupied by the old College of Pharmacy, the building occupied by the University ‘Instituto,’ the important sums of money delivered to the State when it undertook the maintenance of the College, and several other effects. Some of this property has been already expropriated by the State partially or totally.
“By the law of the 24th of March, 1883, published in the Gacota de la Habana on the 5th of the following May, it was decided to construct a new University, the necessary funds to be raised by the sale of the building occupied by the University and Instituto, the sale of State property not yet expropriated originally occupied by the old city walls, provided this property be free of all incumbrances, the sale of other lands in Havana belonging to the State not yet disposed of, gifts and subscriptions that may be obtained for this object by the Governor-General of the Island, and the amount annually fixed in the budget of the Island as an appropriation to this end. The subscription was never started, nor was any appropriation made for it. The same law that assigned the means of raising the funds declared it a public benefit and liable to compulsory appropriation.
“The royal decree of the 7th of July, 1883, ordered the Governor-General of this Island to commence the construction of the University building, and blocks eight and nine of the old city walls were chosen by the State architect. The corner-stone of this building was solemnly laid at 9 o’clock A.M. of the 23d of January, 1884, his Excellency, the Governor-General Don Ignacio-Maria del Castillo y Gil de la Torre, as President, in the presence of the authorities, corporations, civil functionaries, and a number of invited guests. This stone remains in the corner where it was placed in the grounds chosen for the new University.
“By decree of the 9th of August, 1886, the Botanical Gardens of this city were ordered to be a dependency of this University, as they continue to be.
“The scant scientific material of this University, and the valuable collections of the Havana Instituto, and also the modest appurtenances of the Matanzas Institution are all the exclusive property of the colleges in which they are, as they have been acquired by the same and they have the legal right to their possession.
“The library belongs to the University, as nearly all the books came from the Pontifical Library; the appropriation made by the State in the annual budget for the University Library has scarcely sufficed to provide for its care. A good proportion of the books are donations of professors and private individuals, and are mostly valuable acquisitions.