An admirable impetus, of inestimable value, was given to the work of Cuban education in 1900 when Harvard University, General Wood's alma mater, invited Cuban teachers to the number of a thousand to spend the summer at that institution, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where a great summer school in pedagogy and other sciences was conducted. Recognizing the immense value of such a visit from many points of view, the American administration in Cuba agreed to pay each teacher one month's salary for the purpose of the excursion, and to provide transportation from their homes to Havana or other convenient ports, whence their further travel was provided for by the Quartermaster's Department of the United States. On arriving at Cambridge they were received and entertained during their stay by a committee specially appointed by Harvard. They were thus enabled to have without cost an extended and singularly interesting and enjoyable excursion, such as many of them had never had before, to receive stimulus, suggestion and instruction in the most approved methods of education and school management, and--perhaps most important of all--to come into direct touch with the people and institutions of the great northern republic with which their own country had and was destined always to have the closest of relations. The school system of the island was strictly removed from politics, both local and general, and was taken from the control of the municipalities and placed directly and solely under that of the national government. Thus was assured a fine degree of uniformity in the quality and methods of teaching. Thus also the poorer districts, which could with difficulty have maintained any kind of schools at all, were enabled to have as good service as the richest communities. The salaries paid to teachers were good, comparing favorably with those paid in the United States. [Illustration: THE UNIVERSITY OF HAVANA Cuba is enviably distinguished for providing not only elementary but higher education, even of the best university grade, practically without cost to the children of her citizens. The University of Havana, which is the crown of the whole educational system of the country, was founded in 1728, and formerly was housed in the old convent of Santo Domingo. But in 1900 under the American administration of General Leonard Wood, it was removed to the fine site of the former Pirotecnica Militar, near El Principe.]