Arizona republican., 1907-10-12
HIGHER EDUCATION
 BELOW THE EQUATOR
In Peru is University Older Than Harvard Every Latin American Capital Has it's National Institution of Learning.

Washington, oct. 4.-(Special corre- 1spondence of The Republican.)--Ac cir constance that has often surprised vis- itors from Latin America is that the national capital of this country has not been made more unmistakably the ed ucational capital. In practically every icountry of South or Central America
 a national institution of the higher
 education affords to students from the various provinces opportunities to
 make use. under the guidance of teach
 CTS of scholarly attachments. of the li- lbraries. museums, scientific collections
 and other governmental facilities.
 Consequently. Spanish-speaking ob- lservers are astonished that Washing ton. with libraries and museums such
 as no South American land can hope to duplicate has, until very recently, never had anything approaching the character of q national university. Par lticularly, because up to this time we Americans have paid comparatively lit tie attention to intoxicating the sciences | of government such as diplomacy in iternatioual law and jurisprudence right at the seat of government where stu dents can see the actual processes of administration, for this reason they have felt that in at least one respect the North American republic is dis tinctly behind the sister republics of the other side of the equator. The opinions of our Latin American con temporaries are perhaps worth consid- ering independently just now
 when the George Washington univer- sity, more than a century after the bcquest made b. the Father of his
 Country to found a central university
 which should give higher training to
 the youth of all sections, is becoming la realit..
 University education. at all events.
 lis nothing new to the descendants of
 the Spanish conquerors of tropical America. Most people if you ask them
 the name of the oldest of American
 universities will say Harvard. founded
 in 1886. Therein they are mistaken.
 DOwn-Or perhaps at it is in the Andes one should say ''up"-at Lima, Peru. is the Universidad de San Marcos. whose charter was granted by Philip II in
 1572. Before the first Pilgrim stubbed his toe on Plymouth Rock, before Sir Walter Raliegh smoked his first cigar, university instruction in polite liter ature, jurisprudence and theology was being given in the land of the Incas. The institution at Lima has d contin- uOus history from late in the sixteenth century down to this year of grace, and it has always been the central fea ture of the educational system of a wealthy and intelligent republic. Not only is classical education given at the Peruvian capital, but one finds also School of Mines and Civil Engineering, a National Agricultural School and a School of Arts and Trades. All these ernmental collections. just as students at the George Washington University live and work in presence of advan- tages which are shared by no univer- sity outside of the national capital.
 What is true of Peru applies in a measure to practically every South American country. The troubles of Venezuela have been very much in the public prints in the last few years President Castro has been largely re- sponsible for that. In the midst, how ever, of revolutions and counter reyo- lutions centering about the celebrated Yellow House at Caracas, the Central University of Venezuela continues from year to year to train the most gifted1 youth of the provinces of a vast eoun- try. Although the Venezuelan republic usually equipped with local educational