"Don't Degenerate!"

Secretary of War Dwight Filley Davis would never think of suggesting that President Calvin Coolidge ought to do his own marketing, or that Mrs. Coolidge ought to be the White House cook. But just such suggestions were made last week by China's Minister of War, the great Marshal Feng Yu-hsiang.

Addressing the Committee of Yuans, on which sit both the President of China and Mrs. Chiang Kaishek, Marshal Feng drew himself up to his potent height of six feet and said:

"I desire to emphasize the necessity of economy, both for our new Nationalist Government (TIME, Oct. 29) and in our private lives. I hope that all members of this government will practice strict economy and avoid bad habits. Don't degenerate! Even our highest officials should do their own marketing, and their wives should do the family cooking."

From a prissy little man such words would sound insufferably priggish. From Marshal Feng Yu-hsiang--who looks like the Great Buddha suddenly galvanized into something strenuous and vital--the command "Don't degenerate!" rang with significance and power. Chinese know that the largest private army in the world--150,000 men--is maintained by Feng Yu-hsiang, and that he has inspired his soldiers to a remarkable degree with his own austere strength. Each soldier has been taught a trade. The whole army can support itself indefinitely upon the Chinese countryside in Liberty, Frugality, Fraternity.

Naturally War Minister Feng could not resist the temptation to preach his favorite principles, last week, to the new Nationalist Government and to President and Mrs. Chiang Kaishek. Whether the President will hereafter go marketing every day in his armoured Packard car remained to be seen. But the whole Government paid strictest attention as Marshal Feng developed the thesis of Spartan endeavor against a common enemy--JAPAN.

At the passionate climax of his address Marshal Feng boomed: "China has 400,000,000 people, yet we cannot resist the bullying of a nation with only a few scores of millions. Japanese Imperialism is comparable only to the ways of wolves and tigers. What with their gunboat policy and their heavy artillery sometimes we are treated worse than dogs.

"Take the recent Tsinan incident.* How many innocent country men of ours were killed there? The bones of many still lie unburied, yet Japan still occupies Shantung.

"These national humiliations and other disheartening matters confront us for solution, and they are not easy to solve. Our great responsibility is to maintain and protect the legacy of our ancestors and to hand it over intact to our descendants!"

Turning from foreign to domestic problems, Marshal Feng Yu-hsiang concluded his memorable address thus:

"What parasites and pests are the Communists, always plotting to create trouble, trying to poison the minds of our people and upset the social and political balance.

"Gentlemen, under such grave conditions, encroachments from abroad and communism from within, we must work in harmony and cooperate with each other, for we are besieged on all sides by enemies.

"The principal cause of our political unrest during the last seventeen years has been the struggle among individuals. Our so-called leaders have fought against each other for selfish ends. Hereafter all should work together.

"I have spoken bluntly but sincerely, and I hope my remarks will be received in the same spirit."

Observers friendly to Marshal Feng noticed that he, with the potent inconsistency of greatness, has now turned his broad back upon the Russian Soviet Government which, two years ago, was furnishing him with most of his money, ammunition and supplies. It is an historic paradox that the Nationalist Party, which conquered China with Russian propaganda and Russian gold, is now absolutely estranged from Moscow and on the friendliest terms with U. S. business.

For example a $1,800,000 contract was let, last week, to the enterprising Automatic Electric Company of Chicago, which, within the next twelvemonth, will install a U. S. dial-telephone system in the Capital of the Nationalist State, the ancient Chinese city of Nanking, founded even before 206 B. C.

* During the Chinese Revolutionary War, recently won by the Chinese Nationalists, a Japanese interventionary force occupied Shantung ''to protect the lives and property of Japanese colonists" and has remained in occupation ever since. With scant or manufactured provocation, this Japanese force attacked a Nationalist Army at Tsinan, the Capital of Shantung (TIME, May 14), thus seriously embarrassing for a time the eventually victorious. Nationalist offensive.