In my recent despatches I had much to say of the rumours of the supposed impending removal of the Tuchun from. Honan. I reported that General 'Feng had! himself hastened away from one of the most impressive military reviews that Ka feng has ever' seen, en "independence Day, to meet Wu Pei-fu and Tsao Kun in a military conclave in Paotingfu. Well, the Fushun is back from that meeting and from his. general air of abstraction and pre-occupation it 1s evident that sumcth.ng that g.ves him, to say the least of it, deep food for thought, happened there.
Still, no definite word of the future has been spoken and the rumours increase. Despite the fact that Wu Pei-fu answered these reports by the assurance that Teng would not be taken away front Honan, the general public persists in saying that it is the opposition of Wu to the continued residence of Feng in Honan that is mainly responsible for the impending removal. Anhui and Chahar have been dropped out of the reports and Nanyuan has been substituted. This would mean that Feng would be removed from a position of extreme usefulness to mere military occupation. In other words, it means that Wu is bound to get rid of the main obstacle of his source of revenue in the province.
If this is true—and again T repeat that nothing more than rumours can at present be relied on—the verdict of the man in the street is that Wu is making a very great mistake. The unfaltering loyalty of Feng to Wu in all the things that have meant so much to the power and prestige of the latter should assure that Feng should be left in the very strongest position possible. It is true that Feng will not wring money out of the people either for his own needs or for the needs of Wu, but for what has been considered the common objective of the two of them—the elimination of Chang Tso-lin and the eventual conflict with Japan—Feng should not be removed from this strong position.
Apropos of the need of money. Feng's officers have not been paid for months, and no doubt the common soldiers must be farther in arrears. Thus, with so little for his own needs, Feng has not been in a position to supply Wu. However, if Chang Fu-lai comes te Honan as the nominee of Wu, he will be, in all things pertaining to money, undoubtedly far more pliable than Feng has proved. Whether Feng goes to Nanyuan or some other place, or whether Chang Fu-lai or some other man
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.