once without a second interview. The next year, he went to David Bogue's Academy in Gosport (near Portsmouth) for further training. For a while he was torn between Timbuktu in Africa and China as possible fields of service. His prayer was: In 1798, just when the young Robert had been converted, the Rev. William Willis Moseley of Northamptonshire issued a letter urging "the establishment of a society for translating the Holy Scriptures into the languages of the populous oriental nations." He came across a manuscript of most of the New Testament translated into Chinese (probably by earlier Jesuit missionaries) in the British Museum. He immediately printed 100 copies of a further tract "on the importance of translating and publishing the Holy Scriptures into the Chinese language." Copies were sent to all the Church of England bishops and the new mission agencies. Most gave discouraging replies, giving such reasons as the cost and "utter impossibility" of spreading the books inside China. But a copy reached Dr. Bogue, the head of the Hoxton Academy. He replied that if he had been younger he would have "devoted the rest of his days to the propagation of the gospel in China". Dr. Bogue promised to look out for suitable missionary candidates for China. He chose Morrison who soon after turned his attention away from Africa and focused entirely on China. Robert wrote to a friend urging him to become his colleague in his new work, He returned to London and studied medicine with Dr. Blair at St. Bartholomew's Hospital, and astronomy with Dr. Hutton at the Greenwich Observatory. After the decision of the Directors as to his destination, Morrison had most diligently and laboriously pursued the study of Chinese. He learned the Chinese language from a student that he shared lodgings with, called Yong Sam-tak from Canton City. At first they did not get on well together. Morrison absent-mindedly burned a piece of paper with some Chinese characters on it – and infuriated the superstitions of his Chinese mentor, who left for three days. From that time on, Morrison wrote his characters on a piece of tin that could be erased. They continued to work together and studied an early Chinese translation of Gospels named Evangelia Quatuor Sinice which was probably written by a Jesuit, as well as a hand-written Latin-Chinese dictionary. Yong Sam-tak eventually joined him in family worship. In this way Morrison