In 1767 Sir William “borrowed from Dr. Russel and copied the keys of the Chinese language, which he wished to learn” (Life, p. 78). In 1770 he wrote to Count Reviczki, “I succeeded in comparing one of the Odes with the version of Couplet and analysed every word, or more properly every figure in it.” Couplet's version (in Latin) had appeared about a hundred years previously. This is presumably the Ode that Sir William subsequently turned into Latin verse (Works, vol. x, p. 317). Reviczki replied (possibly with slight irony), “Pray inform me when you learned the Chinese language. I did not suspect that this was one of your accomplishments; but there are no bounds to your acquisitions as a linguist.” In 1771 Sir William writes to a friend, “I am sorry the characters you sent me are not Persian but Chinese, which I cannot decipher without a book which I have not at present.” It does not appear that after this period Sir William was ever able to devote time to Chinese linguistic studies. But in a “memorandum on objects of inquiry during my residence in Asia” which he drew up when on his way to India in 1783, he included “The Shi-King or 300 Odes”. The list was a very varied one, and also included “Britain discovered, an Heroic Poem on the Constitution of England. Model, Homer”. In 1790 he undertook to give the second Anniversary Discourse to the Asiatic Society of Bengal. His subject was The Chinese. His sources dated chiefly from the end of the seventeenth century. He seems to have been unaware of the Mémoires concernant les Chinois, the bulk of which had already appeared. He told his audience (Works, vol. iii, p. 147), “Their philosophy seems yet in so rude a state as hardly to deserve the appellation,” and “of painting, sculpture, or architecture, as arts of the imagination, they seem (like other Asiatics) to have no idea”. He had probably not seen the essay, “Sur les beaux Arts de la Chine et principalement sur l'Architecture” that had appeared in Lettres d'un missionaire à Pekin, in 1782. Much of the rest of the discourse seems to be still founded on Couplet.