Mr.Saunders begged him to assure the rajah of the respect and friendship of England, and to give him the promise that, if he should be driven from his capital, he would be received with all honor at Madras, and should be reinstated in his dominions, with much added territory, when the English were again in a position to take the field in force, and to settle their long feud with the French.
Ten days later, they heard that the army of the nizam, of fifteen thousand troops, with eight hundred French under Bussy, were marching against them; and that the horsemen of Murari Reo were devastating the villages near the frontier.

A council of war was held.

Charlie would fain have fought in the open again, believing that his trained troops, flushed with their recent victory, would be a match even for the army of the nizam.

But the rajah and the rest of the council, alarmed at the presence of the French troops, who had hitherto proved invincible against vastly superior forces of natives, shrank from such a course; and it was decided that they should content themselves with the defence of the town and castle.
Orders were accordingly issued that the old men, the women, and children should at once leave the town; and, under guard of one battalion of troops, take refuge in an almost impregnable hill fort some miles away.

One battalion was placed in garrison in the castle.
The other three, with the irregulars, took post in the town, whence they could, if necessary, retreat into the castle.
The day following the removal of the noncombatants the enemy appeared, coming down the valley, having marched over the hills; while the Mahratta cavalry again poured up from below.
Charlie had taken the command of the town, as it was against this that the efforts of the enemy would be first directed.