To Swartz he was gracious in speech, but the letter he entrusted to him was full of threatening for this and other acts which he considered aggressive; and the general impression brought back by the missionary was that a war was to be expected.
Hyder Ali had presented him with a bag of three hundred rupees for travelling expenses, which it would have been a great affront to return.
He, however, made it over to the Government at Madras, and when they would not take it, asked leave to use it as the foundation for a collection for an English orphan school at Tanjore.

This was granted, and proved a success.

Finding that there was an intention of voting a present to him, he begged instead that a salary might be given to Mr.
Pohle at Trichinopoly; and, in consequence, both were enabled to maintain catechists and schoolmasters; for of making a home for themselves, these devoted men never thought.

Moreover, Swartz obtained bricks and lime for the building of his English church within the fort; and he bought and enlarged a house half a mile from it, for his Malabar Christians to worship in.

His own observations of Hyder Ali's warlike intentions led also to his purchasing 12,000 bags of rice as a provision against the scarcity that too surely attends upon Indian warfare.
In the summer of 1780, these apprehensions were realized.