Book Description
Flying Colours is a novel in the Horatio Hornblower series by C. S. Forester, following immediately after A Ship of the Line.Royal Navy Captain Hornblower is a prisoner of war of the Spanish in the Napoleonic Wars (the circumstances of his capture being covered at the end of A Ship of the Line). While being taken to Paris to be tried (and executed) on the trumped up charge of piracy, he, Lieutenant Bush and seaman Brown escape. They find shelter for the winter with the Comte de Graçay and his widowed daughter-in-law Marie, despite the Comte having lost all three of his sons fighting for France. During their stay, Hornblower has an affair with Marie.