Chapters 6 and 7 Summary

Princess heaves-to and wallows in the falling darkness, while Hornblower, Meadows and Baddlestone put their plan into action. The French brig sends a prize crew to Princess. When the longboat arrives, Hornblower tells them to board. As they gain the deck they are knocked down and silenced, one by one, until all the men are captured. English sailors then drop quickly into the French longboat and kill the crew. Princess' boat is quickly launched and the two boats are filled with armed men. They row back to the French brig and board her—Hornblower muses that his boat is rowed nearly entirely by officers. The unsuspecting French ship is stormed by surprise and the thirty Englishmen quickly sweep the deck, killing about forty French sailors. Meadows charges the French captain, and as the Frenchman thrusts his rapier through Meadows' heart...