On the night of Talleyrand’s great ball for Napoleon and Josephine, the eyes of Rémi and Corinne meet across a crowded room: “He saw her catch her breath. The chocolate dropped from her fingers.

On the other hand, in his analysis of Book II of the Gallic Wars, Napoleon totally misses the fact that Caesar’s near disaster against the Nervi and other Belgic tribes on the Sambre in 57 BC was due ...