Having killed off Sherlock Holmes, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle turned his attention to a very different hero. Brigadier Etienne Gerard is an officer in Napoleon's army - recklessly brave, engagingly open-hearted, and unshakable, if not a little absurd, in his devotion to the enigmatic Emperor. Conan Doyle's wonderful stories about the Brigadier - all of which are collected here - are as funny as they are hair-raising, and the Brigadier himself has long since found a place in the hearts of his admirers second only to that of the incomparable Holmes.