We’ve known of French plans to settle Australia after Napoleon, but this new book reveals that the Bonaparte himself was plotting to do so. The inspiration is bound up with one of history's greatest love stories - that of Napoleon and Josephine. The Empress Josephine was fascinated by all things Australian. In the gardens of her grand estate, Malmaison, she kept kangaroos, emus, black swans and other Australian animals, along with hundreds of native plants brought back by French explorers in peacetime. Napoleon, too, had an abiding interest in Australia, but for quite different reasons. What Britain and its Australian colonies did not know was that French explorers visiting these shores, purporting to be naturalists on scientific expeditions, were in fact spies, gathering vital information on the colony's defences. It was ripe for the picking. François Péron ,the zoologist in the expedition led by the French explorer in todays’ question, wrote a report for Napoleon on ways to invade and capture the British colony at Sydney Cove.