1 Clemens answered Barnum’s letter of 18 February (see 3 Feb 75 to Barnum, n. 2). Barnum continued to save and send batches of “queer” letters, monthly, according to Clemens (17 Sept 75 to Wright), at least through the late 1870s. But only two such letters are known to survive, enclosed in letters to Clemens on 20 March 1876 (CU-MARK) and 29 November 1876 (NPV). The first, dated 4 March 1876, was from Helon Buck, of Crown Point Center, New York, who proposed that Barnum publish a book she had “been 13 years preparing . . . which I clame to carry more points than any book except the bible . . . which I claim wonderful wonderful in extreme & I have not the least doubt so you will say.” The second, dated 26 November 1876, was from M. L. Badger, of Worcester, Massachusetts, a thirty-three-year-old housekeeper “in despare & discoraged” and “allwase an admirer of Drameticks,” who wanted Barnum to get her an opportunity “to act on the stage or to ride in a Circus” or to introduce her to “some travling Gentelman that wantes a companon for the winter I will be verry devoted to any one that will be kinde to me for I am of an afectionate dispotion.” In his cover letter Barnum told Clemens: “You are the only ‘travling Gentelman’ whom I know.” Clemens apparently intended using these letters to Barnum in an article, but never did so.