Barnum’s genius for astute showmanship never was displayed to greater advantage than when he harnessed his caravan to the church by the straps of his personal piety; since his piety was sincere and his show carefully moral throughout, his plea for moral support was responded to with enthusiasm by a large body of clergymen and churchgoers, who admired solemnly Barnum’s personal virtues and giggled contentedly at the antics of his clowns. This admiration for him and his enterprise, which was based psychologically on Barnum’s own continual reiterations of his own merits and those of his show, was often productive of personal results. In his advance notes for 1879 Barnum wrote: “One charming old lady in Boston, with a troop of happy grandchildren in her train, shook me cordially by the hand and, with a face beaming with smiles, said to me: ‘Oh, Mr. Barnum, I don’t know how to thank you enough for the pleasure you have afforded these darlings. I never saw them so happy before in all their lives; and they have learned so much in your delightful Museum and wonderful Menagerie. It is better than all the books in Natural History they ever read. I enjoyed it too; I shall never forget this day as long as I live; neither will they. I tell you, Mr. Barnum, you are doing a great deal of good. You deserve canonizing more than many of the saints. God bless you!’ and with another shake of the hand she left me, surrounded by her happy charge.” Even granting the possibility that this particular old lady of Boston was a mythical press agent figure, the incident recorded is one that must have occurred to him often.