Whenever a mysterious oddity arrived readers knew there was one man they could rely on to be at the scene: Frank Buckland.

Rescued after a century of obscurity, and culled from thousands of pages of Buckland’s eyewitness accounts, is the latest volume in Paul Collins’s Collins Library series.

The following is an excerpt from the book, which brings back to life 18 tales from one of the most curious men of all.

Immediately on viewing it, I exclaimed, “Julia Pastrana!”

“Yes, sir,” said the proprietor of the exhibition; “it is Julia Pastrana.”