Yet the vocation of a newspaper editor is a useful and indispensable, and, if rightly exercised, a noble vocation. It possesses this essential element of dignity--that they who are engaged in it are occupied with questions of the highest importance to the happiness of mankind. We cannot see, for our part, why it should not attract men of the first talents and the most exalted virtues. Why should not the discussions of the daily press demand as strong reasoning powers, as large and comprehensive ideas, as profound an acquaintance with principles, eloquence as commanding, and a style of argument as manly and elevated, as the debates of the Senate?
Once established in full charge of the _Evening Post_, with a capable lieutenant, he was able to make rapid, far-reaching, and profitable improvements in the form of the journal. In 1829 it was still closely akin to the _Evening Post_ of 1801--four pages of six columns each, much smaller than newspaper pages of to-day, dingily printed and ineffectively made up. When he left for Europe five years later the four pages had seven columns each, and were much larger than present-day pages--great blanket papers. Old John Randolph of Roanoke wrote Bryant complaining that these expansive sheets crinkled so badly in the mail that he had to have his housekeeper iron them out. But the results of the enlargement were an enhanced revenue from advertisements, and a rise of the subscription list, at $10 a year, above 2,000. In 1834 the management boasted that the journal had never been in a more prosperous condition, and that not three other papers in the city were so productive. The whole number of employees, including those in the mechanical departments, was then thirty.
When Bryant wrote his wife in 1826 that the _Evening Post’s_ profits were $30,000 a year, he overestimated them; its gross receipts were only that much. But Bryant’s share in the newspaper, which was at first one-eighth, which in 1830 became one-fourth, in 1832 was one-third of seven-eighths, and in 1833 was a full third, sufficed to free him from all money cares at once, and within a short time to make him prosperous. The journal’s books were balanced each year on Nov. 16, the anniversary of its founding. On that date in 1829, it was found that the net profits were $10,544, of which Bryant’s one-eighth made $1,318.04. The next year the net profits had risen to $13,466, and Bryant’s quarter share was $3,366.51. In 1831 there was a further increase to $14,429, making Bryant’s income $3,507.24. A heavy slump occurred the following twelvemonth, cutting the net profits to $10,220, and the poet’s share to $2,980.99, but this was only temporary. For the half-year alone ending May 16, 1833--the figures for the full year are lost--the profits were $6,000.35, making Bryant’s income for six months exactly $2,000; and for the full year which closed Nov. 16, 1834, his one-third share yielded no less than $4,646.20. In those days an income of $4,000 or above was handsome, and Bryant was able to sail in the summer of 1834 with a full purse.