"My family stock is increasin', while other folks' seems to run short. I've got a right smart of a family--it's one of the old-fashioned sort: There's Ichabod, Isaac, and Israel, a-workin' away on the farm-- They do 'bout as much as one good boy, and make things go off like a charm. There's Moses and Aaron are sly ones, and slip like a couple of eels; But they're tol'able steady in one thing--they al'ays git round to their meals. There's Peter is busy inventin' (though _what_ he invents I can't see), And Joseph is studyin' medicine--and both of 'em boardin' with me. There's Abram and Albert is married, each workin' my farm for myself, And Sam smashed his nose at a shootin', and so he is laid on the shelf. The rest of the boys are all growin', 'cept this little runt, which is Jim, And I thought that perhaps I'd be makin' an editor outen o' him. "He ain't no great shakes for to labor, though I've labored with him a good deal, And give him some strappin' good arguments I know he couldn't help but to feel; But he's built out of second-growth timber, and nothin' about him is big Exceptin' his appetite only, and there he's as good as a pig. I keep him a-carryin' luncheons, and fillin' and bringin' the jugs, And take him among the pertatoes, and set him to pickin' the bugs; And then there is things to be doin' a-helpin' the women indoors; There's churnin' and washin' of dishes, and other descriptions of chores; But he don't take to nothin' but victuals, and he'll never be much, I'm afraid, So I thought it would be a good notion to larn him the editor's trade. His body's too small for a farmer, his judgment is rather too slim, But I thought we perhaps could be makin' an editor outen o' him! "It ain't much to get up a paper--it wouldn't take him long for to learn; He could feed the machine, I'm thinkin', with a good strappin' fellow to turn. And things that was once hard in doin', is easy enough now to do; Just keep your eye on your machinery, and crack your arrangements right through. I used for to wonder at readin' and where it was got up, and how; But 'tis most of it made by machinery--I can see it all plain enough now. And poetry, too, is constructed by machines of different designs, Each one with a gauge and a chopper to see to the length of the lines; And I hear a New York clairvoyant is runnin' one sleeker than grease, And _a-rentin'_ her heaven-born productions at a couple of dollars apiece; An' since the whole trade has growed easy, 'twould be easy enough, I've a whim, If you was agreed, to be makin' an editor outen of Jim!"