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.