some distinct association with the thorn-flowers, in which case he would have brought out the image full and separate, and not merely thrown it in as a make-weight to “thorn”—­and this is the great reason why epithets are, nine times out of ten, mistakes in song and ballad poetry; he never would have thought of “departed” before he thought of “joys.”  A very little consideration of the actual processes of thought in such a case, will show the truth of our observation, and the instinctive wisdom of the older song-writers, in putting the epithet as often as possible after the noun, instead of before it, even at the expense of grammar.  They are bad things at all times in song poetry, these epithets; and, accordingly, we find that the best German writers, like Uhland and Heine, get rid of them as much as possible, and succeed thereby, every word striking and ringing down with full force, no cushion of an epithet intruding between the reader’s brain-anvil and the poet’s hammer to break the blow.  In Uhland’s “Three Burschen,” if we recollect right, there are but two epithets, and those of the simplest descriptive kind:  “Thy fair daughter” and a “black pall.”  Were there more, we question whether the poet would have succeeded, as he has done, in making our flesh creep as he leads us on from line to line and verse to verse.  So Tennyson, the greatest of our living poets, eschews as much as possible, in his later writings, these same epithets, except in cases where they are themselves objective and pictorial—­in short, the very things which he wants you to look at, as, for instance: 

And into silver arrows break
The sailing moon in creek and cove.

This is fair enough; but, indeed, after laying down our rule, we must confess that it is very difficult to keep always true to it, in a language which does not, like the Latin and German, allow us to put our adjectives very much where we choose.  Nevertheless, whether we can avoid it or not, every time we place before the noun an epithet which, like “departed joys,” relates to our consciousness concerning the object, and not merely to the object itself; or an epithet which, like “flowery thorn,” gives us, before we get to the object itself, those accidents of the object which we only discern by a second look, by analysis and reflection—­(for the thorn, if in the flower, would look to us, at the first glance, not “flowery,” but “white,” “snowy,” or what you will which expresses colour, and not scientific fact)—­ every time, we repeat, this is done, the poet descends from the objective and dramatic domain of song, into the subjective and reflective one of elegy.