Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen, The Wild Swans, part 1, sentence 45

They were not writing lines and letters, as they used to do; but descriptions of the noble deeds they had performed, and of all they had discovered and seen.

Who acts: insects · What happens: not write, use, do, perform, discover, see · To what, where: lines, descriptions, all, noble deeds

This is a sentence of «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, The Wild Swans, part 1. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (insects), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

Parsed by Mova, not checked by a teacher. This tree is Mova's own parse (the en model, on the CPU, when the site is built); it may be wrong.

The tree

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	They	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	4 writing	nsubj
2	were	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	4 writing	aux
3	not	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	4 writing	advmod
4	writing	write	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	root	root
5	lines	line	NOUN	Number=Plur	4 writing	obj
6	and	and	CCONJ	_	7 letters	cc
7	letters	letter	NOUN	Number=Plur	5 lines	conj
8	,	,	PUNCT	_	11 used	punct
9	as	as	SCONJ	_	11 used	mark
10	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	11 used	nsubj
11	used	use	VERB	Mood=Ind Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	4 writing	parataxis
12	to	to	PART	_	13 do	mark
13	do	do	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	11 used	xcomp
14	;	;	PUNCT	_	23 performed	punct
15	but	but	CCONJ	_	23 performed	cc
16	descriptions	description	NOUN	Number=Plur	23 performed	nsubj:pass
17	of	of	ADP	_	20 deeds	case
18	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	20 deeds	det
19	noble	noble	ADJ	Degree=Pos	20 deeds	amod
20	deeds	deed	NOUN	Number=Plur	16 descriptions	nmod
21	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	23 performed	nsubj
22	had	have	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	23 performed	aux
23	performed	perform	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	11 used	conj
24	,	,	PUNCT	_	30 discovered	punct
25	and	and	CCONJ	_	30 discovered	cc
26	of	of	ADP	_	27 all	case
27	all	all	DET	PronType=Tot	30 discovered	nsubj:pass
28	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	30 discovered	nsubj
29	had	have	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	30 discovered	aux
30	discovered	discover	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	23 performed	parataxis
31	and	and	CCONJ	_	32 seen	cc
32	seen	see	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	30 discovered	conj
33	.	.	PUNCT	_	4 writing	punct

Pragmatics

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	roles by
1	not write	past · progressive	insects = insect	lines and letters	vn scribble-25.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent line=Theme
2	use	past	insects = insect		vn use-105.1 «NP V NP S_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality
3	do	to-infinitive	insects = insect not said here		vn act-114-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent
4	perform	past · perfect · passive		descriptions of the noble deeds	vn performance-26.7 «NP V NP»: subject=Theme
5	discover	past · perfect · passive		all	vn discover-84-1 «NP V NP»: subject=Topic
6	see	participle			vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Experiencer
7	describe			the noble deeds	nom description «communication transitive»: of=patient

One row per clause the reader finds. «not said here»: a role filled from the clause above. «roles by»: a VerbNet class and frame when one fits the verb, else the reader's rules on the tree.

Text: «Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen» by H. C. Andersen, Project Gutenberg book 27200 (public domain in the USA). Tree: Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. Frames: Mova's frames reader (prag), the chapter read in order.

This page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg27200/208/45/