Irish Fairy Tales, Chapter VII. “What do you see?” Fionn demanded of the watcher, sentence 39

And they waited, looking no longer on that scarcely perceptible speck in the distance, but straining upon the eye of the watcher as though they would penetrate it and look through it.

Who acts: points · What happens: wait, look, strain, penetrate · To what, where: distance

This is a sentence of «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Chapter VII. “What do you see?” Fionn demanded of the watcher. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (points), 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	And	and	CCONJ	_	3 waited	cc
2	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	3 waited	nsubj
3	waited	wait	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
4	,	,	PUNCT	_	5 looking	punct
5	looking	look	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	3 waited	advcl
6	no	no	ADV	_	7 longer	advmod
7	longer	long	ADV	Degree=Cmp	5 looking	advmod
8	on	on	ADP	_	12 speck	case
9	that	that	PRON	Number=Sing PronType=Dem	12 speck	nsubj
10	scarcely	scarcely	ADJ	Degree=Pos	12 speck	amod
11	perceptible	perceptible	ADJ	Degree=Pos	12 speck	amod
12	speck	speck	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 looking	obl
13	in	in	ADP	_	15 distance	case
14	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	15 distance	det
15	distance	distance	NOUN	Number=Sing	12 speck	nmod
16	,	,	PUNCT	_	18 straining	punct
17	but	but	CCONJ	_	18 straining	cc
18	straining	strain	VERB	VerbForm=Ger	3 waited	advcl
19	upon	upon	ADP	_	21 eye	case
20	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	21 eye	det
21	eye	eye	NOUN	Number=Sing	18 straining	obl
22	of	of	ADP	_	24 watcher	case
23	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	24 watcher	det
24	watcher	watcher	NOUN	Number=Sing	21 eye	nmod
25	as	as	ADV	_	18 straining	advmod
26	though	though	SCONJ	_	29 penetrate	mark
27	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	29 penetrate	nsubj
28	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	29 penetrate	aux
29	penetrate	penetrate	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	18 straining	advcl
30	it	it	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	29 penetrate	obj
31	and	and	CCONJ	_	32 look	cc
32	look	look	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	29 penetrate	conj
33	through	through	ADP	_	34 it	case
34	it	it	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	32 look	obl
35	.	.	PUNCT	_	3 waited	punct

Pragmatics

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	other	roles by
1	wait	past	points = point			vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme
2	look	gerund	points = point not said here		on scarcely perceptible speck in the distance; long property	vn peer-30.3 «NP V PP.theme»: agent=Agent on speck=Theme
3	strain	gerund	points = point not said here		upon the eye of the watcher	vn wipe_manner-10.4.1 «NP V NP.source»: agent=Agent
4	penetrate	would	points = point	distance		vn poke-19 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent it=Patient
5	look	infinitive	points = point not said here		through distance	vn peer-30.3 «NP V PP.theme»: agent=Agent through it=Theme

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: «Irish Fairy Tales» by James Stephens, Project Gutenberg book 2892 (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/pg2892/54/39/