The Brown Fairy Book, The Brown Fairy Book, part 17, sentence 88

To make matters worse, the wind was rising too, and it was quite plain that in a few hours the ship would be dashed to pieces and everybody would be drowned, when suddenly the form of a mermaid was seen dancing on the waves which threatened every moment to overwhelm them.

Who acts: wind, form, waves · What happens: make, rise, be, dash, drown, see · To what, where: matters, ship, everybody, form, waves, mermaid

This is a sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brown Fairy Book, part 17. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (wind, form, waves), 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	To	to	PART	_	2 make	mark
2	make	make	VERB	Mood=Imp VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	matters	matter	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 make	obj
4	worse	bad	ADJ	Degree=Cmp	2 make	xcomp
5	,	,	PUNCT	_	9 rising	punct
6	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	7 wind	det
7	wind	wind	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 rising	nsubj
8	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	9 rising	aux
9	rising	rise	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	2 make	advcl
10	too	too	ADV	_	9 rising	advmod
11	,	,	PUNCT	_	16 plain	punct
12	and	and	CCONJ	_	16 plain	cc
13	it	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	16 plain	nsubj
14	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	16 plain	cop
15	quite	quite	ADV	_	16 plain	advmod
16	plain	plain	ADJ	Degree=Pos	2 make	parataxis
17	that	that	SCONJ	_	26 dashed	mark
18	in	in	ADP	_	21 hours	case
19	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	21 hours	det
20	few	few	ADJ	Degree=Pos	21 hours	amod
21	hours	hour	NOUN	Number=Plur	26 dashed	obl
22	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	23 ship	det
23	ship	ship	NOUN	Number=Sing	26 dashed	nsubj:pass
24	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	26 dashed	aux
25	be	be	AUX	VerbForm=Inf	26 dashed	aux:pass
26	dashed	dash	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	16 plain	advcl
27	to	to	ADP	_	28 pieces	case
28	pieces	piece	NOUN	Number=Plur	26 dashed	obl
29	and	and	CCONJ	_	33 drowned	cc
30	everybody	everybody	PRON	Number=Sing PronType=Tot	33 drowned	nsubj:pass
31	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	33 drowned	aux
32	be	be	AUX	VerbForm=Inf	33 drowned	aux:pass
33	drowned	drown	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	26 dashed	conj
34	,	,	PUNCT	_	43 seen	punct
35	when	when	SCONJ	_	43 seen	mark
36	suddenly	suddenly	ADV	_	38 form	advmod
37	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	38 form	det
38	form	form	NOUN	Number=Sing	43 seen	nsubj:pass
39	of	of	ADP	_	41 mermaid	case
40	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	41 mermaid	det
41	mermaid	mermaid	NOUN	Number=Sing	38 form	nmod
42	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	43 seen	aux:pass
43	seen	see	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	16 plain	parataxis
44	dancing	dance	VERB	VerbForm=Ger	43 seen	xcomp
45	on	on	ADP	_	47 waves	case
46	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	47 waves	det
47	waves	wave	NOUN	Number=Plur	44 dancing	obl
48	which	which	PRON	PronType=Rel	49 threatened	nsubj
49	threatened	threaten	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	47 waves	acl:relcl
50	every	every	DET	PronType=Tot	51 moment	det
51	moment	moment	NOUN	Number=Sing	49 threatened	obj
52	to	to	PART	_	53 overwhelm	mark
53	overwhelm	overwhelm	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	51 moment	acl
54	them	they	PRON	Case=Acc Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	53 overwhelm	obj
55	.	.	PUNCT	_	2 make	punct

Pragmatics

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	make	to-infinitive		matters			bad property	vn build-26.1-1 «NP.asset V NP»: agent=Asset matter=Product
2	rise	past · progressive	the wind					vn assuming_position-50 «NP V»: agent=Agent
3	is	past	wind				plain property	tree rules
4	dash	would · passive		the ship		hour	to pieces result	vn hit-18.1 «NP V NP PP.result»: subject=Patient to piece=Result
5	drown	would · passive		everybody				vn poison-42.2 «NP V NP»: subject=Patient
6	see	past · passive		the form of a mermaid				tree rules
7	dance	gerund	the form of a mermaid not said here		the waves			vn modes_of_being_with_motion-47.3 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme on wave=Location
8	threaten	past	the waves			moment		vn amuse-31.1 «NP V ADV-Middle»: agent=Experiencer
9	overwhelm	to-infinitive	the waves not said here	waves = wave				vn amuse-31.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Stimulus they=Experiencer
10	form			a mermaid				nom form «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: «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 3282 (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/pg3282/17/88/