The Punishment of the Stingy, and Other Indian Stories, Bluejay, the Imitator, sentence 64
They tried to dive, but no matter how hard they might try their backs remained above the water.
Who acts: children · What happens: try, dive, remain · To what, where: backs, water
This is a sentence of «The Punishment of the Stingy, and Other Indian Stories» by George Bird Grinnell, Bluejay, the Imitator. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (children), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.
Mova's own parse. This tree 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 | 2 tried | nsubj |
| 2 | tried | try | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 3 | to | to | PART | _ | 4 dive | mark |
| 4 | dive | dive | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | 2 tried | xcomp |
| 5 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 10 hard | punct |
| 6 | but | but | CCONJ | _ | 10 hard | cc |
| 7 | no | no | DET | PronType=Neg | 8 matter | det |
| 8 | matter | matter | NOUN | Number=Sing | 10 hard | nsubj |
| 9 | how | how | ADV | PronType=Int | 10 hard | advmod |
| 10 | hard | hard | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 2 tried | parataxis |
| 11 | they | they | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs | 13 try | nsubj |
| 12 | might | might | AUX | VerbForm=Fin | 13 try | aux |
| 13 | try | try | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | 10 hard | ccomp |
| 14 | their | their | PRON | Case=Gen Number=Plur Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs | 15 backs | nmod:poss |
| 15 | backs | back | NOUN | Number=Plur | 13 try | obj |
| 16 | remained | remain | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | 13 try | xcomp |
| 17 | above | above | ADP | _ | 19 water | case |
| 18 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 19 water | det |
| 19 | water | water | NOUN | Number=Sing | 16 remained | obl |
| 20 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 2 tried | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | try | past | children = child | vn try-61.1 «NP V S_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality | |||||
| 2 | dive not said to happen | to-infinitive | children = child not said here | vn calibratable_cos-45.6.1-1 «NP.attribute V»: agent=Attribute | |||||
| 3 | try | might | children = child | children's backs | tree rules | ||||
| 4 | remain not said to happen | participle | children = child not said here | the water | vn exist-47.1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme above water=Location |
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 Punishment of the Stingy, and Other Indian Stories» by George Bird Grinnell, Project Gutenberg book 66596 (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/pg66596/5/64/