The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North, The Slave Boy, sentence 10
When any work was given him to do he was sure to spoil it; he could not be trusted, he seemed to be unfit for any duty.
Who acts: slave · What happens: give, do, be, spoil, not trust, seem · To what, where: work, slave
This is a sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, The Slave Boy. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (slave), 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 | When | when | SCONJ | _ | 5 given | mark |
| 2 | any | any | DET | PronType=Ind | 3 work | det |
| 3 | work | work | NOUN | Number=Sing | 5 given | nsubj:pass |
| 4 | was | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 5 given | aux:pass |
| 5 | given | give | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | 20 trusted | advcl |
| 6 | him | he | PRON | Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 5 given | iobj |
| 7 | to | to | PART | _ | 8 do | mark |
| 8 | do | do | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | 5 given | advcl |
| 9 | he | he | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 11 sure | nsubj |
| 10 | was | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 11 sure | cop |
| 11 | sure | sure | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 8 do | ccomp |
| 12 | to | to | PART | _ | 13 spoil | mark |
| 13 | spoil | spoil | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | 11 sure | xcomp |
| 14 | it | it | PRON | Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 13 spoil | obj |
| 15 | ; | ; | PUNCT | _ | 5 given | punct |
| 16 | he | he | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 20 trusted | nsubj:pass |
| 17 | could | could | AUX | VerbForm=Fin | 20 trusted | aux |
| 18 | not | not | PART | Polarity=Neg | 20 trusted | advmod |
| 19 | be | be | AUX | VerbForm=Inf | 20 trusted | aux:pass |
| 20 | trusted | trust | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | 23 seemed | advcl |
| 21 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 20 trusted | punct |
| 22 | he | he | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 23 seemed | nsubj |
| 23 | seemed | seem | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 24 | to | to | PART | _ | 26 unfit | mark |
| 25 | be | be | AUX | VerbForm=Inf | 26 unfit | cop |
| 26 | unfit | unfit | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 23 seemed | xcomp |
| 27 | for | for | ADP | _ | 29 duty | case |
| 28 | any | any | DET | PronType=Ind | 29 duty | det |
| 29 | duty | duty | NOUN | Number=Sing | 26 unfit | obl |
| 30 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 23 seemed | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | give | past · passive | any work | slave | vn give-13.1-1 «NP V NP-Dative NP»: subject=Recipient he=Theme | ||||
| 2 | do | to-infinitive | vn act-114-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent | ||||||
| 3 | is | past | slave | sure property | tree rules | ||||
| 4 | spoil | to-infinitive | slave not said here | work | tree rules | ||||
| 5 | not trust | could · passive | slave | vn conjecture-29.5-1 «NP V NP»: subject=Theme | |||||
| 6 | seem | past | slave | vn seem-109-1-1-1 «NP V S_INF»: agent=Theme | |||||
| 7 | is | to-infinitive | slave not said here | for any duty; unfit property | tree rules |
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 Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, Project Gutenberg book 66819 (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/pg66819/29/10/