Gleanings from Chinese folklore, An Appreciation of Nellie N. Russell, sentence 10

Her great dark eyes were at some times like deep wells at the bottom of which truth lay, at others like stars emitting a tender light, and at others like hot coals flashing fires of generous and righteous wrath.

Who acts: great dark eyes, times, stars, hot coals · What happens: be, lay, emit, flash, fire · To what, where: others, tender light, fires, generous wrath

This is a sentence of «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, An Appreciation of Nellie N. Russell. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (great dark eyes, times, stars, hot coals), 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	Her	her	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Fem Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	4 eyes	nmod:poss
2	great	great	ADJ	Degree=Pos	4 eyes	amod
3	dark	dark	ADJ	Degree=Pos	4 eyes	amod
4	eyes	eye	NOUN	Number=Plur	8 times	nsubj
5	were	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	8 times	cop
6	at	at	ADP	_	8 times	case
7	some	some	DET	PronType=Ind	8 times	det
8	times	time	NOUN	Number=Plur	18 lay	nsubj
9	like	like	ADP	_	11 wells	case
10	deep	deep	ADJ	Degree=Pos	11 wells	amod
11	wells	well	NOUN	Number=Plur	8 times	nmod
12	at	at	ADP	_	14 bottom	case
13	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	14 bottom	det
14	bottom	bottom	NOUN	Number=Sing	11 wells	nmod
15	of	of	ADP	_	17 truth	case
16	which	which	DET	PronType=Int	17 truth	det
17	truth	truth	NOUN	Number=Sing	14 bottom	nmod
18	lay	lay	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
19	,	,	PUNCT	_	21 others	punct
20	at	at	ADP	_	21 others	case
21	others	other	NOUN	Number=Plur	18 lay	obl
22	like	like	ADP	_	23 stars	case
23	stars	star	NOUN	Number=Plur	21 others	nmod
24	emitting	emit	VERB	VerbForm=Ger	23 stars	acl
25	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	27 light	det
26	tender	tender	ADJ	Degree=Pos	27 light	amod
27	light	light	NOUN	Number=Sing	24 emitting	obj
28	,	,	PUNCT	_	31 others	punct
29	and	and	CCONJ	_	31 others	cc
30	at	at	ADP	_	31 others	case
31	others	other	NOUN	Number=Plur	18 lay	obl
32	like	like	ADP	_	34 coals	case
33	hot	hot	ADJ	Degree=Pos	34 coals	amod
34	coals	coal	NOUN	Number=Plur	31 others	nmod
35	flashing	flash	VERB	VerbForm=Ger	34 coals	acl
36	fires	fire	NOUN	Number=Plur	35 flashing	obj
37	of	of	ADP	_	41 wrath	case
38	generous	generous	ADJ	Degree=Pos	41 wrath	amod
39	and	and	CCONJ	_	40 righteous	cc
40	righteous	righteous	ADJ	Degree=Pos	38 generous	conj
41	wrath	wrath	NOUN	Number=Sing	36 fires	nmod
42	.	.	PUNCT	_	18 lay	punct

Pragmatics

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	past	Nellie's great dark eyes			at some times	like deep wells at the bottom of which truth	tree rules
2	lay	present	some times		others like stars		at others like hot coals	vn put_spatial-9.2 «NP V NP PP.destination»: agent=Agent at other=Destination
3	emit	gerund	stars not said here	a tender light				vn substance_emission-43.4 «NP V NP»: agent=Source light=Theme
4	flash	gerund	hot coals not said here	fires of generous wrath				vn light_emission-43.1 «NP V NP.theme»: agent=Agent fire=Theme
5	fire			generous wrath				nom fire «event 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: «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, Project Gutenberg book 75089 (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/pg75089/2/10/

🌲 Gleanings from Chinese folklore, An Appreciation of Nellie N. Russell, sentence 10

The tree

Pragmatics

Gleanings from Chinese folklore, An Appreciation of Nellie N. Russell, sentence 10