Tanglewood Tales, The Dragon's Teeth., part 4, sentence 10
Before Cadmus could reach the spot, this pitiless reptile had killed his poor companions, and was busily devouring them, making but a mouthful of each man.
Who acts: Cadmus · What happens: reach, kill, devour, make · To what, where: spot, pitiless reptile, companions
This is a sentence of «Tanglewood Tales» by Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Dragon's Teeth., part 4. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Cadmus), 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 | Before | before | SCONJ | _ | 4 reach | mark |
| 2 | Cadmus | Cadmus | PROPN | Number=Sing | 4 reach | nsubj |
| 3 | could | could | AUX | VerbForm=Fin | 4 reach | aux |
| 4 | reach | reach | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | root | root |
| 5 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 6 spot | det |
| 6 | spot | spot | NOUN | Number=Sing | 4 reach | obj |
| 7 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 12 killed | punct |
| 8 | this | this | DET | Number=Sing PronType=Dem | 10 reptile | det |
| 9 | pitiless | pitiless | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 10 reptile | amod |
| 10 | reptile | reptile | NOUN | Number=Sing | 12 killed | nsubj:pass |
| 11 | had | have | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 12 killed | aux |
| 12 | killed | kill | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | 4 reach | conj |
| 13 | his | his | PRON | Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs | 15 companions | nmod:poss |
| 14 | poor | poor | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 15 companions | amod |
| 15 | companions | companion | NOUN | Number=Plur | 12 killed | obj |
| 16 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 20 devouring | punct |
| 17 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 20 devouring | cc |
| 18 | was | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 20 devouring | aux |
| 19 | busily | busily | ADV | _ | 20 devouring | advmod |
| 20 | devouring | devour | VERB | Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part | 4 reach | advcl |
| 21 | them | they | PRON | Case=Acc Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs | 20 devouring | obj |
| 22 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 23 making | punct |
| 23 | making | make | VERB | Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part | 20 devouring | conj |
| 24 | but | but | CCONJ | _ | 26 mouthful | cc |
| 25 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 26 mouthful | det |
| 26 | mouthful | mouthful | NOUN | Number=Sing | 23 making | conj |
| 27 | of | of | ADP | _ | 29 man | case |
| 28 | each | each | DET | PronType=Tot | 29 man | det |
| 29 | man | man | NOUN | Number=Sing | 26 mouthful | nmod |
| 30 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 4 reach | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | reach | could | Cadmus | the spot | vn body_motion-49.2-1-1 «NP V NP ADV»: agent=Agent spot=Theme | ||||
| 2 | kill | past · perfect · passive | this pitiless reptile | vn amuse-31.1 «NP V NP ADJ»: subject=Experiencer companion=Result | |||||
| 3 | devour | past · progressive | Cadmus not said here | companions = companion | busily property | vn devour-39.4 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent they=Patient | |||
| 4 | make | gerund | Cadmus not said here | vn build-26.1-1 «NP.asset V NP»: agent=Asset |
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: «Tanglewood Tales» by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Project Gutenberg book 976 (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/pg976/13/10/