Tanglewood Tales, Circe's Palace., part 1, sentence 84

So plaintively intelligent was the sound, that it seemed as if the little creature were going to break its heart with some mighty secret that it had to tell, and only this one poor note to tell it with.

Who acts: it, little creature, sound, this · What happens: be, seem, go, break, have, tell · To what, where: heart, sound · Speech: someone speaks here

This is a sentence of «Tanglewood Tales» by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Circe's Palace., part 1. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (it, little creature, sound, this), 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	So	so	ADV	_	3 intelligent	advmod
2	plaintively	plaintively	ADV	_	3 intelligent	advmod
3	intelligent	intelligent	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root
4	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	3 intelligent	cop
5	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	6 sound	det
6	sound	sound	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 was	nsubj
7	,	,	PUNCT	_	10 seemed	punct
8	that	that	SCONJ	_	10 seemed	mark
9	it	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	10 seemed	nsubj
10	seemed	seem	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	3 intelligent	parataxis
11	as	as	SCONJ	_	17 going	mark
12	if	if	SCONJ	_	17 going	mark
13	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	15 creature	det
14	little	little	ADJ	Degree=Pos	15 creature	amod
15	creature	creature	NOUN	Number=Sing	17 going	nsubj
16	were	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	17 going	aux
17	going	go	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	10 seemed	xcomp
18	to	to	PART	_	19 break	mark
19	break	break	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	17 going	xcomp
20	its	its	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	21 heart	nmod:poss
21	heart	heart	NOUN	Number=Sing	19 break	obj
22	with	with	ADP	_	25 secret	case
23	some	some	DET	PronType=Ind	25 secret	det
24	mighty	mighty	ADJ	Degree=Pos	25 secret	amod
25	secret	secret	NOUN	Number=Sing	19 break	obl
26	that	that	SCONJ	_	28 had	mark
27	it	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	28 had	nsubj
28	had	have	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	19 break	advcl
29	to	to	PART	_	30 tell	mark
30	tell	tell	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	28 had	xcomp
31	,	,	PUNCT	_	37 note	punct
32	and	and	CCONJ	_	37 note	cc
33	only	only	ADV	_	37 note	advmod
34	this	this	PRON	Number=Sing PronType=Dem	37 note	nsubj
35	one	one	NUM	NumForm=Word NumType=Card	37 note	nummod
36	poor	poor	ADJ	Degree=Pos	37 note	amod
37	note	note	NOUN	Number=Sing	10 seemed	obl
38	to	to	PART	_	39 tell	mark
39	tell	tell	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	37 note	acl
40	it	it	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	39 tell	obj
41	with	with	ADP	_	39 tell	obl
42	.	.	PUNCT	_	3 intelligent	punct

Pragmatics

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	other	roles by
1	is	past				intelligent, plaintively property	tree rules
2	seem	past	it				vn seem-109-1-1-1 «NP V S_INF»: agent=Theme clause=Attribute
3	go a condition, not said to happen	past · progressive	the little creature				vn say-37.7 «NP V S-Quote»: agent=Agent clause=Topic
4	break	to-infinitive	the little creature not said here	sound's heart		with some mighty secret	vn break-45.1 «NP V NP PP.instrument»: agent=Agent heart=Patient with secret=Instrument
5	have	past	sound				tree rules
6	tell speech: assert	to-infinitive	sound not said here				vn transfer_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent
7	note		this				tree rules
8	tell speech: assert	to-infinitive			sound		vn transfer_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent it=Recipient

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.

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