Tanglewood Tales, The Pomegranate Seeds., part 2, sentence 39

He had a secret motive in this; for, you are to understand, it is a fixed law, that when persons are carried off to the land of magic, if they once taste any food there, they can never get back to their friends.

Who acts: sort, you, motive, persons · What happens: have, be, fix, carry off, taste, not get back · To what, where: secret motive, this, fixed law, that, land, food

This is a sentence of «Tanglewood Tales» by Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Pomegranate Seeds., part 2. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (sort, you, motive, persons), 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	He	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 had	nsubj
2	had	have	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	5 motive	det
4	secret	secret	ADJ	Degree=Pos	5 motive	amod
5	motive	motive	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 had	obj
6	in	in	ADP	_	7 this	case
7	this	this	PRON	Number=Sing PronType=Dem	2 had	obl
8	;	;	PUNCT	_	14 understand	punct
9	for	for	SCONJ	_	14 understand	mark
10	,	,	PUNCT	_	9 for	punct
11	you	you	PRON	Case=Nom Person=2 PronType=Prs	14 understand	nsubj
12	are	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=2 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	14 understand	cop
13	to	to	PART	_	14 understand	mark
14	understand	understand	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	2 had	parataxis
15	,	,	PUNCT	_	20 law	punct
16	it	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	20 law	nsubj
17	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	20 law	cop
18	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	20 law	det
19	fixed	fix	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	20 law	amod
20	law	law	NOUN	Number=Sing	14 understand	conj
21	,	,	PUNCT	_	26 carried	punct
22	that	that	PRON	Number=Sing PronType=Dem	26 carried	nsubj:pass
23	when	when	SCONJ	_	26 carried	mark
24	persons	person	NOUN	Number=Plur	26 carried	nsubj:pass
25	are	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	26 carried	aux:pass
26	carried	carry	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	14 understand	parataxis
27	off	off	ADP	_	26 carried	compound:prt
28	to	to	ADP	_	30 land	case
29	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	30 land	det
30	land	land	NOUN	Number=Sing	26 carried	obl
31	of	of	ADP	_	32 magic	case
32	magic	magic	NOUN	Number=Sing	30 land	nmod
33	,	,	PUNCT	_	37 taste	punct
34	if	if	SCONJ	_	37 taste	mark
35	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	37 taste	nsubj
36	once	once	ADV	NumForm=Word NumType=Mult	37 taste	advmod
37	taste	taste	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	26 carried	conj
38	any	any	DET	PronType=Ind	39 food	det
39	food	food	NOUN	Number=Sing	37 taste	obj
40	there	there	ADV	PronType=Dem	37 taste	advmod
41	,	,	PUNCT	_	45 get	punct
42	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	45 get	nsubj
43	can	can	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	45 get	aux
44	never	never	ADV	PronType=Neg	45 get	advmod
45	get	get	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	14 understand	parataxis
46	back	back	ADV	_	45 get	advmod
47	to	to	ADP	_	49 friends	case
48	their	their	PRON	Case=Gen Number=Plur Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	49 friends	nmod:poss
49	friends	friend	NOUN	Number=Plur	46 back	obl
50	.	.	PUNCT	_	2 had	punct

Pragmatics

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	where	other	roles by
1	have	past	sort	a secret motive	this		vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent motive=Patient
2	is	present	you			understand property	tree rules
3	fix	participle					vn shake-22.3-2 «NP V ADV-Middle»: agent=Patient
4	is a	present	motive	a fixed law			tree rules
5	carry off	present · passive		that	the land of magic		vn carry-11.4 «NP V NP PP.destination»: subject=Theme to land=Destination
6	taste a condition, not said to happen	present	persons = person	any food	there	once property	vn seem-109 «NP V ADJ»: agent=Theme food=Attribute
7	not get back	can	persons = person				vn comprehend-87.2-1 «NP V S_ING»: agent=Experiencer

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/pg976/21/39/