Tanglewood Tales, The Golden Fleece., part 2, sentence 46

Since the king had chosen to ask him the question, and since Jason had promised him an answer, there was no right way save to tell him precisely what would be the most prudent thing to do, if he had his worst enemy in his power.

Who acts: Jason · What happens: choose, ask, promise, be, tell, do · To what, where: king, question, answer, Jason, prudent thing, worst enemy · Speech: someone speaks here

This is a sentence of «Tanglewood Tales» by Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Golden Fleece., 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 (Jason), 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	Since	since	SCONJ	_	5 chosen	mark
2	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	3 king	det
3	king	king	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 chosen	nsubj:pass
4	had	have	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	5 chosen	aux
5	chosen	choose	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	26 save	advcl
6	to	to	PART	_	7 ask	mark
7	ask	ask	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	5 chosen	advcl
8	him	he	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	7 ask	obj
9	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	10 question	det
10	question	question	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 ask	obj
11	,	,	PUNCT	_	16 promised	punct
12	and	and	CCONJ	_	16 promised	cc
13	since	since	ADP	_	14 Jason	case
14	Jason	Jason	PROPN	Number=Sing	16 promised	obl
15	had	have	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	16 promised	aux
16	promised	promise	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part	5 chosen	parataxis
17	him	he	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	16 promised	iobj
18	an	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	19 answer	det
19	answer	answer	NOUN	Number=Sing	16 promised	obj
20	,	,	PUNCT	_	22 was	punct
21	there	there	PRON	PronType=Dem	22 was	expl
22	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	26 save	cop
23	no	no	DET	PronType=Neg	25 way	det
24	right	right	ADJ	Degree=Pos	25 way	amod
25	way	way	NOUN	Number=Sing	26 save	obl:unmarked
26	save	save	VERB	Mood=Imp VerbForm=Fin	root	root
27	to	to	PART	_	28 tell	mark
28	tell	tell	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	26 save	xcomp
29	him	he	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	28 tell	iobj
30	precisely	precisely	ADV	_	28 tell	advmod
31	what	what	PRON	PronType=Int	37 thing	nsubj
32	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	37 thing	aux
33	be	be	AUX	VerbForm=Inf	37 thing	cop
34	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	37 thing	det
35	most	most	ADV	Degree=Sup	36 prudent	advmod
36	prudent	prudent	ADJ	Degree=Pos	37 thing	amod
37	thing	thing	NOUN	Number=Sing	28 tell	ccomp
38	to	to	PART	_	39 do	mark
39	do	do	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	37 thing	acl
40	,	,	PUNCT	_	43 had	punct
41	if	if	SCONJ	_	43 had	mark
42	he	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	43 had	nsubj
43	had	have	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	26 save	parataxis
44	his	his	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	46 enemy	nmod:poss
45	worst	bad	ADJ	Degree=Sup	46 enemy	amod
46	enemy	enemy	NOUN	Number=Sing	43 had	obj
47	in	in	ADP	_	49 power	case
48	his	his	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	49 power	nmod:poss
49	power	power	NOUN	Number=Sing	43 had	obl
50	.	.	PUNCT	_	26 save	punct

Pragmatics

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	choose	past · perfect · passive		the king					vn get-13.5.1 «NP V NP»: subject=Theme
2	ask speech: ask	to-infinitive		the question	king				tree rules
3	promise speech: promise	past · perfect		a answer	Jason		since Jason		vn future_having-13.3 «NP V NP.goal NP»: agent=Agent he=Goal answer=Theme
4	is	past						no right way obl:unmarked; save property	tree rules
5	tell speech: assert	to-infinitive			Jason			precisely property	vn transfer_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent he=Recipient
6	is a	would		the prudent thing					tree rules
7	do	to-infinitive							vn act-114-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent
8	have a condition, not said to happen	past	Jason	Jason's worst enemy		Jason's power			vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent enemy=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: «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/pg976/26/46/