---
title: In the dusk she could not make out what they were, and so she pointe… — Fifty Famous Stories Retold · tree and pragmatics
description: In the dusk she could not make out what they were, and so she pointed them out to one of the watch-men. Who acts: wife. A sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, The Black Douglas., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Fifty Famous Stories Retold, The Black Douglas., sentence 14

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In the dusk she could not make out what they were, and so she pointed them out to one of the watch-men.

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**Who acts:** wife · **What happens:** not make out, point out · **To what, where:** objects, one

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This is a sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, The Black Douglas.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (wife), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**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 {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg18442:13:14
# text = In the dusk she could not make out what they were, and so she pointed them out to one of the watch-men.
1	In	in	ADP	IN	_	3	case	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	dusk	dusk	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obl	_	_
4	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	nsubj	_	_
5	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	7	aux	_	_
6	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	7	advmod	_	_
7	make	make	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
8	out	out	ADP	RP	_	7	compound:prt	_	_
9	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	7	obj	_	_
10	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
11	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	9	acl:relcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
13	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	16	cc	_	_
14	so	so	ADV	RB	_	16	advmod	_	_
15	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	nsubj	_	_
16	pointed	point	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	parataxis	_	_
17	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	obj	_	_
18	out	out	ADP	RP	_	16	compound:prt	_	_
19	to	to	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
20	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	16	obl	_	_
21	of	of	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
22	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	25	det	_	_
23	watch	watch	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	23	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	men	man	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	20	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **not** **make out** | could | wife |  |  |  | dusk |  | vn sight-30.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer what=Stimulus |
| 2 | **point out** | past | wife | objects *= object* | one of the watch men |  |  |  | vn wink-40.3.1 «NP V NP PP.recipient»: agent=Agent they=Theme to one=Recipient |

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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.

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**Text:** «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, Project Gutenberg book 18442 (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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