---
title: On the top of the buoy the abbot placed a bell; and when the waves d… — Fifty Famous Stories Retold · tree and pragmatics
description: On the top of the buoy the abbot placed a bell; and when the waves dashed against it, the bell would ring out loud and clear. Who acts: abbot, waves, bell. A sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, The Inchcape Rock., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Fifty Famous Stories Retold, The Inchcape Rock., sentence 9

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On the top of the buoy the abbot placed a bell; and when the waves dashed against it, the bell would ring out loud and clear.

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**Who acts:** abbot, waves, bell · **What happens:** place, dash, ring out · **To what, where:** bell, top, buoy

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This is a sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, The Inchcape Rock.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (abbot, waves, bell), 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:pg18442:48:9
# text = On the top of the buoy the abbot placed a bell; and when the waves dashed against it, the bell would ring out loud and clear.
1	On	on	ADP	IN	_	3	case	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	top	top	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	obl	_	_
4	of	of	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	buoy	buoy	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	nmod	_	_
7	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
8	abbot	abbot	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	nsubj	_	_
9	placed	place	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
10	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
11	bell	bell	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	;	;	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
13	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	17	cc	_	_
14	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	17	advmod	_	_
15	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
16	waves	wave	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	17	nsubj	_	_
17	dashed	dash	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	9	conj	_	_
18	against	against	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
19	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	17	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	24	punct	_	_
21	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	22	det	_	_
22	bell	bell	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	24	nsubj	_	_
23	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	24	aux	_	_
24	ring	ring	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	9	parataxis	_	_
25	out	out	ADV	RB	_	24	advmod	_	_
26	loud	loud	ADV	RB	_	24	advmod	_	_
27	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	28	cc	_	_
28	clear	clear	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	24	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	9	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **place** | past | the abbot | a bell |  | the top of the buoy |  |  | vn put-9.1-2 «NP V PP.destination NP»: agent=Agent bell=Theme on top=Destination |
| 2 | **dash** | past | the waves |  |  | buoy |  |  | vn run-51.3.2-2 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme against it=Trajectory |
| 3 | **ring out** | would | the bell |  |  |  |  | loud, out *property* | vn sound\_emission-43.2 «NP V»: agent=Theme |

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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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