---
title: Perchance the birdie meant the avenger with the magic arrow, for the… — Old Indian Legends · tree and pragmatics
description: Perchance the birdie meant the avenger with the magic arrow, for there across the plain he strode. Who acts: Perchance. A sentence of «Old Indian Legends» by Zitkala-Sa, The Tree-bound, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg338/8/9/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [Old Indian Legends](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg338/) / [The Tree-bound](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg338/8/) / 9

# Old Indian Legends, The Tree-bound, sentence 9

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
Perchance the birdie meant the avenger with the magic arrow, for there across the plain he strode.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** Perchance · **What happens:** mean, stride · **To what, where:** avenger, plain

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Old Indian Legends» by Zitkala-Sa, The Tree-bound. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Perchance), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**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:pg338:8:9
# text = Perchance the birdie meant the avenger with the magic arrow, for there across the plain he strode.
1	Perchance	Perchance	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	birdie	birdie	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	1	appos	_	_
4	meant	mean	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	avenger	avenger	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obj	_	_
7	with	with	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
9	magic	magic	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	10	amod	_	_
10	arrow	arrow	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
12	for	for	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
13	there	there	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	4	parataxis	_	_
14	across	across	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
15	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
16	plain	plain	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obl	_	_
17	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	18	nsubj	_	_
18	strode	stride	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	16	acl:relcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **mean** | past | Perchance | the avenger |  |  |  | with the magic arrow | vn intend-61.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent avenger=Topic |
| 2 | **stride** | past | Perchance | the plain *not said here* |  |  |  |  | vn run-51.3.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme plain=Trajectory |

<!-- .note -->
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.

<!-- div src -->

**Text:** «Old Indian Legends» by Zitkala-Sa, Project Gutenberg book 338 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg338/8/8/)
- next →: [sentence 10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg338/8/10/)
- ↑ back to [The Tree-bound](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg338/8/)