---
title: He tried to drive them away, but couldn’t. — Myths and Folk-lore of the Timiskaming Algonquin… · tree and pragmatics
description: He tried to drive them away, but couldn’t. Who acts: answer. A sentence of «Myths and Folk-lore of the Timiskaming Algonquin and Timagami Ojibwa» by Frank G. Speck, Wiske·djak Cycle., part 1, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Myths and Folk-lore of the Timiskaming Algonquin and Timagami Ojibwa, Wiske·djak Cycle., part 1, sentence 92

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He tried to drive them away, but couldn’t.

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**Who acts:** answer · **What happens:** try, drive away · **To what, where:** kinds

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This is a sentence of «Myths and Folk-lore of the Timiskaming Algonquin and Timagami Ojibwa» by Frank G. Speck, Wiske·djak Cycle., part 1. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (answer), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**Mova's own parse.** This tree may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg66509:5:92
# text = He tried to drive them away, but couldn’t.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	tried	try	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	to	to	PART	TO	_	4	mark	_	_
4	drive	drive	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	2	xcomp	_	_
5	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	obj	_	_
6	away	away	ADV	RB	_	4	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	_
8	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	9	cc	_	_
9	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	n’t	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	9	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **try** | past | answer |  |  |  |  |  | vn try-61.1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 2 | **drive away** *not said to happen* | to-infinitive | answer *not said here* | kinds *= kind* |  |  |  | away *property* | vn nonvehicle-51.4.2-1 «NP V PP»: agent=Theme they=Trajectory |

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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:** «Myths and Folk-lore of the Timiskaming Algonquin and Timagami Ojibwa» by Frank G. Speck, Project Gutenberg book 66509 (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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