---
title: It was all he could do to keep from looking back for one last glimps… — The Punishment of the Stingy, and Other Indian S… · tree and pragmatics
description: It was all he could do to keep from looking back for one last glimpse of them. Who acts: power. A sentence of «The Punishment of the Stingy, and Other Indian Stories» by George Bird Grinnell, The Beaver Stick, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Punishment of the Stingy, and Other Indian Stories, The Beaver Stick, sentence 135

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It was all he could do to keep from looking back for one last glimpse of them.

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**Who acts:** power · **What happens:** do, keep, look back, glimpse · **To what, where:** all, beavers

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This is a sentence of «The Punishment of the Stingy, and Other Indian Stories» by George Bird Grinnell, The Beaver Stick. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (power), 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:pg66596:17:135
# text = It was all he could do to keep from looking back for one last glimpse of them.
1	It	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
2	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	3	cop	_	_
3	all	all	DET	DT	PronType=Tot	0	root	_	_
4	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	6	nsubj	_	_
5	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	6	aux	_	_
6	do	do	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	acl:relcl	_	_
7	to	to	PART	TO	_	8	mark	_	_
8	keep	keep	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	6	advcl	_	_
9	from	from	SCONJ	IN	_	10	mark	_	_
10	looking	look	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	8	xcomp	_	_
11	back	back	ADV	RB	_	10	advmod	_	_
12	for	for	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
13	one	one	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	15	nummod	_	_
14	last	last	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	15	amod	_	_
15	glimpse	glimpse	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obl	_	_
16	of	of	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
17	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **do** | could | power |  |  |  |  |  | vn act-114-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **keep** | to-infinitive | power *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **look back** | gerund | power *not said here* |  |  |  |  | for one last glimpse of beavers | vn rummage-35.5 «NP V PP.location PP.theme»: agent=Agent for glimpse=Theme |
| 5 | **glimpse** |  |  | beavers *= beaver* |  |  |  |  | nom glimpse «act transitive»: of=patient |

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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:** «The Punishment of the Stingy, and Other Indian Stories» by George Bird Grinnell, Project Gutenberg book 66596 (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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