---
title: Tall, thick grass grew on the dam, and he pulled armfuls of this and… — The Punishment of the Stingy, and Other Indian S… · tree and pragmatics
description: Tall, thick grass grew on the dam, and he pulled armfuls of this and heaped it up, and then crawled under the pile to pass the night. Who acts: Tall thick grass, grass. A sentence of «The Punishment of the Stingy, and Other Indian Stories» by George Bird Grinnell, The Beaver Stick, with its dependen
---

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# The Punishment of the Stingy, and Other Indian Stories, The Beaver Stick, sentence 38

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Tall, thick grass grew on the dam, and he pulled armfuls of this and heaped it up, and then crawled under the pile to pass the night.

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**Who acts:** Tall thick grass, grass · **What happens:** grow, pull, heap up, crawl, pass · **To what, where:** dam, armfuls, pile

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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 (Tall thick grass, grass), 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:pg66596:17:38
# text = Tall, thick grass grew on the dam, and he pulled armfuls of this and heaped it up, and then crawled under the pile to pass the night.
1	Tall	tall	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	amod	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	1	punct	_	_
3	thick	thick	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	amod	_	_
4	grass	grass	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nsubj	_	_
5	grew	grow	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	on	on	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
7	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
8	dam	dam	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
10	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	12	cc	_	_
11	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	12	nsubj	_	_
12	pulled	pull	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	parataxis	_	_
13	armfuls	armful	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	12	obj	_	_
14	of	of	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
15	this	this	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	13	nmod	_	_
16	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	17	cc	_	_
17	heaped	heap	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	12	conj	_	_
18	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	17	obj	_	_
19	up	up	ADP	RP	_	17	compound:prt	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	23	punct	_	_
21	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	23	cc	_	_
22	then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	23	advmod	_	_
23	crawled	crawl	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	conj	_	_
24	under	under	ADP	IN	_	26	case	_	_
25	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	26	det	_	_
26	pile	pile	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	obl	_	_
27	to	to	PART	TO	_	28	mark	_	_
28	pass	pass	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	23	advcl	_	_
29	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	30	det	_	_
30	night	night	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	28	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **grow** | past | Tall thick grass |  |  | the dam |  |  | vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme on dam=Location |
| 2 | **pull** | past | grass | armfuls of this |  |  |  |  | vn push-12-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent armful=Theme |
| 3 | **heap up** | past | grass *not said here* | dam |  |  |  |  | vn spray-9.7-2 «NP V NP.theme»: agent=Agent it=Theme |
| 4 | **crawl** | past | Tall thick grass *not said here* |  |  | the pile | then |  | vn run-51.3.2 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme under pile=Trajectory |
| 5 | **pass** | to-infinitive | Tall thick grass *not said here* |  |  |  | night |  | vn occur-48.3-1 «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:** «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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