---
title: And all the while, he kept muttering harshly the spells and charms w… — The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North · tree and pragmatics
description: And all the while, he kept muttering harshly the spells and charms which none but smiths and skilful wizards understand. Who acts: Smith, none. A sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, The Caldron, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North, The Caldron, sentence 58

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And all the while, he kept muttering harshly the spells and charms which none but smiths and skilful wizards understand.

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**Who acts:** Smith, none · **What happens:** keep, mutter, understand · **To what, where:** spells

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This is a sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, The Caldron. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Smith, none), 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:pg66819:10:58
# text = And all the while, he kept muttering harshly the spells and charms which none but smiths and skilful wizards understand.
1	And	and	CCONJ	CC	_	7	cc	_	_
2	all	all	DET	PDT	PronType=Tot	4	det:predet	_	_
3	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
4	while	while	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	mark	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	_
6	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	nsubj	_	_
7	kept	keep	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
8	muttering	mutter	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	7	xcomp	_	_
9	harshly	harshly	ADV	RB	_	11	advmod	_	_
10	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
11	spells	spell	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	8	obj	_	_
12	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
13	charms	charm	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	11	conj	_	_
14	which	which	DET	WDT	PronType=Int	15	det	_	_
15	none	none	PRON	NN	PronType=Neg	21	nsubj	_	_
16	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	17	cc	_	_
17	smiths	smith	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	15	conj	_	_
18	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	20	cc	_	_
19	skilful	skilful	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	20	amod	_	_
20	wizards	wizard	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	15	conj	_	_
21	understand	understand	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	11	acl:relcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **keep** | past | Smith |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **mutter** *speech: assert* | gerund | Smith *not said here* | the spells and charms |  |  |  |  | vn manner\_speaking-37.3 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent spell=Topic |
| 3 | **understand** | present | none  smiths  skilful wizards |  |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Experiencer |

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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 Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, Project Gutenberg book 66819 (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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