---
title: He sat down upon the white sand and pondered upon the troubles that… — The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North · tree and pragmatics
description: He sat down upon the white sand and pondered upon the troubles that confronted him. Who acts: plan, troubles. A sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, The Unfinished Boat, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North, The Unfinished Boat, sentence 124

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He sat down upon the white sand and pondered upon the troubles that confronted him.

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**Who acts:** plan, troubles · **What happens:** sit down, ponder, confront · **To what, where:** white sand, plan

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This is a sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, The Unfinished Boat. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (plan, troubles), 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:pg66819:13:124
# text = He sat down upon the white sand and pondered upon the troubles that confronted him.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	sat	sit	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	down	down	ADV	RB	_	2	advmod	_	_
4	upon	upon	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
6	white	white	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	7	amod	_	_
7	sand	sand	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obl	_	_
8	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	9	cc	_	_
9	pondered	ponder	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
10	upon	upon	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	troubles	trouble	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	9	obl	_	_
13	that	that	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	14	nsubj	_	_
14	confronted	confront	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	12	acl:relcl	_	_
15	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	14	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **sit down** | past | plan |  |  | the white sand |  | down *property* | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent upon sand=Location |
| 2 | **ponder** | past | plan *not said here* |  |  |  |  | upon the troubles | vn focus-87.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **confront** | past | the troubles | plan |  |  |  |  | vn confront-98 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent he=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 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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