---
title: The cuckoo was silent in her nest, and the cattle were slumbering in… — The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North · tree and pragmatics
description: The cuckoo was silent in her nest, and the cattle were slumbering in their paddock. Who acts: cuckoo, cattle. A sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, The Launching, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North, The Launching, sentence 8

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The cuckoo was silent in her nest, and the cattle were slumbering in their paddock.

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**Who acts:** cuckoo, cattle · **What happens:** be, slumber · **To what, where:** nest, paddock

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This is a sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, The Launching. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (cuckoo, cattle), 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:pg66819:18:8
# text = The cuckoo was silent in her nest, and the cattle were slumbering in their paddock.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	cuckoo	cuckoo	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
3	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	cop	_	_
4	silent	silent	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	_
5	in	in	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
6	her	her	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	7	nmod:poss	_	_
7	nest	nest	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
9	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
10	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
11	cattle	cattle	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	13	nsubj	_	_
12	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	13	aux	_	_
13	slumbering	slumber	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	4	advcl	_	_
14	in	in	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
15	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	16	nmod:poss	_	_
16	paddock	paddock	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past | the cuckoo |  |  | Beauty's nest |  | silent *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **slumber** | past · progressive | the cattle |  |  | cattle's paddock |  |  | vn snooze-40.4 «NP V»: agent=Agent |

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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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