---
title: “Well,” said the maiden, and she laughed while speaking, “memories a… — The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North · tree and pragmatics
description: “Well,” said the maiden, and she laughed while speaking, “memories are sometimes short, and even a minstrel may forget. Who acts: hero, memories, minstrel. A sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, The Maid of the Morning, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg66819/19/28/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old No…](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg66819/) / [The Maid of the Morning](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg66819/19/) / 28

# The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North, The Maid of the Morning, sentence 28

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
“Well,” said the maiden, and she laughed while speaking, “memories are sometimes short, and even a minstrel may forget.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** hero, memories, minstrel · **What happens:** say, laugh, speak, be, forget · **To what, where:** maiden · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, The Maid of the Morning. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (hero, memories, minstrel), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**Mova's own parse.** This tree may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg66819:19:28
# text = “Well,” said the maiden, and she laughed while speaking, “memories are sometimes short, and even a minstrel may forget.
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Well	well	INTJ	UH	_	5	discourse	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	2	punct	_	_
5	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
7	maiden	maiden	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	5	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
9	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	11	cc	_	_
10	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
11	laughed	laugh	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	conj	_	_
12	while	while	SCONJ	IN	_	13	mark	_	_
13	speaking	speak	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	11	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
15	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	19	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	memories	memory	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	19	nsubj	_	_
17	are	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	19	cop	_	_
18	sometimes	sometimes	ADV	RB	PronType=Ind	19	advmod	_	_
19	short	short	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	13	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	26	punct	_	_
21	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	26	cc	_	_
22	even	even	ADV	RB	_	24	advmod	_	_
23	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	24	det	_	_
24	minstrel	minstrel	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	26	nsubj	_	_
25	may	may	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	26	aux	_	_
26	forget	forget	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	11	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **say** *speech: assert* | past |  | the maiden |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP.topic»: agent=Agent maiden=Topic |
| 2 | **laugh** | past | hero |  |  |  |  |  | vn nonverbal\_expression-40.2 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **speak** *speech: other* | gerund | hero *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn talk-37.5 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 4 | **is** *in a quote* | present | memories |  |  |  |  | short, sometimes *property* | tree rules |
| 5 | **forget** *in a quote* | may | a minstrel |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |

<!-- .note -->
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.

<!-- div src -->

**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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 27](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg66819/19/27/)
- next →: [sentence 29](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg66819/19/29/)
- ↑ back to [The Maid of the Morning](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg66819/19/)