---
title: “I must earn something to feed our children, to clothe them, to keep… — The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North · tree and pragmatics
description: “I must earn something to feed our children, to clothe them, to keep them neat. Who acts: Woman. A sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, The Barking Dogs, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North, The Barking Dogs, sentence 38

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“I must earn something to feed our children, to clothe them, to keep them neat.

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**Who acts:** Woman · **What happens:** earn, feed, clothe, keep · **To what, where:** something, children

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This is a sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, The Barking Dogs. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Woman), 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:pg66819:22:38
# text = “I must earn something to feed our children, to clothe them, to keep them neat.
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
3	must	must	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
4	earn	earn	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
5	something	something	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Ind	4	obj	_	_
6	to	to	PART	TO	_	7	mark	_	_
7	feed	feed	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	acl	_	_
8	our	our	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	9	nmod:poss	_	_
9	children	child	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	7	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
11	to	to	PART	TO	_	12	mark	_	_
12	clothe	clothe	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	conj	_	_
13	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	12	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
15	to	to	PART	TO	_	16	mark	_	_
16	keep	keep	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	conj	_	_
17	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	obj	_	_
18	neat	neat	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	16	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **earn** *in a quote* | must | Woman | something |  |  |  |  | vn get-13.5.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent something=Theme |
| 2 | **feed** *in a quote* | to-infinitive | Woman *not said here* | something *not said here* | our children |  |  |  | vn feeding-39.7 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent child=Recipient |
| 3 | **clothe** *in a quote* | to-infinitive | Woman *not said here* | children *= child* |  |  |  |  | vn dress-41.1.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent they=Patient |
| 4 | **keep** *in a quote* | to-infinitive | Woman *not said here* | children *= child* |  |  |  | neat *property* | vn keep-15.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent they=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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