---
title: “My son,” said the older man, “do you hear the black watchdog? — The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North · tree and pragmatics
description: “My son,” said the older man, “do you hear the black watchdog? Who acts: son, you. 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 44

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“My son,” said the older man, “do you hear the black watchdog?

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**Who acts:** son, you · **What happens:** say, hear · **To what, where:** black watchdog · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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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 (son, you), 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:pg66819:22:44
# text = “My son,” said the older man, “do you hear the black watchdog?
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	My	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	3	nmod:poss	_	_
3	son	son	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	3	punct	_	_
6	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
7	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
8	older	old	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	9	amod	_	_
9	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
11	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	14	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	do	do	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	14	aux	_	_
13	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	14	nsubj	_	_
14	hear	hear	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	6	conj	_	_
15	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
16	black	black	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	17	amod	_	_
17	watchdog	watchdog	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **say** *speech: ask* | past | My son |  |  |  |  | the older man *nsubj* | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **hear** *in a quote* | present · do-support | you | the black watchdog |  |  |  |  | vn see-30.1-1-1 «NP V S»: agent=Experiencer watchdog=Stimulus |

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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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