---
title: Or is it only the billows breaking on the beach, or the wind whistli… — The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North · tree and pragmatics
description: Or is it only the billows breaking on the beach, or the wind whistling and moaning among the pines?” Who acts: army, billows, wind. A sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, The Wedding Feast, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North, The Wedding Feast, sentence 51

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Or is it only the billows breaking on the beach, or the wind whistling and moaning among the pines?”

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**Who acts:** army, billows, wind · **What happens:** be, break, whistle, moan · **To what, where:** billows, beach, pines

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This is a sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, The Wedding Feast. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (army, billows, wind), 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:pg66819:27:51
# text = Or is it only the billows breaking on the beach, or the wind whistling and moaning among the pines?”
1	Or	or	CCONJ	CC	_	6	cc	_	_
2	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	6	cop	_	_
3	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	6	nsubj	_	_
4	only	only	ADV	RB	_	6	advmod	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	billows	billow	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	0	root	_	_
7	breaking	break	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	6	acl	_	_
8	on	on	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	beach	beach	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
12	or	or	CCONJ	CC	_	14	cc	_	_
13	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
14	wind	wind	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	appos	_	_
15	whistling	whistle	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	14	acl	_	_
16	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	17	cc	_	_
17	moaning	moan	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	15	conj	_	_
18	among	among	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
20	pines	pine	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	17	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	15	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	14	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** | present | army | the billows |  |  |  | the wind *appos* | tree rules |
| 2 | **break** | gerund | the billows *not said here* |  |  | the beach |  |  | vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme on beach=Location |
| 3 | **whistle** | gerund | the wind *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn manner\_speaking-37.3 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 4 | **moan** | gerund | the wind *not said here* |  |  | the pines |  |  | vn sound\_emission-43.2 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme among pine=Location |

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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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