---
title: But its temper was good, for it had been forged by a master smith in… — The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North · tree and pragmatics
description: But its temper was good, for it had been forged by a master smith in the days when men did honest work. Who acts: temper, master smith, men, knife. A sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, The Slave Boy, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg66819/29/96/)

<!-- 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 Slave Boy](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg66819/29/) / 96

# The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North, The Slave Boy, sentence 96

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
But its temper was good, for it had been forged by a master smith in the days when men did honest work.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** temper, master smith, men, knife · **What happens:** be, forge, do, temper · **To what, where:** knife, honest work

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, The Slave Boy. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (temper, master smith, men, knife), 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:pg66819:29:96
# text = But its temper was good, for it had been forged by a master smith in the days when men did honest work.
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	5	cc	_	_
2	its	its	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	3	nmod:poss	_	_
3	temper	temper	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nsubj	_	_
4	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	cop	_	_
5	good	good	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
7	for	for	SCONJ	IN	_	11	mark	_	_
8	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj:pass	_	_
9	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	11	aux	_	_
10	been	be	AUX	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	11	aux:pass	_	_
11	forged	forge	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	5	parataxis	_	_
12	by	by	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
13	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
14	master	master	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	compound	_	_
15	smith	smith	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obl	_	_
16	in	in	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
17	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
18	days	day	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	15	nmod	_	_
19	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	21	advmod	_	_
20	men	man	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	21	nsubj	_	_
21	did	do	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	11	advcl	_	_
22	honest	honest	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	23	amod	_	_
23	work	work	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past | knife's temper |  |  |  |  | good *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **forge** | past · perfect · passive | a master smith in the days | knife |  |  |  |  | vn build-26.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent subject=Product |
| 3 | **do** | past | men | honest work |  |  |  |  | vn act-114-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent work=Eventuality |
| 4 | **temper** |  | knife |  |  |  |  |  | nom temper «feeling transitive»: poss=agent |

<!-- .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 95](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg66819/29/95/)
- next →: [sentence 97](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg66819/29/97/)
- ↑ back to [The Slave Boy](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg66819/29/)