---
title: The days were growing shorter and the nights were getting cold. — The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North · tree and pragmatics
description: The days were growing shorter and the nights were getting cold. Who acts: days, nights. A sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, The Golden Maiden, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North, The Golden Maiden, sentence 2

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The days were growing shorter and the nights were getting cold.

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**Who acts:** days, nights · **What happens:** grow, be, get

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This is a sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, The Golden Maiden. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (days, nights), 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:pg66819:31:2
# text = The days were growing shorter and the nights were getting cold.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	days	day	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	5	nsubj	_	_
3	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	cop	_	_
4	growing	grow	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	5	nsubj	_	_
5	shorter	short	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	0	root	_	_
6	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	10	cc	_	_
7	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
8	nights	night	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	10	nsubj	_	_
9	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	10	aux	_	_
10	getting	get	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	5	conj	_	_
11	cold	cold	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	10	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **grow** | gerund |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **is** | past | the days |  |  |  |  | short *property* | tree rules |
| 3 | **get** | past · progressive | the nights |  |  |  |  | cold *property* | vn comprehend-87.2-1 «NP V S\_ING»: agent=Experiencer |

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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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