---
title: Very awkward were his fingers and dull of feeling, but his hearing w… — The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North · tree and pragmatics
description: Very awkward were his fingers and dull of feeling, but his hearing was keen and his sight even keener. Who acts: hearing, sight, fisherman. A sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, The Weeping Ship, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North, The Weeping Ship, sentence 114

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Very awkward were his fingers and dull of feeling, but his hearing was keen and his sight even keener.

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**Who acts:** hearing, sight, fisherman · **What happens:** be, hear, sight · **To what, where:** awkward fingers

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This is a sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, The Weeping Ship. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (hearing, sight, fisherman), 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:pg66819:33:114
# text = Very awkward were his fingers and dull of feeling, but his hearing was keen and his sight even keener.
1	Very	very	ADV	RB	_	2	advmod	_	_
2	awkward	awkward	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	5	amod	_	_
3	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	cop	_	_
4	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	5	nmod:poss	_	_
5	fingers	finger	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	7	nsubj	_	_
6	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	7	cc	_	_
7	dull	dull	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	_
8	of	of	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
9	feeling	feeling	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
11	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	15	cc	_	_
12	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	13	nmod:poss	_	_
13	hearing	hearing	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	nsubj	_	_
14	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	15	cop	_	_
15	keen	keen	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	7	conj	_	_
16	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	20	cc	_	_
17	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	18	nmod:poss	_	_
18	sight	sight	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	nsubj	_	_
19	even	even	ADV	RB	_	20	advmod	_	_
20	keener	keen	ADJ	JJR	Degree=Cmp	15	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** | past |  | fisherman's awkward fingers |  |  |  | fisherman *nmod:poss* | tree rules |
| 2 | **is** | past | fisherman's hearing |  |  |  |  | keen *property* | tree rules |
| 3 | **be** |  | fisherman's sight |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 5 | **hear** |  | fisherman |  |  |  |  |  | nom hearing «act intransitive»: poss=agent |
| 6 | **sight** |  | fisherman |  |  |  |  |  | nom sight «cognition transitive»: poss=agent |

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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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