---
title: “We must not sing upon these waters; singing would turn the ship fro… — The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North · tree and pragmatics
description: “We must not sing upon these waters; singing would turn the ship from its right course, songs would hinder the rowers. Who acts: We, singing, songs. A sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, The Flight, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North, The Flight, sentence 64

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“We must not sing upon these waters; singing would turn the ship from its right course, songs would hinder the rowers.

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**Who acts:** We, singing, songs · **What happens:** not sing, sing, turn, hinder · **To what, where:** waters, ship, right course, rowers · **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 Flight. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (We, singing, songs), 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:pg66819:36:64
# text = “We must not sing upon these waters; singing would turn the ship from its right course, songs would hinder the rowers.
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	We	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
3	must	must	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	5	aux	_	_
4	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	5	advmod	_	_
5	sing	sing	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
6	upon	upon	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
7	these	this	DET	DT	Number=Plur|PronType=Dem	8	det	_	_
8	waters	water	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	5	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	12	punct	_	_
10	singing	sing	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	12	csubj	_	_
11	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	12	aux	_	_
12	turn	turn	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	conj	_	_
13	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
14	ship	ship	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obj	_	_
15	from	from	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
16	its	its	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	18	nmod:poss	_	_
17	right	right	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	18	amod	_	_
18	course	course	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	22	punct	_	_
20	songs	song	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	22	nsubj	_	_
21	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	22	aux	_	_
22	hinder	hinder	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	12	conj	_	_
23	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	24	det	_	_
24	rowers	rower	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	22	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
25	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **not** **sing** *speech: express* *in a quote* | must | We |  |  | this waters |  |  | vn sound\_emission-43.2 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme upon water=Location |
| 2 | **sing** *speech: express* *in a quote* | gerund |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn sound\_emission-43.2 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **turn** *in a quote* | would | singing | the ship |  | ship's right course |  |  | vn roll-51.3.1 «NP V NP PP.trajectory»: agent=Agent ship=Theme from course=Trajectory |
| 4 | **hinder** *in a quote* | would | songs | the rowers |  |  |  |  | vn discourage-64.5-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Causer rower=Eventuality |

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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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