---
title: The day was breaking when he reached the end of the mighty forest. — The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North · tree and pragmatics
description: The day was breaking when he reached the end of the mighty forest. Who acts: day, Minstrel. A sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, The Graybeard and His Son, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North, The Graybeard and His Son, sentence 2

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The day was breaking when he reached the end of the mighty forest.

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**Who acts:** day, Minstrel · **What happens:** break, reach · **To what, where:** end

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This is a sentence of «The Sampo: A Wonder Tale of the Old North» by James Baldwin, The Graybeard and His Son. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (day, Minstrel), 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:pg66819:4:2
# text = The day was breaking when he reached the end of the mighty forest.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	day	day	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
3	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
4	breaking	break	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
5	when	when	SCONJ	WRB	_	7	mark	_	_
6	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	nsubj	_	_
7	reached	reach	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	advcl	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
9	end	end	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obj	_	_
10	of	of	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
12	mighty	mighty	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	13	amod	_	_
13	forest	forest	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **break** | past · progressive | the day |  |  |  |  |  | vn hurt-40.8.3-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Patient |
| 2 | **reach** | past | Minstrel | the end of the mighty forest |  |  |  |  | vn body\_motion-49.2-1-1 «NP V NP ADV»: agent=Agent end=Theme |

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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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