---
title: In the evening, just before it gets dark, you can frequently see tho… — Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria · tree and pragmatics
description: In the evening, just before it gets dark, you can frequently see thousands of these bats flying off, high up in the air, to their favourite feeding places. Who acts: trade, you, bats. A sentence of «Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria» by Elphinstone Dayrell, Opening, with its dependency tree an
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg70959/1/120/)

<!-- 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/) / [Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg70959/) / [Opening](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg70959/1/) / 120

# Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria, Opening, sentence 120

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
In the evening, just before it gets dark, you can frequently see thousands of these bats flying off, high up in the air, to their favourite feeding places.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** trade, you, bats · **What happens:** get, see, fly off, high up · **To what, where:** thousands, air

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria» by Elphinstone Dayrell, Opening. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (trade, you, bats), 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:pg70959:1:120
# text = In the evening, just before it gets dark, you can frequently see thousands of these bats flying off, high up in the air, to their favourite feeding places.
1	In	in	ADP	IN	_	3	case	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	evening	evening	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	_
5	just	just	ADV	RB	_	8	advmod	_	_
6	before	before	SCONJ	IN	_	8	mark	_	_
7	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	8	nsubj	_	_
8	gets	get	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
9	dark	dark	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
11	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	14	nsubj	_	_
12	can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	14	aux	_	_
13	frequently	frequently	ADV	RB	_	14	advmod	_	_
14	see	see	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	8	parataxis	_	_
15	thousands	thousand	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	14	obj	_	_
16	of	of	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
17	these	this	DET	DT	Number=Plur|PronType=Dem	18	det	_	_
18	bats	bat	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	15	nmod	_	_
19	flying	fly	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	18	acl	_	_
20	off	off	ADP	RP	_	19	compound:prt	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	22	punct	_	_
22	high	high	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	14	conj	_	_
23	up	up	ADP	RP	_	22	compound:prt	_	_
24	in	in	ADP	IN	_	26	case	_	_
25	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	26	det	_	_
26	air	air	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	22	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	32	punct	_	_
28	to	to	ADP	IN	_	32	case	_	_
29	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	32	nmod:poss	_	_
30	favourite	favourite	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	32	amod	_	_
31	feeding	feeding	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	32	compound	_	_
32	places	place	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	14	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
33	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **get** | present | trade |  |  |  | evening | dark *property* | vn comprehend-87.2-1 «NP V S\_ING»: agent=Experiencer |
| 2 | **see** | can | you | thousands of this bats |  |  |  | to bats's favourite feeding places; frequently *property* | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer thousand=Stimulus |
| 3 | **fly off** | gerund | this bats *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn spatial\_configuration-47.6-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 4 | **high up** | infinitive | you *not said here* |  |  | the air |  |  | tree rules |

<!-- .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:** «Ikom folk stories from Southern Nigeria» by Elphinstone Dayrell, Project Gutenberg book 70959 (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 119](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg70959/1/119/)
- next →: [sentence 121](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg70959/1/121/)
- ↑ back to [Opening](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg70959/1/)