---
title: They looked behind, and saw clouds of dust which she made as she ran. — Kaffir folk-lore · tree and pragmatics
description: They looked behind, and saw clouds of dust which she made as she ran. Who acts: children, dust, Nomagoda. A sentence of «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, The Runaway Children; Or, the Wonderful Feather., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Kaffir folk-lore, The Runaway Children; Or, the Wonderful Feather., sentence 38

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They looked behind, and saw clouds of dust which she made as she ran.

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**Who acts:** children, dust, Nomagoda · **What happens:** look, see, make, run, cloud · **To what, where:** clouds, dust

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This is a sentence of «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, The Runaway Children; Or, the Wonderful Feather.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (children, dust, Nomagoda), 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:pg71335:12:38
# text = They looked behind, and saw clouds of dust which she made as she ran.
1	They	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	looked	look	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	behind	behind	ADV	RB	_	2	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	6	punct	_	_
5	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	6	cc	_	_
6	saw	see	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
7	clouds	cloud	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	6	obj	_	_
8	of	of	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
9	dust	dust	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	nmod	_	_
10	which	which	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	12	nsubj	_	_
11	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	12	nsubj	_	_
12	made	make	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	9	acl:relcl	_	_
13	as	as	SCONJ	IN	_	15	mark	_	_
14	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	nsubj	_	_
15	ran	run	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	12	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **look** | past | children *= child* |  |  |  |  | behind *property* | vn stimulus\_subject-30.4 «NP V PP.attribute»: agent=Stimulus |
| 2 | **see** | past | children *= child* *not said here* | clouds of dust |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer cloud=Stimulus |
| 3 | **make** | past | dust |  |  |  |  | Nomagoda *nsubj* | vn build-26.1-1 «NP.asset V NP»: agent=Asset |
| 4 | **run** | past | Nomagoda |  |  |  |  |  | vn run-51.3.2-2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 5 | **cloud** |  |  | dust |  |  |  |  | nom cloud «phenomenon transitive»: of=patient |

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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:** «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, Project Gutenberg book 71335 (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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