---
title: While the Indian was hard at work pulling, the old fox pushed off tw… — Wigwam stories told by North American Indians · tree and pragmatics
description: While the Indian was hard at work pulling, the old fox pushed off two or three good fish and rolled off himself. Who acts: Indian, work. A sentence of «Wigwam stories told by North American Indians» by Mary Catherine Judd, XII. How the Bear Lost His Tail, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics 
---

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# Wigwam stories told by North American Indians, XII. How the Bear Lost His Tail, sentence 9

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While the Indian was hard at work pulling, the old fox pushed off two or three good fish and rolled off himself.

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**Who acts:** Indian, work · **What happens:** be, pull, push off, roll off · **To what, where:** work, old fox, fox

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This is a sentence of «Wigwam stories told by North American Indians» by Mary Catherine Judd, XII. How the Bear Lost His Tail. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Indian, work), 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:pg73136:37:9
# text = While the Indian was hard at work pulling, the old fox pushed off two or three good fish and rolled off himself.
1	While	while	SCONJ	IN	_	5	mark	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	Indian	Indian	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	5	nsubj	_	_
4	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	cop	_	_
5	hard	hard	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	12	advcl	_	_
6	at	at	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
7	work	work	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obl	_	_
8	pulling	pull	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	7	acl	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	5	punct	_	_
10	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
11	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	12	amod	_	_
12	fox	fox	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	_
13	pushed	push	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	12	acl	_	_
14	off	off	ADP	RP	_	13	compound:prt	_	_
15	two	two	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	19	nummod	_	_
16	or	or	CCONJ	CC	_	17	cc	_	_
17	three	three	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	15	conj	_	_
18	good	good	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	19	amod	_	_
19	fish	fish	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	13	obl:agent	_	_
20	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	21	cc	_	_
21	rolled	roll	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	13	conj	_	_
22	off	off	ADP	RP	_	21	compound:prt	_	_
23	himself	himself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	21	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	12	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past | the Indian |  |  | work |  | hard *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **pull** | gerund | work *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn slide-11.2 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **push off** | participle |  | the old fox *not said here* |  |  |  | two good fish *obl:agent* | vn push-12-1-1 «NP V PP»: agent=Agent |
| 4 | **roll off** | participle |  | fox |  |  |  |  | vn run-51.3.2-2 «NP V»: agent=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:** «Wigwam stories told by North American Indians» by Mary Catherine Judd, Project Gutenberg book 73136 (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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