---
title: The porcupine squaw said, “I will call a council, for I do not know… — Wigwam stories told by North American Indians · tree and pragmatics
description: The porcupine squaw said, “I will call a council, for I do not know what to feed you.” Who acts: porcupine squaw. A sentence of «Wigwam stories told by North American Indians» by Mary Catherine Judd, XV. the Good Bear and the Lost Boy, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg73136/40/9/)

<!-- 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/) / [Wigwam stories told by North American…](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg73136/) / [XV. the Good Bear and the Lost Boy](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg73136/40/) / 9

# Wigwam stories told by North American Indians, XV. the Good Bear and the Lost Boy, sentence 9

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
The porcupine squaw said, “I will call a council, for I do not know what to feed you.”

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** porcupine squaw · **What happens:** say, call, not know, feed · **To what, where:** council, you · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Wigwam stories told by North American Indians» by Mary Catherine Judd, XV. the Good Bear and the Lost Boy. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (porcupine squaw), 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:pg73136:40:9
# text = The porcupine squaw said, “I will call a council, for I do not know what to feed you.”
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
2	porcupine	porcupine	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	3	compound	_	_
3	squaw	squaw	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
4	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	_
6	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	9	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	9	nsubj	_	_
8	will	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	9	aux	_	_
9	call	call	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	ccomp	_	_
10	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
11	council	council	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
13	for	for	SCONJ	IN	_	17	mark	_	_
14	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	17	nsubj	_	_
15	do	do	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	17	aux	_	_
16	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	17	advmod	_	_
17	know	know	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	9	conj	_	_
18	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	20	obj	_	_
19	to	to	PART	TO	_	20	mark	_	_
20	feed	feed	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	17	ccomp	_	_
21	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Person=2|PronType=Prs	20	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	9	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	9	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | the porcupine squaw |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 2 | **call** *in a quote* | future | the porcupine squaw *= squaw* | a council |  |  |  |  | vn initiate\_communication-37.4.2-1 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent council=Recipient |
| 3 | **not** **know** *in a quote* | present · do-support | the porcupine squaw *= squaw* |  |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V how S\_INF»: agent=Experiencer clause=Stimulus |
| 4 | **feed** *in a quote* | to-infinitive |  | you |  |  |  | what *obj* | vn feeding-39.7 «NP V NP-Dative NP»: agent=Agent what=Recipient you=Theme |

<!-- .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:** «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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg73136/40/8/)
- next →: [sentence 10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg73136/40/10/)
- ↑ back to [XV. the Good Bear and the Lost Boy](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg73136/40/)