---
title: Singing, humming, whirling, they seemed to fill the air. — Wigwam stories told by North American Indians · tree and pragmatics
description: Singing, humming, whirling, they seemed to fill the air. Who acts: Spirits. A sentence of «Wigwam stories told by North American Indians» by Mary Catherine Judd, XXVII. the Star That Never Moves, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Wigwam stories told by North American Indians, XXVII. the Star That Never Moves, sentence 29

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Singing, humming, whirling, they seemed to fill the air.

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**Who acts:** Spirits · **What happens:** sing, hum, whirl, seem, fill · **To what, where:** air

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This is a sentence of «Wigwam stories told by North American Indians» by Mary Catherine Judd, XXVII. the Star That Never Moves. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Spirits), 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:pg73136:52:29
# text = Singing, humming, whirling, they seemed to fill the air.
1	Singing	sing	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	8	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	_
3	humming	hum	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	1	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	5	punct	_	_
5	whirling	whirl	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	1	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	1	punct	_	_
7	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	8	nsubj	_	_
8	seemed	seem	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
9	to	to	PART	TO	_	10	mark	_	_
10	fill	fill	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	8	xcomp	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	air	air	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **sing** *speech: express* | gerund | Spirits *= spirit* *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn sound\_emission-43.2 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **hum** | gerund | Spirits *= spirit* *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn bulge-47.5.3 «NP V»: agent=Location |
| 3 | **whirl** | gerund | Spirits *= spirit* *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn roll-51.3.1 «NP.theme V»: agent=Theme |
| 4 | **seem** | past | Spirits *= spirit* |  |  |  |  |  | vn seem-109-1-1-1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Theme clause=Attribute |
| 5 | **fill** | to-infinitive | Spirits *= spirit* *not said here* | the air |  |  |  |  | vn other\_cos-45.4 «NP V NP.patient»: agent=Agent air=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:** «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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