---
title: It seemed like a bird of fire. — Wigwam stories told by North American Indians · tree and pragmatics
description: It seemed like a bird of fire. Who acts: It. A sentence of «Wigwam stories told by North American Indians» by Mary Catherine Judd, XXXVI. How the Water Lily Came, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Wigwam stories told by North American Indians, XXXVI. How the Water Lily Came, sentence 16

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It seemed like a bird of fire.

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**Who acts:** It · **What happens:** seem

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This is a sentence of «Wigwam stories told by North American Indians» by Mary Catherine Judd, XXXVI. How the Water Lily Came. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (It), 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:pg73136:61:16
# text = It seemed like a bird of fire.
1	It	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	seemed	seem	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	like	like	ADP	IN	_	5	case	_	_
4	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	bird	bird	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obl	_	_
6	of	of	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
7	fire	fire	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **seem** | past | It |  |  |  |  | like a bird of fire | vn seem-109-1-1-1 «NP V S\_INF»: 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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