---
title: He could not restrain himself from approaching the graceful figure,… — Legends and tales of the Harz Mountains · tree and pragmatics
description: He could not restrain himself from approaching the graceful figure, and inquiring the cause of her grief. Who acts: sympathy. A sentence of «Legends and tales of the Harz Mountains» by Toofie Lauder, A Historical Tale., part 4, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Legends and tales of the Harz Mountains, A Historical Tale., part 4, sentence 86

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He could not restrain himself from approaching the graceful figure, and inquiring the cause of her grief.

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**Who acts:** sympathy · **What happens:** not restrain, approach, inquire, cause · **To what, where:** sympathy, graceful figure, cause, grief

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This is a sentence of «Legends and tales of the Harz Mountains» by Toofie Lauder, A Historical Tale., part 4. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (sympathy), 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:pg74323:21:86
# text = He could not restrain himself from approaching the graceful figure, and inquiring the cause of her grief.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
2	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
3	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	4	advmod	_	_
4	restrain	restrain	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
5	himself	himself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	4	obj	_	_
6	from	from	SCONJ	IN	_	7	mark	_	_
7	approaching	approach	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	4	advcl	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
9	graceful	graceful	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	10	amod	_	_
10	figure	figure	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	13	punct	_	_
12	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	13	cc	_	_
13	inquiring	inquire	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	7	conj	_	_
14	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
15	cause	cause	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obj	_	_
16	of	of	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
17	her	her	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	18	nmod:poss	_	_
18	grief	grief	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **not** **restrain** | could | sympathy | sympathy |  |  |  |  | vn discourage-64.5-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Causer himself=Eventuality |
| 2 | **approach** | gerund | sympathy *not said here* | the graceful figure |  |  |  |  | vn confront-98 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent figure=Theme |
| 3 | **inquire** *speech: other* | gerund | sympathy *not said here* | the cause of maiden's grief |  |  |  |  | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent cause=Recipient |
| 4 | **cause** |  |  | maiden's grief |  |  |  |  | nom cause «event 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:** «Legends and tales of the Harz Mountains» by Toofie Lauder, Project Gutenberg book 74323 (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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