---
title: Could she let him go, out into the great unknown world, her little b… — Gleanings from Chinese folklore · tree and pragmatics
description: Could she let him go, out into the great unknown world, her little boy, her baby; how could she? Who acts: mother, child. A sentence of «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, A Story of Old China, part 2, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Gleanings from Chinese folklore, A Story of Old China, part 2, sentence 50

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Could she let him go, out into the great unknown world, her little boy, her baby; how could she?

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**Who acts:** mother, child · **What happens:** let, go · **To what, where:** child, great unknown world

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This is a sentence of «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, A Story of Old China, part 2. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (mother, child), 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:pg75089:18:50
# text = Could she let him go, out into the great unknown world, her little boy, her baby; how could she?
1	Could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	3	aux	_	_
2	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	let	let	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
4	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	obj	_	_
5	go	go	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	3	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
7	out	out	ADV	RB	_	12	advmod	_	_
8	into	into	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
10	great	great	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	12	amod	_	_
11	unknown	unknown	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	12	amod	_	_
12	world	world	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
14	her	her	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	16	nmod:poss	_	_
15	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	16	amod	_	_
16	boy	boy	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
18	her	her	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	19	nmod:poss	_	_
19	baby	baby	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	;	;	PUNCT	,	_	22	punct	_	_
21	how	how	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	22	advmod	_	_
22	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	3	parataxis	_	_
23	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	22	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
24	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **let** | could | mother | child |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **go** | infinitive | child *not said here* |  |  | the great unknown world and mother's little boy and mother's baby |  |  | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V PP.initial\_location»: agent=Theme into world=Initial\_Location |

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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:** «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, Project Gutenberg book 75089 (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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