---
title: The killing or torturing of children was the worst thing Indians cou… — Ojibwa myths and tales · tree and pragmatics
description: The killing or torturing of children was the worst thing Indians could do. Who acts: killing, Indians. A sentence of «Ojibwa myths and tales» by Geo. E. Laidlaw, Ojibwa and Mohawks. (no. 4.), 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/pg76755/11/38/)

<!-- 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/) / [Ojibwa myths and tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg76755/) / [Ojibwa and Mohawks. (no. 4.)](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg76755/11/) / 38

# Ojibwa myths and tales, Ojibwa and Mohawks. (no. 4.), sentence 38

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
The killing or torturing of children was the worst thing Indians could do.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** killing, Indians · **What happens:** torture, be, do · **To what, where:** worst thing

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Ojibwa myths and tales» by Geo. E. Laidlaw, Ojibwa and Mohawks. (no. 4.). The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (killing, Indians), 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:pg76755:11:38
# text = The killing or torturing of children was the worst thing Indians could do.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	killing	killing	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	nsubj	_	_
3	or	or	CCONJ	CC	_	4	cc	_	_
4	torturing	torture	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	2	conj	_	_
5	of	of	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
6	children	child	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	4	obl	_	_
7	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	10	cop	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
9	worst	bad	ADJ	JJS	Degree=Sup	10	amod	_	_
10	thing	thing	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	_
11	Indians	Indian	PROPN	NNPS	Number=Plur	13	nsubj	_	_
12	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	13	aux	_	_
13	do	do	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	10	acl:relcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	10	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **torture** | gerund | the killing *not said here* |  |  |  |  | of children | vn amuse-31.1 «NP V ADV-Middle»: agent=Experiencer |
| 2 | **is a** | past | the killing | the worst thing |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **do** | could | Indians | the worst thing *not said here* |  |  |  |  | vn act-114-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent thing=Eventuality |

<!-- .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:** «Ojibwa myths and tales» by Geo. E. Laidlaw, Project Gutenberg book 76755 (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 37](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg76755/11/37/)
- next →: [sentence 39](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg76755/11/39/)
- ↑ back to [Ojibwa and Mohawks. (no. 4.)](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg76755/11/)