---
title: There were lots of ducks on the lake. — Ojibwa myths and tales · tree and pragmatics
description: There were lots of ducks on the lake. Who acts: lots. A sentence of «Ojibwa myths and tales» by Geo. E. Laidlaw, Nanabush and the Ducks. (no. 8.), with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Ojibwa myths and tales, Nanabush and the Ducks. (no. 8.), sentence 5

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There were lots of ducks on the lake.

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**Who acts:** lots · **What happens:** be

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This is a sentence of «Ojibwa myths and tales» by Geo. E. Laidlaw, Nanabush and the Ducks. (no. 8.). The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (lots), 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:pg76755:25:5
# text = There were lots of ducks on the lake.
1	There	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	2	expl	_	_
2	were	be	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	lots	lot	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	2	nsubj	_	_
4	of	of	ADP	IN	_	5	case	_	_
5	ducks	duck	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	3	nmod	_	_
6	on	on	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
7	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
8	lake	lake	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **be** | past | lots of ducks on the lake |  |  | there |  |  | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: 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:** «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.

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