---
title: “But how, without ships, shall we ever return to our homes?” — Legends of the conquest of Spain · tree and pragmatics
description: “But how, without ships, shall we ever return to our homes?” Who acts: ships. A sentence of «Legends of the conquest of Spain» by Washington Irving, Letter of Muza to the Caliph.—second Expedition of Taric El Tuerto., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Legends of the conquest of Spain, Letter of Muza to the Caliph.—second Expedition of Taric El Tuerto., sentence 26

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“But how, without ships, shall we ever return to our homes?”

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**Who acts:** ships · **What happens:** return

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This is a sentence of «Legends of the conquest of Spain» by Washington Irving, Letter of Muza to the Caliph.—second Expedition of Taric El Tuerto.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (ships), 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:pg77685:11:26
# text = “But how, without ships, shall we ever return to our homes?”
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	11	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	11	cc	_	_
3	how	how	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	11	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	6	punct	_	_
5	without	without	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
6	ships	ship	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	11	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
8	shall	shall	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	11	aux	_	_
9	we	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
10	ever	ever	ADV	RB	PronType=Ind	11	advmod	_	_
11	return	return	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
12	to	to	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
13	our	our	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	14	nmod:poss	_	_
14	homes	home	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	11	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	11	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	11	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **return** *in a quote* | shall | ships |  |  |  | ever | to our homes *result*; we *nsubj* | vn convert-26.6.2-1 «NP V S\_ING»: agent=Patient to home=Result |

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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 of the conquest of Spain» by Washington Irving, Project Gutenberg book 77685 (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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