---
title: Sometimes a mass dislodged would clatter down with hollow echoings;—… — In Ghostly Japan · tree and pragmatics
description: Sometimes a mass dislodged would clatter down with hollow echoings;—sometimes the substance trodden would burst like an empty shell…. Who acts: mass, substance. A sentence of «In Ghostly Japan» by Lafcadio Hearn, Opening, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# In Ghostly Japan, Opening, sentence 16

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Sometimes a mass dislodged would clatter down with hollow echoings;—sometimes the substance trodden would burst like an empty shell….

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**Who acts:** mass, substance · **What happens:** dislodge, clatter down, tread, burst · **To what, where:** mass, substance

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This is a sentence of «In Ghostly Japan» by Lafcadio Hearn, Opening. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (mass, substance), 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:pg8128:1:16
# text = Sometimes a mass dislodged would clatter down with hollow echoings;—sometimes the substance trodden would burst like an empty shell….
1	Sometimes	sometimes	ADV	RB	PronType=Ind	6	advmod	_	_
2	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
3	mass	mass	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nsubj	_	_
4	dislodged	dislodge	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	3	acl	_	_
5	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	6	aux	_	_
6	clatter	clatter	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
7	down	down	ADP	RP	_	6	compound:prt	_	_
8	with	with	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
9	hollow	hollow	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	10	amod	_	_
10	echoings	echoing	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	6	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	6	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	—	-	PUNCT	:	_	18	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	sometimes	sometimes	ADV	RB	PronType=Ind	18	advmod	_	_
14	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
15	substance	substance	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	nsubj	_	_
16	trodden	tread	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	15	acl	_	_
17	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	18	aux	_	_
18	burst	burst	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	6	parataxis	_	_
19	like	like	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
20	an	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	22	det	_	_
21	empty	empty	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	22	amod	_	_
22	shell	shell	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	….	..	PUNCT	.	_	18	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **dislodge** | participle |  | a mass *not said here* |  |  |  |  | vn remove-10.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **clatter down** | would | a mass |  |  |  |  | with hollow echoings; sometimes *property* | vn sound\_emission-43.2 «NP.location V PP.theme»: agent=Location with echoing=Theme |
| 3 | **tread** | participle |  | the substance *not said here* |  |  |  |  | vn run-51.3.2 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 4 | **burst** | would | the substance |  |  |  |  | like a empty shell; sometimes *property* | vn appear-48.1.1 «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:** «In Ghostly Japan» by Lafcadio Hearn, Project Gutenberg book 8128 (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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