---
title: The rustic people, of whom they asked this question, paused a little… — Tanglewood Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: The rustic people, of whom they asked this question, paused a little while from their labors in the field, and looked very much surprised. Who acts: people, rustic people. A sentence of «Tanglewood Tales» by Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Dragon's Teeth., part 1, with its dependency tree and the pragmatic
---

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[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg976/10/98/)

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# Tanglewood Tales, The Dragon's Teeth., part 1, sentence 98

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The rustic people, of whom they asked this question, paused a little while from their labors in the field, and looked very much surprised.

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**Who acts:** people, rustic people · **What happens:** ask, pause, look · **To what, where:** question, labors

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This is a sentence of «Tanglewood Tales» by Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Dragon's Teeth., part 1. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (people, rustic people), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**Parsed by Mova, not checked by a teacher.** This tree is Mova's own parse (the `en` model, on the CPU, when the site is built); it may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg976:10:98
# text = The rustic people, of whom they asked this question, paused a little while from their labors in the field, and looked very much surprised.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
2	rustic	rustic	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	3	amod	_	_
3	people	people	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	12	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	_
5	of	of	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
6	whom	whom	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	3	nmod	_	_
7	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	8	nsubj	_	_
8	asked	ask	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	acl:relcl	_	_
9	this	this	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	10	det	_	_
10	question	question	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	_
12	paused	pause	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
13	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
14	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	15	amod	_	_
15	while	while	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obj	_	_
16	from	from	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
17	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	18	nmod:poss	_	_
18	labors	labor	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	12	obl	_	_
19	in	in	ADP	IN	_	21	case	_	_
20	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	21	det	_	_
21	field	field	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	24	punct	_	_
23	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	24	cc	_	_
24	looked	look	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	12	conj	_	_
25	very	very	ADV	RB	_	26	advmod	_	_
26	much	much	ADV	RB	_	27	advmod	_	_
27	surprised	surprised	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	24	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	12	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **ask** *speech: ask* | past | people | this question |  |  |  |  | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent question=Recipient |
| 2 | **pause** | past | the rustic people |  |  | people's labors in the field | while |  | vn linger-53.1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **look** | past | the rustic people *not said here* |  |  |  |  | surprised *property* | vn stimulus\_subject-30.4 «NP V ADJ»: agent=Stimulus |

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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:** «Tanglewood Tales» by Nathaniel Hawthorne, Project Gutenberg book 976 (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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