---
title: A moment afterwards, the whole surface of the ground was broken by a… — Tanglewood Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: A moment afterwards, the whole surface of the ground was broken by a multitude of polished brass helmets, coming up like a crop of enormous beans. Who acts: multitude. A sentence of «Tanglewood Tales» by Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Dragon's Teeth., part 4, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of
---

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# Tanglewood Tales, The Dragon's Teeth., part 4, sentence 36

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A moment afterwards, the whole surface of the ground was broken by a multitude of polished brass helmets, coming up like a crop of enormous beans.

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**Who acts:** multitude · **What happens:** break, polish, come up · **To what, where:** moment

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This is a sentence of «Tanglewood Tales» by Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Dragon's Teeth., part 4. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (multitude), 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:pg976:13:36
# text = A moment afterwards, the whole surface of the ground was broken by a multitude of polished brass helmets, coming up like a crop of enormous beans.
1	A	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	moment	moment	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	nsubj:pass	_	_
3	afterwards	afterwards	ADV	RB	_	2	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	7	punct	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
6	whole	whole	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	7	amod	_	_
7	surface	surface	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	nmod	_	_
8	of	of	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	ground	ground	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	nmod	_	_
11	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	12	aux:pass	_	_
12	broken	break	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	_
13	by	by	ADP	IN	_	15	case	_	_
14	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
15	multitude	multitude	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obl	_	_
16	of	of	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
17	polished	polish	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	19	amod	_	_
18	brass	brass	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	compound	_	_
19	helmets	helmet	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	15	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
21	coming	come	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	12	parataxis	_	_
22	up	up	ADP	RP	_	21	compound:prt	_	_
23	like	like	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
24	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	25	det	_	_
25	crop	crop	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	obl	_	_
26	of	of	ADP	IN	_	28	case	_	_
27	enormous	enormous	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	28	amod	_	_
28	beans	bean	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	25	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	12	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **break** | past · passive | a multitude of polished brass helmets | a moment  the whole surface of the ground |  |  |  |  | vn hurt-40.8.3-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer subject=Patient |
| 2 | **polish** | participle |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn butter-9.9 «NP V NP.destination»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **come up** | gerund |  |  |  |  |  | like a crop of enormous beans | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |

<!-- .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.

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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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