---
title: But nobody had seen Proserpina, nor could give Mother Ceres the leas… — Tanglewood Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: But nobody had seen Proserpina, nor could give Mother Ceres the least hint which way to seek her. Who acts: nobody. A sentence of «Tanglewood Tales» by Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Pomegranate Seeds., part 2, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Tanglewood Tales, The Pomegranate Seeds., part 2, sentence 79

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But nobody had seen Proserpina, nor could give Mother Ceres the least hint which way to seek her.

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**Who acts:** nobody · **What happens:** see, give, seek · **To what, where:** Proserpina, least hint, Mother Ceres, child

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This is a sentence of «Tanglewood Tales» by Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Pomegranate Seeds., part 2. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (nobody), 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:pg976:21:79
# text = But nobody had seen Proserpina, nor could give Mother Ceres the least hint which way to seek her.
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	4	cc	_	_
2	nobody	nobody	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Neg	4	nsubj	_	_
3	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
4	seen	see	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
5	Proserpina	Proserpina	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	4	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	_
7	nor	nor	CCONJ	CC	Polarity=Neg	9	cc	_	_
8	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	9	aux	_	_
9	give	give	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	parataxis	_	_
10	Mother	Mother	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	11	compound	_	_
11	Ceres	Ceres	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	9	obj	_	_
12	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
13	least	least	ADJ	JJS	Degree=Sup	14	amod	_	_
14	hint	hint	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	obj	_	_
15	which	which	DET	WDT	PronType=Int	16	det	_	_
16	way	way	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	obl:unmarked	_	_
17	to	to	PART	TO	_	18	mark	_	_
18	seek	seek	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	16	acl	_	_
19	her	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	18	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **see** | past · perfect | nobody | Proserpina |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer proserpina=Stimulus |
| 2 | **give** | could |  | the least hint | Mother Ceres |  |  | which way *obl:unmarked* | vn give-13.1-1 «NP V NP-Dative NP»: agent=Agent ceres=Recipient hint=Theme |
| 3 | **seek** | to-infinitive |  | child |  |  |  |  | vn hunt-35.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent she=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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