---
title: But how can you help me to do the things of which you speak? — Tanglewood Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: But how can you help me to do the things of which you speak? Who acts: you, me. A sentence of «Tanglewood Tales» by Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Golden Fleece., part 4, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Tanglewood Tales, The Golden Fleece., part 4, sentence 42

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But how can you help me to do the things of which you speak?

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**Who acts:** you, me · **What happens:** help, do, speak · **To what, where:** me, things · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Tanglewood Tales» by Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Golden Fleece., 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 (you, me), 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:pg976:28:42
# text = But how can you help me to do the things of which you speak?
1	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	5	cc	_	_
2	how	how	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	5	advmod	_	_
3	can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	5	aux	_	_
4	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
5	help	help	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
6	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	5	obj	_	_
7	to	to	PART	TO	_	8	mark	_	_
8	do	do	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	xcomp	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	things	thing	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	8	obj	_	_
11	of	of	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
12	which	which	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	14	obl	_	_
13	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	14	nsubj	_	_
14	speak	speak	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=2|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	10	acl:relcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **help** | can | you | me |  |  |  |  | vn help-72.1-1-1 «NP V NP S\_INF»: agent=Agent i=Beneficiary clause=Theme |
| 2 | **do** | to-infinitive | me *not said here* | the things |  |  |  |  | vn act-114-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent thing=Eventuality |
| 3 | **speak** *speech: other* | present | you |  |  |  |  | of the things | vn talk-37.5 «NP V»: agent=Agent |

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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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