---
title: A mere lad, like Theseus, is not fit to be trusted on such a perilou… — Tanglewood Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: A mere lad, like Theseus, is not fit to be trusted on such a perilous journey, all by himself. Who acts: mere lad, Theseus. A sentence of «Tanglewood Tales» by Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Minotaur., part 1, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Tanglewood Tales, The Minotaur., part 1, sentence 70

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A mere lad, like Theseus, is not fit to be trusted on such a perilous journey, all by himself.

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**Who acts:** mere lad, Theseus · **What happens:** not be, trust · **To what, where:** perilous journey

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This is a sentence of «Tanglewood Tales» by Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Minotaur., 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 (mere lad, Theseus), 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:pg976:3:70
# text = A mere lad, like Theseus, is not fit to be trusted on such a perilous journey, all by himself.
1	A	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	3	det	_	_
2	mere	mere	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	3	amod	_	_
3	lad	lad	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
4	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	6	punct	_	_
5	like	like	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
6	Theseus	Theseus	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	3	appos	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	_
8	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	10	cop	_	_
9	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	10	advmod	_	_
10	fit	fit	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	_
11	to	to	PART	TO	_	13	mark	_	_
12	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	13	aux:pass	_	_
13	trusted	trust	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	10	xcomp	_	_
14	on	on	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
15	such	such	DET	PDT	PronType=Ind	18	det:predet	_	_
16	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
17	perilous	perilous	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	18	amod	_	_
18	journey	journey	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	22	punct	_	_
20	all	all	ADV	RB	_	22	advmod	_	_
21	by	by	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
22	himself	himself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	13	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	10	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **not** **is** | present | a mere lad |  |  |  |  | fit *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **trust** | to-infinitive · passive | Theseus |  |  | such perilous journey |  |  | vn conjecture-29.5-1 «NP V that S»: 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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