---
title: In a few moments, this wondrous sentinel was far away, flashing in t… — Tanglewood Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: In a few moments, this wondrous sentinel was far away, flashing in the distant sunshine, and revolving with immense strides round the island of Crete, as it was his never-ceasing task to do. Who acts: wondrous sentinel, sentinel. A sentence of «Tanglewood Tales» by Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Minotaur.
---

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[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg976/5/54/)

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# Tanglewood Tales, The Minotaur., part 3, sentence 54

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In a few moments, this wondrous sentinel was far away, flashing in the distant sunshine, and revolving with immense strides round the island of Crete, as it was his never-ceasing task to do.

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**Who acts:** wondrous sentinel, sentinel · **What happens:** be, flash, revolve, not cease, do · **To what, where:** distant sunshine, island, ceasing task

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This is a sentence of «Tanglewood Tales» by Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Minotaur., part 3. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (wondrous sentinel, sentinel), 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:pg976:5:54
# text = In a few moments, this wondrous sentinel was far away, flashing in the distant sunshine, and revolving with immense strides round the island of Crete, as it was his never-ceasing task to do.
1	In	in	ADP	IN	_	4	case	_	_
2	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
3	few	few	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	amod	_	_
4	moments	moment	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	11	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	_
6	this	this	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	8	det	_	_
7	wondrous	wondrous	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	amod	_	_
8	sentinel	sentinel	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	nsubj	_	_
9	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	11	cop	_	_
10	far	far	ADV	RB	Degree=Pos	11	advmod	_	_
11	away	away	ADV	RB	_	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
13	flashing	flash	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	11	advcl	_	_
14	in	in	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
15	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
16	distant	distant	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	17	amod	_	_
17	sunshine	sunshine	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
19	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	20	cc	_	_
20	revolving	revolve	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	13	advcl	_	_
21	with	with	ADP	IN	_	23	case	_	_
22	immense	immense	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	23	amod	_	_
23	strides	stride	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	20	obl	_	_
24	round	round	ADP	IN	_	26	case	_	_
25	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	26	det	_	_
26	island	island	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	obl	_	_
27	of	of	ADP	IN	_	28	case	_	_
28	Crete	Crete	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	26	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	37	punct	_	_
30	as	as	SCONJ	IN	_	37	mark	_	_
31	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	37	nsubj	_	_
32	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	37	cop	_	_
33	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	37	nmod:poss	_	_
34	never	never	ADV	RB	PronType=Neg	36	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
35	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	34	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
36	ceasing	cease	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	37	amod	_	_
37	task	task	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	obl	_	_
38	to	to	PART	TO	_	39	mark	_	_
39	do	do	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	37	acl	_	SpaceAfter=No
40	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	11	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past | this wondrous sentinel |  |  |  | moment | away, far *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **flash** | gerund | this wondrous sentinel *not said here* |  |  | the distant sunshine |  |  | vn light\_emission-43.1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme in sunshine=Location |
| 3 | **revolve** | gerund | this wondrous sentinel *not said here* |  |  | the island of Crete |  | with immense strides | vn roll-51.3.1 «NP V PP.trajectory»: agent=Theme round island=Trajectory |
| 4 | **not** **cease** | gerund |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn stop-55.4-1-1 «NP.eventuality V»: agent=Eventuality |
| 5 | **is a** | past | sentinel | Crete's ceasing task |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 6 | **do** | to-infinitive | this wondrous sentinel *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn act-114-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |

<!-- .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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