Exam question 2 · English Fairy Tales, Johnny-Cake, part 1: Mr. Fox is cut t…

By what means did Lady Mary's brothers and friends dispatch Mr. Fox?

Mova's choice: option 2 · The right answer: option 2 · right ✓ · Who acts: Mary brothers · What happens: mean, dispatch · To what, where: Mr. Fox · Speech: someone speaks here

This is exam question 2 of lesson 1965 «English Fairy Tales, Johnny-Cake, part 1: Mr. Fox is cut to pieces, Lazy Jack wins a bride, and a cake escapes from the oven» of the books course of Mova's primary school, asked in stiff, formal language. The page gives the question's syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause, then the 4 options as the student saw them, each with its tree and pragmatics. Every text is parsed by Mova itself. How the student answered it, with the score of every option and why: the test at school.

The question

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	By	by	SCONJ	_	3 means	mark
2	what	what	PRON	PronType=Int	3 means	nsubj
3	means	mean	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
4	did	do	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=1 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	6 Mary	aux
5	Lady	Lady	PROPN	Number=Sing	6 Mary	compound
6	Mary	Mary	PROPN	Number=Sing	8 brothers	compound
7	's	's	PART	_	6 Mary	case
8	brothers	brother	NOUN	Number=Plur	11 dispatch	nsubj
9	and	and	CCONJ	_	10 friends	cc
10	friends	friend	NOUN	Number=Plur	8 brothers	conj
11	dispatch	dispatch	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	3 means	ccomp
12	Mr.	Mr.	PROPN	Number=Sing	13 Fox	compound
13	Fox	fox	NOUN	Number=Sing	11 dispatch	obj
14	?	?	PUNCT	_	3 means	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	mean	present							vn intend-61.2-1 «NP V S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic
2	dispatch	present	Mary brothers and friends	Mr. Fox					vn murder-42.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent fox=Patient

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.

The options

Option 1

by hanging him high

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	by	by	SCONJ	_	2 hanging	mark
2	hanging	hang	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	root	root
3	him	he	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 hanging	obj
4	high	high	ADJ	Degree=Pos	2 hanging	xcomp

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	hang	gerund		him = he				high property	vn poison-42.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent he=Patient

Option 2 · ← Mova's choice · ✓ the right answer

by cutting him into pieces

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	by	by	SCONJ	_	2 cutting	mark
2	cutting	cut	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	root	root
3	him	he	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 cutting	obj
4	into	into	ADP	_	5 pieces	case
5	pieces	piece	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 cutting	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	cut	gerund		him = he		pieces			vn build-26.1-1 «NP V NP.material PP.product»: agent=Agent he=Material into piece=Product

Option 3

by burning him alive

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	by	by	SCONJ	_	2 burning	mark
2	burning	burn	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	root	root
3	him	he	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 burning	obj
4	alive	alive	ADJ	Degree=Pos	2 burning	xcomp

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	burn	gerund		him = he				alive property	vn light_emission-43.1 «NP V NP.theme»: agent=Agent he=Theme

Option 4

by chasing him out and cutting him up

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	by	by	SCONJ	_	2 chasing	mark
2	chasing	chase	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	root	root
3	him	he	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 chasing	obj
4	out	out	ADP	_	2 chasing	compound:prt
5	and	and	CCONJ	_	6 cutting	cc
6	cutting	cut	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	2 chasing	conj
7	him	he	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	6 cutting	obj
8	up	up	ADP	_	6 cutting	compound:prt

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	chase out	gerund		him = he					vn chase-51.6 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent he=Theme
2	cut up	gerund		him = he					vn build-26.1-1 «NP.asset V NP»: agent=Asset he=Product

Text: the tests of Mova's primary school, written for Mova (world/data/school/), as the course runner gave them to the student. Trees: Mova's own parse — the en model on the CPU, when the site is built — not checked by a teacher; they may be wrong. Frames: Mova's frames reader (prag), each text read on its own. Elamur Cosmic License.

This page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/questions/books/1965-pg7439-part24/e2/