Exam question 4 · Old Tales, Whittington and His Cat, part 27: Dick's cat wi…

What was the response of the court when the captain brought the cat before the king and queen?

Mova's choice: option 3 · The right answer: option 3 · right ✓ · Who acts: captain · What happens: be, bring · To what, where: response, cat

This is exam question 4 of lesson 1968 «Old Tales, Whittington and His Cat, part 27: Dick's cat wins his place at court across the sea» 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	What	what	PRON	PronType=Int	4 response	nsubj
2	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	4 response	cop
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 response	det
4	response	response	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root
5	of	of	ADP	_	7 court	case
6	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	7 court	det
7	court	court	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 response	nmod
8	when	when	ADV	PronType=Int	11 brought	advmod
9	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	10 captain	det
10	captain	captain	NOUN	Number=Sing	11 brought	nsubj
11	brought	bring	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	4 response	advcl
12	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	13 cat	det
13	cat	cat	NOUN	Number=Sing	11 brought	obj
14	before	before	ADP	_	16 king	case
15	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	16 king	det
16	king	king	NOUN	Number=Sing	11 brought	obl
17	and	and	CCONJ	_	18 queen	cc
18	queen	queen	NOUN	Number=Sing	16 king	conj
19	?	?	PUNCT	_	4 response	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is a	past		the response				of the court	tree rules
2	bring	past	the captain	the cat			before the king and queen		vn bring-11.3-1 «NP V NP PP.destination»: agent=Agent cat=Theme before king=Destination

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

The king was delighted with the animal

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 king	det
2	king	king	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 delighted	nsubj
3	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	4 delighted	cop
4	delighted	delighted	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root
5	with	with	ADP	_	7 animal	case
6	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	7 animal	det
7	animal	animal	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 delighted	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	past	the king					with the animal; delighted property	tree rules

Option 2

The queen wanted to buy the animal

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 queen	det
2	queen	queen	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 wanted	nsubj
3	wanted	want	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
4	to	to	PART	_	5 buy	mark
5	buy	buy	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	3 wanted	xcomp
6	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	7 animal	det
7	animal	animal	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 buy	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	want	past	the queen						vn want-32.1-1-1 «NP V NP S_INF»: agent=Pivot clause=Theme
2	buy not said to happen	to-infinitive	the queen not said here	the animal					vn accept-77.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent animal=Theme

Option 3 · ← Mova's choice · ✓ the right answer

The queen was afraid to touch the animal

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	The	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	2 queen	det
2	queen	queen	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 afraid	nsubj
3	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	4 afraid	cop
4	afraid	afraid	ADJ	Degree=Pos	root	root
5	to	to	PART	_	6 touch	mark
6	touch	touch	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	4 afraid	xcomp
7	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	8 animal	det
8	animal	animal	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 touch	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is	past	the queen					afraid property	tree rules
2	touch	to-infinitive	the queen not said here	the animal					vn contiguous_location-47.8-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme animal=Co-Theme

Option 4

They wanted the cat gone

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	They	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	2 wanted	nsubj
2	wanted	want	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	4 cat	det
4	cat	cat	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 wanted	obj
5	gone	go	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	4 cat	acl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	want	past	They	the cat					vn want-32.1-1-1 «NP V NP ADV»: agent=Pivot cat=Theme
2	go	participle		the cat not said here					vn disappearance-48.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme

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/1968-pg7439-part27/e4/