The Book of Dragons, Opening, part 8, sentence 113
Suddenly there was a flapping of wings, and the white grouse perched on the dragon's head and said: "Can I be of any assistance?"
Who acts: flapping, white grouse · What happens: be, perch, say, flap · To what, where: white grouse, head, wings · Speech: someone speaks here
This is a sentence of «The Book of Dragons» by E. Nesbit, Opening, part 8. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (flapping, white grouse), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.
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
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Suddenly | suddenly | ADV | _ | 3 was | advmod |
| 2 | there | there | PRON | PronType=Dem | 3 was | expl |
| 3 | was | be | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 20 said | parataxis |
| 4 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 5 flapping | det |
| 5 | flapping | flapping | NOUN | Number=Sing | 3 was | nsubj |
| 6 | of | of | ADP | _ | 7 wings | case |
| 7 | wings | wing | NOUN | Number=Plur | 5 flapping | nmod |
| 8 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 20 said | punct |
| 9 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 20 said | cc |
| 10 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 12 grouse | det |
| 11 | white | white | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 12 grouse | amod |
| 12 | grouse | grouse | NOUN | Number=Sing | 20 said | nsubj |
| 13 | perched | perch | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | 12 grouse | acl |
| 14 | on | on | ADP | _ | 18 head | case |
| 15 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 16 dragon | det |
| 16 | dragon | dragon | NOUN | Number=Sing | 18 head | nmod:poss |
| 17 | 's | 's | PART | _ | 16 dragon | case |
| 18 | head | head | NOUN | Number=Sing | 13 perched | obl |
| 19 | and | and | CCONJ | _ | 20 said | cc |
| 20 | said | say | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 21 | : | : | PUNCT | _ | 28 assistance | punct |
| 22 | " | " | PUNCT | _ | 28 assistance | punct |
| 23 | Can | can | AUX | VerbForm=Fin | 28 assistance | aux |
| 24 | I | I | PRON | Case=Nom Number=Sing Person=1 PronType=Prs | 28 assistance | nsubj |
| 25 | be | be | AUX | VerbForm=Inf | 28 assistance | cop |
| 26 | of | of | ADP | _ | 28 assistance | case |
| 27 | any | any | DET | PronType=Ind | 28 assistance | det |
| 28 | assistance | assistance | NOUN | Number=Sing | 20 said | ccomp |
| 29 | ? | ? | PUNCT | _ | 28 assistance | punct |
| 30 | " | " | PUNCT | _ | 28 assistance | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | be | past | a flapping of wings | there | suddenly property | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme | |||
| 2 | perch | participle | the white grouse not said here | the dragon's head | vn assuming_position-50 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent on head=Location | ||||
| 3 | say speech: ask | past | the white grouse | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent | |||||
| 4 | is in a quote | can | the white grouse = grouse | of any assistance | tree rules | ||||
| 5 | flap | wings | nom flapping «event transitive»: of=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.
Text: «The Book of Dragons» by E. Nesbit, Project Gutenberg book 23661 (public domain in the USA). Tree: Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. Frames: Mova's frames reader (prag), the chapter read in order.
This page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg23661/8/113/