The Orange Fairy Book, Opening, part 12, sentence 75

Things went on like this for some weeks, when, one day, as the king's son was riding through the forest, he heard some strange birds singing more sweetly than birds had ever sung before.

Who acts: Things, son, strange birds · What happens: go on, ride, hear, sing · To what, where: forest, strange birds

This is a sentence of «The Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 12. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Things, son, strange birds), 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	Things	thing	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 went	nsubj
2	went	go	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
3	on	on	ADP	_	2 went	compound:prt
4	like	like	ADP	_	5 this	case
5	this	this	PRON	Number=Sing PronType=Dem	2 went	obl
6	for	for	ADP	_	8 weeks	case
7	some	some	DET	PronType=Ind	8 weeks	det
8	weeks	week	NOUN	Number=Plur	2 went	obl
9	,	,	PUNCT	_	10 when	punct
10	when	when	ADV	PronType=Int	2 went	parataxis
11	,	,	PUNCT	_	13 day	punct
12	one	one	NUM	NumForm=Word NumType=Card	13 day	nummod
13	day	day	NOUN	Number=Sing	2 went	obl
14	,	,	PUNCT	_	21 riding	punct
15	as	as	SCONJ	_	21 riding	mark
16	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	17 king	det
17	king	king	NOUN	Number=Sing	19 son	nmod:poss
18	's	's	PART	_	17 king	case
19	son	son	NOUN	Number=Sing	21 riding	nsubj
20	was	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	21 riding	aux
21	riding	ride	VERB	Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part	2 went	advcl
22	through	through	ADP	_	24 forest	case
23	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	24 forest	det
24	forest	forest	NOUN	Number=Sing	21 riding	obl
25	,	,	PUNCT	_	27 heard	punct
26	he	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	27 heard	nsubj
27	heard	hear	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	2 went	conj
28	some	some	DET	PronType=Ind	30 birds	det
29	strange	strange	ADJ	Degree=Pos	30 birds	amod
30	birds	bird	NOUN	Number=Plur	27 heard	obj
31	singing	sing	VERB	VerbForm=Ger	30 birds	acl
32	more	more	ADV	Degree=Cmp	33 sweetly	advmod
33	sweetly	sweetly	ADV	_	38 sung	advmod
34	than	than	ADP	_	35 birds	case
35	birds	bird	NOUN	Number=Plur	38 sung	obl
36	had	have	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	38 sung	aux
37	ever	ever	ADV	PronType=Ind	38 sung	advmod
38	sung	sing	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part	31 singing	advcl
39	before	before	ADV	_	38 sung	advmod
40	.	.	PUNCT	_	2 went	punct

Pragmatics

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	go on	past	Things			day; week	like this	vn function-105.2.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme
2	ride	past · progressive	the king's son		the forest			vn nonvehicle-51.4.2 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent through forest=Trajectory
3	hear	past	son	some strange birds				vn see-30.1-1-1 «NP V S»: agent=Experiencer bird=Stimulus
4	sing speech: express	gerund	some strange birds not said here					vn sound_emission-43.2 «NP V»: agent=Theme
5	sing speech: express	past · perfect	some strange birds not said here			ever	than birds; before, sweetly property	vn sound_emission-43.2 «NP V»: agent=Theme

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 Orange Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 3027 (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/pg3027/12/75/