The Brown Fairy Book, The Brown Fairy Book, part 18, sentence 9
But before he had time to close his eyes there was a great noise in the trees near by, as if a big heavy body was crashing through them.
Who acts: lion, great noise, big heavy body · What happens: have, close, be, crash · To what, where: eyes
This is a sentence of «The Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Brown Fairy Book, part 18. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (lion, great noise, big heavy body), 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 | But | but | CCONJ | _ | 11 was | cc |
| 2 | before | before | SCONJ | _ | 4 had | mark |
| 3 | he | he | PRON | Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs | 4 had | nsubj |
| 4 | had | have | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 11 was | advcl |
| 5 | time | time | NOUN | Number=Sing | 4 had | obj |
| 6 | to | to | PART | _ | 7 close | mark |
| 7 | close | close | VERB | VerbForm=Inf | 5 time | acl |
| 8 | his | his | PRON | Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs | 9 eyes | nmod:poss |
| 9 | eyes | eye | NOUN | Number=Plur | 7 close | obj |
| 10 | there | there | PRON | PronType=Dem | 11 was | expl |
| 11 | was | be | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 12 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 14 noise | det |
| 13 | great | great | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 14 noise | amod |
| 14 | noise | noise | NOUN | Number=Sing | 11 was | nsubj |
| 15 | in | in | ADP | _ | 17 trees | case |
| 16 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 17 trees | det |
| 17 | trees | tree | NOUN | Number=Plur | 14 noise | nmod |
| 18 | near | near | ADV | _ | 17 trees | advmod |
| 19 | by | by | ADP | _ | 18 near | fixed |
| 20 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 28 crashing | punct |
| 21 | as | as | SCONJ | _ | 28 crashing | mark |
| 22 | if | if | SCONJ | _ | 28 crashing | mark |
| 23 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 26 body | det |
| 24 | big | big | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 26 body | amod |
| 25 | heavy | heavy | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 26 body | amod |
| 26 | body | body | NOUN | Number=Sing | 28 crashing | nsubj |
| 27 | was | be | AUX | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin | 28 crashing | aux |
| 28 | crashing | crash | VERB | Tense=Pres VerbForm=Part | 11 was | advcl |
| 29 | through | through | ADP | _ | 30 them | case |
| 30 | them | they | PRON | Case=Acc Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs | 28 crashing | obl |
| 31 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 11 was | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | have | past | lion | time | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent | ||||
| 2 | close | to-infinitive | lion not said here | lion's eyes | vn crane-40.3.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent eye=Patient | ||||
| 3 | be | past | a great noise in the trees | there | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme | ||||
| 4 | crash | past · progressive | a big heavy body | through trees = tree | vn sound_emission-43.2 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme through they=Location |
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 Brown Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 3282 (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/pg3282/18/9/