The Blue Fairy Book, The Master Cat; Or, Puss in Boots, sentence 12

He had often seen him play a great many cunning tricks to catch rats and mice, as when he used to hang by the heels, or hide himself in the meal, and make as if he were dead; so that he did not altogether despair of his affording him some help in his miserable condition.

Who acts: master, cat · What happens: see, play, catch, use, hang, hide · To what, where: cat, great many cunning tricks, rats, master, meal, miserable condition

This is a sentence of «The Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Master Cat; Or, Puss in Boots. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (master, cat), 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	He	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	4 seen	nsubj
2	had	have	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	4 seen	aux
3	often	often	ADV	_	4 seen	advmod
4	seen	see	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part	root	root
5	him	he	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	4 seen	obj
6	play	play	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	4 seen	xcomp
7	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	11 tricks	det
8	great	great	ADJ	Degree=Pos	11 tricks	amod
9	many	many	ADJ	Degree=Pos	11 tricks	amod
10	cunning	cunning	ADJ	Degree=Pos	11 tricks	amod
11	tricks	trick	NOUN	Number=Plur	6 play	obj
12	to	to	PART	_	13 catch	mark
13	catch	catch	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	6 play	advcl
14	rats	rat	NOUN	Number=Plur	13 catch	obj
15	and	and	CCONJ	_	16 mice	cc
16	mice	mouse	NOUN	Number=Plur	14 rats	conj
17	,	,	PUNCT	_	21 used	punct
18	as	as	SCONJ	_	21 used	mark
19	when	when	ADV	PronType=Int	21 used	advmod
20	he	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	21 used	nsubj
21	used	use	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	13 catch	advcl
22	to	to	PART	_	23 hang	mark
23	hang	hang	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	21 used	xcomp
24	by	by	ADP	_	26 heels	case
25	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	26 heels	det
26	heels	heel	NOUN	Number=Plur	23 hang	obl
27	,	,	PUNCT	_	29 hide	punct
28	or	or	CCONJ	_	29 hide	cc
29	hide	hide	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	23 hang	advcl
30	himself	himself	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs Reflex=Yes	29 hide	obj
31	in	in	ADP	_	33 meal	case
32	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	33 meal	det
33	meal	meal	NOUN	Number=Sing	29 hide	obl
34	,	,	PUNCT	_	36 make	punct
35	and	and	CCONJ	_	36 make	cc
36	make	make	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	6 play	conj
37	as	as	SCONJ	_	41 dead	mark
38	if	if	SCONJ	_	41 dead	mark
39	he	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	41 dead	nsubj
40	were	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	41 dead	cop
41	dead	dead	ADJ	Degree=Pos	36 make	advcl
42	;	;	PUNCT	_	49 despair	punct
43	so	so	SCONJ	_	49 despair	case
44	that	that	SCONJ	_	43 so	fixed
45	he	he	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	49 despair	nsubj
46	did	do	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	49 despair	aux
47	not	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	48 altogether	advmod
48	altogether	altogether	ADJ	Degree=Pos	49 despair	amod
49	despair	despair	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 seen	parataxis
50	of	of	SCONJ	_	52 affording	mark
51	his	his	PRON	Gender=Masc Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	52 affording	nsubj
52	affording	afford	VERB	VerbForm=Ger	49 despair	acl
53	him	he	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	52 affording	obj
54	some	some	DET	PronType=Ind	55 help	det
55	help	help	NOUN	Number=Sing	52 affording	obj
56	in	in	ADP	_	59 condition	case
57	his	his	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	59 condition	nmod:poss
58	miserable	miserable	ADJ	Degree=Pos	59 condition	amod
59	condition	condition	NOUN	Number=Sing	52 affording	obl
60	.	.	PUNCT	_	4 seen	punct

Pragmatics

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	where	other	roles by
1	see	past · perfect	master	cat		often property	tree rules
2	play	infinitive	cat not said here	a great many cunning tricks			vn use-105.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent trick=Theme
3	catch	to-infinitive	cat not said here	rats and mice			vn get-13.5.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent rat=Theme
4	use	past	master				vn use-105.1 «NP V NP S_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality
5	hang	to-infinitive	master not said here			by the heels	vn assuming_position-50 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent by heel=Location
6	hide	infinitive	master not said here	master	the meal		vn concealment-16-1 «NP V NP PP.location»: agent=Agent himself=Patient in meal=Location
7	make	infinitive	cat not said here				vn build-26.1-1 «NP.asset V NP»: agent=Asset
8	is	past	master			dead property	tree rules
9	afford	gerund	master	cat	master's miserable condition		tree rules
10	condition		master				nom condition «state transitive»: poss=agent

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 Blue Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 503 (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/pg503/21/12/