---
title: “But perhaps it was only sobbing,” she thought, and looked into its… — Alice's Adventures in Wonderland · tree and pragmatics
description: “But perhaps it was only sobbing,” she thought, and looked into its eyes again, to see if there were any tears. Who acts: doubt, Alice, tears. A sentence of «Alice's Adventures in Wonderland» by Lewis Carroll, Chapter VI. Pig and Pepper, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg11/7/82/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [Alice's Adventures in Wonderland](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg11/) / [Chapter VI. Pig and Pepper](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg11/7/) / 82

# Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, Chapter VI. Pig and Pepper, sentence 82

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
“But perhaps it was only sobbing,” she thought, and looked into its eyes again, to see if there were any tears.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** doubt, Alice, tears · **What happens:** sob, think, look, see, be · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Alice's Adventures in Wonderland» by Lewis Carroll, Chapter VI. Pig and Pepper. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (doubt, Alice, tears), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**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 {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg11:7:82
# text = “But perhaps it was only sobbing,” she thought, and looked into its eyes again, to see if there were any tears.
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	7	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	But	but	CCONJ	CC	_	7	cc	_	_
3	perhaps	perhaps	ADV	RB	_	7	advmod	_	_
4	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	nsubj	_	_
5	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	aux	_	_
6	only	only	ADV	RB	_	7	advmod	_	_
7	sobbing	sob	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	11	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	7	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	7	punct	_	_
10	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
11	thought	think	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
13	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	14	cc	_	_
14	looked	look	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	11	ccomp	_	_
15	into	into	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
16	its	its	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	17	nmod:poss	_	_
17	eyes	eye	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	14	obl	_	_
18	again	again	ADV	RB	_	14	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
20	to	to	PART	TO	_	21	mark	_	_
21	see	see	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	14	conj	_	_
22	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	24	mark	_	_
23	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	24	expl	_	_
24	were	be	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	21	ccomp	_	_
25	any	any	DET	DT	PronType=Ind	26	det	_	_
26	tears	tear	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	24	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	11	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **sob** *in a quote* | past · progressive | doubt |  |  |  |  | perhaps *property* | vn nonverbal\_expression-40.2 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **think** *speech: other* | past | Alice |  |  |  |  |  | vn consider-29.9-2 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent clause=Theme |
| 3 | **look** | past |  |  |  |  | again | into doubt's eyes | vn peer-30.3 «NP V PP.theme»: agent=Agent into eye=Theme |
| 4 | **see** | to-infinitive |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V how S\_INF»: agent=Experiencer clause=Stimulus |
| 5 | **be** *a condition, not said to happen* | past | any tears |  |  | there |  |  | vn exist-47.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |

<!-- .note -->
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.

<!-- div src -->

**Text:** «Alice's Adventures in Wonderland» by Lewis Carroll, Project Gutenberg book 11 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 81](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg11/7/81/)
- next →: [sentence 83](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg11/7/83/)
- ↑ back to [Chapter VI. Pig and Pepper](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg11/7/)