---
title: "It was silly of you to do so," said Fred, "to grease the roads with… — Grimm's Fairy Stories · tree and pragmatics
description: "It was silly of you to do so," said Fred, "to grease the roads with butter, and to roll cheese down the hill!" Who acts: cheese, Fred. A sentence of «Grimm's Fairy Stories» by Jacob Grimm, Catherine and Frederick, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Grimm's Fairy Stories, Catherine and Frederick, sentence 56

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
"It was silly of you to do so," said Fred, "to grease the roads with butter, and to roll cheese down the hill!"

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** cheese, Fred · **What happens:** be, do, say, grease, roll · **To what, where:** roads, cheese, hill · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Grimm's Fairy Stories» by Jacob Grimm, Catherine and Frederick. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (cheese, Fred), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**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:pg11027:12:56
# text = "It was silly of you to do so," said Fred, "to grease the roads with butter, and to roll cheese down the hill!"
1	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	It	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
3	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	cop	_	_
4	silly	silly	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	12	ccomp	_	_
5	of	of	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
6	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Person=2|PronType=Prs	4	obl	_	_
7	to	to	PART	TO	_	8	mark	_	_
8	do	do	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	advcl	_	_
9	so	so	ADV	RB	_	8	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	4	punct	_	_
12	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
13	Fred	Fred	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	12	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
15	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	17	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	to	to	PART	TO	_	17	mark	_	_
17	grease	grease	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	12	ccomp	_	_
18	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
19	roads	road	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	17	obj	_	_
20	with	with	ADP	IN	_	21	case	_	_
21	butter	butter	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	25	punct	_	_
23	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	25	cc	_	_
24	to	to	PART	TO	_	25	mark	_	_
25	roll	roll	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	17	conj	_	_
26	cheese	cheese	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	obj	_	_
27	down	down	ADP	IN	_	29	case	_	_
28	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	29	det	_	_
29	hill	hill	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	25	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	17	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	17	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** *in a quote* | past | cheese |  |  |  |  | of you; silly *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **do** *in a quote* | to-infinitive | cheese *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn act-114-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **say** *speech: express* | past | Fred |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 4 | **grease** *in a quote* | to-infinitive |  | the roads |  |  |  | with butter | vn butter-9.9 «NP V NP PP.theme»: agent=Agent road=Destination with butter=Theme |
| 5 | **roll** *in a quote* | to-infinitive |  | cheese |  | the hill |  |  | vn run-51.3.2-2 «NP V NP PP.trajectory»: agent=Agent cheese=Theme down hill=Trajectory |

<!-- .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.

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**Text:** «Grimm's Fairy Stories» by Jacob Grimm, Project Gutenberg book 11027 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

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