---
title: As soon as they saw the little tailor, they said to themselves, "A l… — Grimm's Fairy Stories · tree and pragmatics
description: As soon as they saw the little tailor, they said to themselves, "A little fellow like this could creep through a keyhole, and aid us greatly." Who acts: robbers, little fellow. A sentence of «Grimm's Fairy Stories» by Jacob Grimm, The Travels of Tom Thumb, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics
---

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# Grimm's Fairy Stories, The Travels of Tom Thumb, sentence 17

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
As soon as they saw the little tailor, they said to themselves, "A little fellow like this could creep through a keyhole, and aid us greatly."

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**Who acts:** robbers, little fellow · **What happens:** see, say, creep, aid · **To what, where:** little tailor, robbers, keyhole, us · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Grimm's Fairy Stories» by Jacob Grimm, The Travels of Tom Thumb. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (robbers, little fellow), 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:pg11027:22:17
# text = As soon as they saw the little tailor, they said to themselves, "A little fellow like this could creep through a keyhole, and aid us greatly."
1	As	as	ADV	RB	_	2	advmod	_	_
2	soon	soon	ADV	RB	Degree=Pos	5	advmod	_	_
3	as	as	SCONJ	IN	_	5	mark	_	_
4	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
5	saw	see	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
7	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	amod	_	_
8	tailor	tailor	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
10	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
11	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	conj	_	_
12	to	to	ADP	IN	_	13	case	_	_
13	themselves	themselves	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	11	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	22	punct	_	_
15	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	22	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	A	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	18	det	_	_
17	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	18	amod	_	_
18	fellow	fellow	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	22	nsubj	_	_
19	like	like	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
20	this	this	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	18	nmod	_	_
21	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	22	aux	_	_
22	creep	creep	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	11	ccomp	_	_
23	through	through	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
24	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	25	det	_	_
25	keyhole	keyhole	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	22	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	28	punct	_	_
27	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	28	cc	_	_
28	aid	aid	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	22	conj	_	_
29	us	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	28	obj	_	_
30	greatly	greatly	ADV	RB	_	28	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	22	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
32	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	22	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **see** | past | robbers *= robber* | the little tailor |  |  |  | soon *property* | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer tailor=Stimulus |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | robbers *= robber* |  | robbers *= robber* |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V PP.recipient S-Quote»: agent=Agent to themselves=Recipient clause=Topic |
| 3 | **creep** *in a quote* | could | a little fellow like this |  |  | a keyhole |  |  | vn run-51.3.2 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme through keyhole=Trajectory |
| 4 | **aid** *in a quote* | infinitive | a little fellow like this *not said here* |  | us |  |  | greatly *property* | vn help-72.1-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent we=Beneficiary |

<!-- .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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