---
title: He sat still in the bracken, and hoped that the other rabbits wouldn… — The Velveteen Rabbit · tree and pragmatics
description: He sat still in the bracken, and hoped that the other rabbits wouldn't notice. Who acts: back, other rabbits. A sentence of «The Velveteen Rabbit» by Margery Williams Bianco, Opening, 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/pg11757/1/111/)

<!-- 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/) / [The Velveteen Rabbit](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg11757/) / [Opening](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg11757/1/) / 111

# The Velveteen Rabbit, Opening, sentence 111

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
He sat still in the bracken, and hoped that the other rabbits wouldn't notice.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** back, other rabbits · **What happens:** sit, hope, not notice · **To what, where:** bracken · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Velveteen Rabbit» by Margery Williams Bianco, Opening. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (back, other rabbits), 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:pg11757:1:111
# text = He sat still in the bracken, and hoped that the other rabbits wouldn't notice.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	sat	sit	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	still	still	ADV	RB	_	2	advmod	_	_
4	in	in	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	bracken	bracken	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	_
8	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	9	cc	_	_
9	hoped	hope	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
10	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	16	mark	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
12	other	other	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	13	amod	_	_
13	rabbits	rabbit	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	16	nsubj	_	_
14	would	would	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	16	aux	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	n't	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	16	advmod	_	_
16	notice	notice	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	9	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **sit** | past | back |  |  | the bracken | still |  | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent in bracken=Location |
| 2 | **hope** | past | back *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn long-32.2 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Pivot clause=Theme |
| 3 | **not** **notice** | would | the other rabbits |  |  |  |  |  | vn see-30.1-1 «NP V S\_ING»: agent=Experiencer |

<!-- .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:** «The Velveteen Rabbit» by Margery Williams Bianco, Project Gutenberg book 11757 (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 110](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg11757/1/110/)
- next →: [sentence 112](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg11757/1/112/)
- ↑ back to [Opening](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg11757/1/)