---
title: Instead of dingy velveteen he had brown fur, soft and shiny, his ear… — The Velveteen Rabbit · tree and pragmatics
description: Instead of dingy velveteen he had brown fur, soft and shiny, his ears twitched by themselves, and his whiskers were so long that they brushed the grass. Who acts: Rabbit, whiskers. A sentence of «The Velveteen Rabbit» by Margery Williams Bianco, Opening, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics o
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg11757/1/223/)

<!-- 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/) / 223

# The Velveteen Rabbit, Opening, sentence 223

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
Instead of dingy velveteen he had brown fur, soft and shiny, his ears twitched by themselves, and his whiskers were so long that they brushed the grass.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** Rabbit, whiskers · **What happens:** have, twitch, be, brush · **To what, where:** brown fur, ears, grass

<!-- .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 (Rabbit, whiskers), 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:pg11757:1:223
# text = Instead of dingy velveteen he had brown fur, soft and shiny, his ears twitched by themselves, and his whiskers were so long that they brushed the grass.
1	Instead	instead	ADV	RB	ExtPos=ADP	4	case	_	_
2	of	of	ADP	IN	_	1	fixed	_	_
3	dingy	dingy	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	amod	_	_
4	velveteen	velveteen	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	_
5	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	6	nsubj	_	_
6	had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
7	brown	brown	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	amod	_	_
8	fur	fur	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	10	punct	_	_
10	soft	soft	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	amod	_	_
11	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	12	cc	_	_
12	shiny	shiny	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	10	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
14	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	15	nmod:poss	_	_
15	ears	ear	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	8	conj	_	_
16	twitched	twitch	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	15	acl	_	_
17	by	by	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
18	themselves	themselves	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	16	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	25	punct	_	_
20	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	25	cc	_	_
21	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	22	nmod:poss	_	_
22	whiskers	whisker	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	25	nsubj	_	_
23	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	25	cop	_	_
24	so	so	ADV	RB	_	25	advmod	_	_
25	long	long	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	6	advmod	_	_
26	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	28	mark	_	_
27	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	28	nsubj	_	_
28	brushed	brush	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	25	advcl	_	_
29	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	30	det	_	_
30	grass	grass	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	28	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **have** | past | Rabbit | brown fur and Rabbit's ears |  |  |  | instead dingy velveteen | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent fur=Patient |
| 2 | **twitch** | participle |  | Rabbit's ears *not said here* |  |  |  | by ears *= ear* | vn body\_internal\_motion-49.1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **is** | past | Rabbit's whiskers |  |  |  |  | long *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **brush** | past | whiskers *= whisker* | the grass |  |  |  |  | vn spray-9.7-1 «NP V NP.theme»: agent=Agent grass=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:** «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 222](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg11757/1/222/)
- next →: [sentence 224](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg11757/1/224/)
- ↑ back to [Opening](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg11757/1/)