---
title: He was just about to draw them when he saw the Caliph approaching. — The Arabian Nights Entertainments · tree and pragmatics
description: He was just about to draw them when he saw the Caliph approaching. Who acts: fisherman, Caliph. A sentence of «The Arabian Nights Entertainments» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 30, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Arabian Nights Entertainments, Opening, part 30, sentence 6

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He was just about to draw them when he saw the Caliph approaching.

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**Who acts:** fisherman, Caliph · **What happens:** be, see, approach · **To what, where:** Caliph

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This is a sentence of «The Arabian Nights Entertainments» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 30. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (fisherman, Caliph), 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:pg128:30:6
# text = He was just about to draw them when he saw the Caliph approaching.
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	6	nsubj	_	_
2	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	cop	_	_
3	just	just	ADV	RB	_	4	advmod	_	_
4	about	about	ADV	RB	_	6	advmod	_	_
5	to	to	PART	TO	_	6	mark	_	_
6	draw	draw	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
7	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	6	obj	_	_
8	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	10	advmod	_	_
9	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	10	nsubj	_	_
10	saw	see	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	advcl	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	Caliph	Caliph	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	10	obj	_	_
13	approaching	approach	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	10	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past | fisherman |  |  |  |  | about, draw *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **see** | past | fisherman | the Caliph |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **approach** | gerund | the Caliph *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |

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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:** «The Arabian Nights Entertainments» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 128 (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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