---
title: The water was so clear that they could see the four kinds of fish sw… — The Arabian Nights Entertainments · tree and pragmatics
description: The water was so clear that they could see the four kinds of fish swimming about in it. Who acts: water, mountains, fish. A sentence of «The Arabian Nights Entertainments» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 5, 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/pg128/5/58/)

<!-- 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 Arabian Nights Entertainments](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg128/) / [Opening, part 5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg128/5/) / 58

# The Arabian Nights Entertainments, Opening, part 5, sentence 58

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
The water was so clear that they could see the four kinds of fish swimming about in it.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** water, mountains, fish · **What happens:** be, see, swim · **To what, where:** four kinds

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Arabian Nights Entertainments» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 5. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (water, mountains, fish), 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:pg128:5:58
# text = The water was so clear that they could see the four kinds of fish swimming about in it.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	water	water	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nsubj	_	_
3	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	cop	_	_
4	so	so	ADV	RB	_	5	advmod	_	_
5	clear	clear	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	_
6	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	9	mark	_	_
7	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	9	nsubj	_	_
8	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	9	aux	_	_
9	see	see	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	csubj	_	_
10	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
11	four	four	NUM	CD	NumForm=Word|NumType=Card	12	nummod	_	_
12	kinds	kind	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	9	obj	_	_
13	of	of	ADP	IN	_	14	case	_	_
14	fish	fish	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	12	nmod	_	_
15	swimming	swim	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	14	acl	_	_
16	about	about	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
17	in	in	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
18	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past | the water |  |  |  |  | clear *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **see** | could | mountains *= mountain* | the four kinds of fish |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer kind=Stimulus |
| 3 | **swim** | gerund | fish *not said here* |  |  |  |  | about water | vn run-51.3.2-1 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Theme about it=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.

<!-- div src -->

**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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 57](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg128/5/57/)
- next →: [sentence 59](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg128/5/59/)
- ↑ back to [Opening, part 5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg128/5/)