---
title: This counsel was very distasteful to me, but I thought I could not d… — The Arabian Nights Entertainments · tree and pragmatics
description: This counsel was very distasteful to me, but I thought I could not do otherwise than adopt it. Who acts: counsel, I. A sentence of «The Arabian Nights Entertainments» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 8, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Arabian Nights Entertainments, Opening, part 8, sentence 59

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This counsel was very distasteful to me, but I thought I could not do otherwise than adopt it.

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**Who acts:** counsel, I · **What happens:** be, think, not do, adopt · **To what, where:** me, counsel · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Arabian Nights Entertainments» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 8. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (counsel, I), 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:pg128:8:59
# text = This counsel was very distasteful to me, but I thought I could not do otherwise than adopt it.
1	This	this	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	2	det	_	_
2	counsel	counsel	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nsubj	_	_
3	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	cop	_	_
4	very	very	ADV	RB	_	5	advmod	_	_
5	distasteful	distasteful	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	_
6	to	to	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
7	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	5	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
9	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	11	cc	_	_
10	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
11	thought	think	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	parataxis	_	_
12	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	15	nsubj	_	_
13	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	15	aux	_	_
14	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	15	advmod	_	_
15	do	do	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	11	ccomp	_	_
16	otherwise	otherwise	ADV	RB	_	15	advmod	_	_
17	than	than	SCONJ	IN	_	18	mark	_	_
18	adopt	adopt	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	15	advcl	_	_
19	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	18	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is** | past | this counsel |  | me |  |  | distasteful *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **think** *speech: other* | past | I |  |  |  |  |  | vn consider-29.9-2 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent clause=Theme |
| 3 | **not** **do** | could | I |  |  |  |  | otherwise *property* | vn act-114-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 4 | **adopt** | infinitive | I *not said here* | counsel |  |  |  |  | vn appoint-29.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent it=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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