---
title: He lay quite still, and in a moment he heard a voice saying, "Can yo… — The Arabian Nights Entertainments · tree and pragmatics
description: He lay quite still, and in a moment he heard a voice saying, "Can you guess whom this man is that we have saved from death?" Who acts: dervish, you, man, we. A sentence of «The Arabian Nights Entertainments» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 9, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause
---

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# The Arabian Nights Entertainments, Opening, part 9, sentence 60

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He lay quite still, and in a moment he heard a voice saying, "Can you guess whom this man is that we have saved from death?"

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** dervish, you, man, we · **What happens:** lie, hear, say, guess, be, save · **To what, where:** voice, death · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Arabian Nights Entertainments» by Andrew Lang, Opening, part 9. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (dervish, you, man, we), 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:pg128:9:60
# text = He lay quite still, and in a moment he heard a voice saying, "Can you guess whom this man is that we have saved from death?"
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	lay	lie	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	quite	quite	ADV	RB	_	4	advmod	_	_
4	still	still	ADV	RB	_	2	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
6	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	11	cc	_	_
7	in	in	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
8	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
9	moment	moment	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obl	_	_
10	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	nsubj	_	_
11	heard	hear	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	2	conj	_	_
12	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
13	voice	voice	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	11	obj	_	_
14	saying	say	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	11	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
16	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	19	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	Can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	19	aux	_	_
18	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	19	nsubj	_	_
19	guess	guess	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	14	ccomp	_	_
20	whom	whom	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	19	obj	_	_
21	this	this	DET	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	22	det	_	_
22	man	man	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	nsubj	_	_
23	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	20	cop	_	_
24	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	27	mark	_	_
25	we	we	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=1|PronType=Prs	27	nsubj	_	_
26	have	have	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	27	aux	_	_
27	saved	save	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	19	advcl	_	_
28	from	from	ADP	IN	_	29	case	_	_
29	death	death	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	27	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
30	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **lie** | past | dervish |  |  |  | still |  | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **hear** | past | dervish | a voice |  |  | moment |  | vn see-30.1-1-1 «NP V S»: agent=Experiencer voice=Stimulus |
| 3 | **say** *speech: ask* | gerund | dervish *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 4 | **guess** *in a quote* | can | you |  |  |  |  |  | vn conjecture-29.5-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |
| 5 | **is a** *in a quote* | present | this man |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 6 | **save** *in a quote* | present · perfect | we |  |  | death |  |  | vn get-13.5.1-1 «NP V NP PP.source»: agent=Agent from death=Source |

<!-- .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.

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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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