---
title: "Well, then, question first--where is the centre of the round earth?… — More English Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: "Well, then, question first--where is the centre of the round earth?" said the King. Who acts: question. A sentence of «More English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, More English Fairy Tales, part 14, 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/pg14241/28/55/)

<!-- 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/) / [More English Fairy Tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg14241/) / [More English Fairy Tales, part 14](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg14241/28/) / 55

# More English Fairy Tales, More English Fairy Tales, part 14, sentence 55

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
"Well, then, question first--where is the centre of the round earth?" said the King.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** question · **What happens:** be, say · **To what, where:** centre · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «More English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, More English Fairy Tales, part 14. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (question), 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:pg14241:28:55
# text = "Well, then, question first--where is the centre of the round earth?" said the King.
1	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	6	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Well	well	INTJ	UH	_	6	discourse	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	2	punct	_	_
4	then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	6	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	_
6	question	question	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	nsubj	_	_
7	first	first	ADV	RB	NumForm=Word|NumType=Ord	6	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	--	--	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	where	where	ADV	WRB	PronType=Rel	12	advmod	_	_
10	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	12	cop	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	centre	centre	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	appos	_	_
13	of	of	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
14	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
15	round	round	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	16	amod	_	_
16	earth	earth	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	12	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	12	punct	_	_
19	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
20	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	21	det	_	_
21	King	King	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	19	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	19	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** *in a quote* | present |  | the centre |  |  |  | of the round earth | tree rules |
| 2 | **say** *speech: ask* | past | question |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |

<!-- .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:** «More English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Project Gutenberg book 14241 (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 54](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg14241/28/54/)
- next →: [sentence 56](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg14241/28/56/)
- ↑ back to [More English Fairy Tales, part 14](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg14241/28/)