---
title: The mother was heartily vexed at this, for in those days no lassie h… — More English Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: The mother was heartily vexed at this, for in those days no lassie had any chance of a good husband unless she was an industrious spinster. Who acts: lassie, mother, good husband. A sentence of «More English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, More English Fairy Tales, part 16, with its dependency tree a
---

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# More English Fairy Tales, More English Fairy Tales, part 16, sentence 160

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The mother was heartily vexed at this, for in those days no lassie had any chance of a good husband unless she was an industrious spinster.

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**Who acts:** lassie, mother, good husband · **What happens:** vex, have, be, chance · **To what, where:** mother, this, chance, industrious spinster

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This is a sentence of «More English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, More English Fairy Tales, part 16. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (lassie, mother, good husband), 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:pg14241:30:160
# text = The mother was heartily vexed at this, for in those days no lassie had any chance of a good husband unless she was an industrious spinster.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	mother	mother	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nsubj:pass	_	_
3	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	aux:pass	_	_
4	heartily	heartily	ADV	RB	_	5	advmod	_	_
5	vexed	vex	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	_
6	at	at	ADP	IN	_	7	case	_	_
7	this	this	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	5	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
9	for	for	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
10	in	in	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
11	those	that	DET	DT	Number=Plur|PronType=Dem	12	det	_	_
12	days	day	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	15	obl	_	_
13	no	no	DET	DT	PronType=Neg	14	det	_	_
14	lassie	lassie	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	nsubj	_	_
15	had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	conj	_	_
16	any	any	DET	DT	PronType=Ind	17	det	_	_
17	chance	chance	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obj	_	_
18	of	of	ADP	IN	_	21	case	_	_
19	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	21	det	_	_
20	good	good	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	21	amod	_	_
21	husband	husband	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	nmod	_	_
22	unless	unless	SCONJ	IN	_	27	mark	_	_
23	she	she	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	27	nsubj	_	_
24	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	27	cop	_	_
25	an	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	27	det	_	_
26	industrious	industrious	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	27	amod	_	_
27	spinster	spinster	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **vex** | past · passive |  | the mother |  | this |  | heartily *property* | vn amuse-31.1 «NP V NP»: subject=Experiencer |
| 2 | **have** | past | no lassie | any chance of a good husband |  |  | day |  | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent chance=Patient |
| 3 | **is a** *a condition, not said to happen* | past | mother | a industrious spinster |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **chance** |  | a good husband |  |  |  |  |  | nom chance «state intransitive»: of=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.

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**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.

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