---
title: The fox and his wife they had a great strife, They never ate mustard… — More English Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: The fox and his wife they had a great strife, They never ate mustard in all their whole life; They ate their meat without fork or knife And loved to be picking a bone, e-ho! Who acts: fox. A sentence of «More English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, More English Fairy Tales, part 17, with its dependen
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg14241/31/53/)

<!-- 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 17](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg14241/31/) / 53

# More English Fairy Tales, More English Fairy Tales, part 17, sentence 53

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
The fox and his wife they had a great strife, They never ate mustard in all their whole life; They ate their meat without fork or knife And loved to be picking a bone, e-ho!

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** fox · **What happens:** have, not eat, eat, love, pick · **To what, where:** great strife, mustard, whole life, meat, bone

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «More English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, More English Fairy Tales, part 17. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (fox), 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:pg14241:31:53
# text = The fox and his wife they had a great strife, They never ate mustard in all their whole life; They ate their meat without fork or knife And loved to be picking a bone, e-ho!
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	fox	fox	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	nsubj	_	_
3	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	5	cc	_	_
4	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	5	nmod:poss	_	_
5	wife	wife	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	conj	_	_
6	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	nsubj	_	_
7	had	have	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
8	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
9	great	great	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	10	amod	_	_
10	strife	strife	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	14	punct	_	_
12	They	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	14	nsubj	_	_
13	never	never	ADV	RB	PronType=Neg	14	advmod	_	_
14	ate	eat	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	conj	_	_
15	mustard	mustard	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	obj	_	_
16	in	in	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
17	all	all	DET	PDT	PronType=Tot	20	det:predet	_	_
18	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	20	nmod:poss	_	_
19	whole	whole	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	20	amod	_	_
20	life	life	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	23	punct	_	_
22	They	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	23	nsubj	_	_
23	ate	eat	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	parataxis	_	_
24	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	25	nmod:poss	_	_
25	meat	meat	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	obj	_	_
26	without	without	ADP	IN	_	27	case	_	_
27	fork	fork	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	obl	_	_
28	or	or	CCONJ	CC	_	29	cc	_	_
29	knife	knife	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	27	conj	_	_
30	And	and	CCONJ	CC	_	31	cc	_	_
31	loved	love	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	23	conj	_	_
32	to	to	PART	TO	_	34	mark	_	_
33	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	34	aux	_	_
34	picking	pick	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	31	advcl	_	_
35	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	36	det	_	_
36	bone	bone	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	34	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
37	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	38	punct	_	_
38	e-ho	e-ho	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	36	appos	_	SpaceAfter=No
39	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **have** | past | the fox and Waggle's wife | a great strife |  |  |  |  | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent strife=Patient |
| 2 | **not** **eat** | past | fox | mustard |  | fox's whole life |  |  | vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent mustard=Patient |
| 3 | **eat** | past | fox | fox's meat |  |  |  | without fork or knife | vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent meat=Patient |
| 4 | **love** | past | fox *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn admire-31.2-1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Experiencer |
| 5 | **pick** | to-infinitive · progressive | fox *not said here* | a bone |  |  |  |  | vn chew-39.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent bone=Patient |

<!-- .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 52](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg14241/31/52/)
- next →: [sentence 54](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg14241/31/54/)
- ↑ back to [More English Fairy Tales, part 17](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg14241/31/)