---
title: Matter of fact is my reply, which will only confirm him, I fear, in… — More English Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: Matter of fact is my reply, which will only confirm him, I fear, in his convictions. Who acts: Matter, reply, I, fact. A sentence of «More English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Ætat. XIII, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# More English Fairy Tales, Ætat. XIII, sentence 23

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Matter of fact is my reply, which will only confirm him, I fear, in his convictions.

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**Who acts:** Matter, reply, I, fact, Philistinism · **What happens:** be, confirm, fear, matter, convict · **To what, where:** reply, Philistinism, convictions

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This is a sentence of «More English Fairy Tales» by Joseph Jacobs, Ætat. XIII. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Matter, reply, I, fact), 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:pg14241:4:23
# text = Matter of fact is my reply, which will only confirm him, I fear, in his convictions.
1	Matter	matter	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	nsubj	_	_
2	of	of	ADP	IN	_	3	case	_	_
3	fact	fact	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	1	nmod	_	_
4	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	6	cop	_	_
5	my	my	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Sing|Person=1|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	6	nmod:poss	_	_
6	reply	reply	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
8	which	which	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	11	nsubj	_	_
9	will	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	11	aux	_	_
10	only	only	ADV	RB	_	11	advmod	_	_
11	confirm	confirm	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	6	parataxis	_	_
12	him	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	11	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
14	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	15	nsubj	_	_
15	fear	fear	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	11	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
17	in	in	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
18	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	19	nmod:poss	_	_
19	convictions	conviction	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	15	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** | present | Matter of fact | my reply |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **confirm** | future | my reply | Philistinism |  |  |  |  | vn indicate-78-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Pivot he=Topic |
| 3 | **fear** | present | I | Philistinism's convictions |  |  |  |  | vn admire-31.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer conviction=Stimulus |
| 4 | **matter** |  | fact |  |  |  |  |  | nom matter «cognition intransitive»: of=agent |
| 5 | **convict** |  | Philistinism |  |  |  |  |  | nom conviction «cognition transitive»: poss=agent |

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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:** «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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