---
title: And then he told all about his youth; and the little Mice had never… — Andersen's Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: And then he told all about his youth; and the little Mice had never heard the like before; and they listened and said, Who acts: sun, birds. A sentence of «Andersen's Fairy Tales» by H. C. Andersen, The Fir Tree, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Andersen's Fairy Tales, The Fir Tree, sentence 159

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
And then he told all about his youth; and the little Mice had never heard the like before; and they listened and said,

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**Who acts:** sun, birds · **What happens:** tell, not hear, listen, say · **To what, where:** youth, little Mice · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Andersen's Fairy Tales» by H. C. Andersen, The Fir Tree. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (sun, birds), 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:pg1597:10:159
# text = And then he told all about his youth; and the little Mice had never heard the like before; and they listened and said,
1	And	and	CCONJ	CC	_	4	cc	_	_
2	then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	4	advmod	_	_
3	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
4	told	tell	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
5	all	all	ADV	RB	_	8	advmod	_	_
6	about	about	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
7	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	8	nmod:poss	_	_
8	youth	youth	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	16	punct	_	_
10	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	16	cc	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
12	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	13	amod	_	_
13	Mice	mouse	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	16	nsubj:pass	_	_
14	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	16	aux	_	_
15	never	never	ADV	RB	PronType=Neg	16	advmod	_	_
16	heard	hear	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	4	conj	_	_
17	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
18	like	like	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
19	before	before	ADV	RB	_	16	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	;	;	PUNCT	,	_	23	punct	_	_
21	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	23	cc	_	_
22	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	23	nsubj	_	_
23	listened	listen	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	parataxis	_	_
24	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	25	cc	_	_
25	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	23	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
26	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **tell** *speech: assert* | past | sun | sun's youth |  |  | then |  | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent youth=Recipient |
| 2 | **not** **hear** | past · perfect · passive |  | the little Mice |  |  |  | before *property* | vn see-30.1-1-1 «NP V S»: subject=Stimulus |
| 3 | **listen** | past | birds *= bird* |  |  |  |  |  | vn peer-30.3 «NP V PP.theme»: agent=Agent |
| 4 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | birds *= bird* *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | 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.

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**Text:** «Andersen's Fairy Tales» by H. C. Andersen, Project Gutenberg book 1597 (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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