---
title: “They are the ladies of the court; I must go down and see what they… — Andersen's Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: “They are the ladies of the court; I must go down and see what they are about!” Who acts: ladies, Emperor. A sentence of «Andersen's Fairy Tales» by H. C. Andersen, The Swineherd, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Andersen's Fairy Tales, The Swineherd, sentence 83

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“They are the ladies of the court; I must go down and see what they are about!”

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**Who acts:** ladies, Emperor · **What happens:** be, go down, see · **To what, where:** ladies

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This is a sentence of «Andersen's Fairy Tales» by H. C. Andersen, The Swineherd. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (ladies, Emperor), 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:pg1597:3:83
# text = “They are the ladies of the court; I must go down and see what they are about!”
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	They	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
3	are	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	5	cop	_	_
4	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
5	ladies	lady	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	0	root	_	_
6	of	of	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
7	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
8	court	court	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	;	;	PUNCT	:	_	12	punct	_	_
10	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	12	nsubj	_	_
11	must	must	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	12	aux	_	_
12	go	go	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	parataxis	_	_
13	down	down	ADV	RB	_	12	advmod	_	_
14	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	15	cc	_	_
15	see	see	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	12	conj	_	_
16	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	19	obl	_	_
17	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	19	nsubj	_	_
18	are	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	19	cop	_	_
19	about	about	ADV	RB	_	15	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	!	!	PUNCT	.	_	12	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	12	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** *in a quote* | present | ladies *= lady* | the ladies |  |  |  | of the court | tree rules |
| 2 | **go down** *in a quote* | must | the Emperor *= emperor* |  |  |  |  | down *property* | vn calibratable\_cos-45.6.1-1 «NP.attribute V»: agent=Attribute |
| 3 | **see** *in a quote* | infinitive | the Emperor *= emperor* *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V»: agent=Experiencer |
| 4 | **is** *in a quote* | present | ladies *= lady* |  |  |  |  | about *property* | tree rules |

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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:** «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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