---
title: “When ladies used to come to me in dreams, I said, ‘Pretty mother, p… — Peter Pan · tree and pragmatics
description: “When ladies used to come to me in dreams, I said, ‘Pretty mother, pretty mother.’ Who acts: ladies, dignity. A sentence of «Peter Pan» by J. M. Barrie, Chapter VI. THE LITTLE HOUSE, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Peter Pan, Chapter VI. THE LITTLE HOUSE, sentence 20

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“When ladies used to come to me in dreams, I said, ‘Pretty mother, pretty mother.’

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**Who acts:** ladies, dignity · **What happens:** use, come, say · **To what, where:** dignity, dreams · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Peter Pan» by J. M. Barrie, Chapter VI. THE LITTLE HOUSE. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (ladies, dignity), 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:pg16:7:20
# text = “When ladies used to come to me in dreams, I said, ‘Pretty mother, pretty mother.’
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	13	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	When	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	4	advmod	_	_
3	ladies	lady	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	4	nsubj	_	_
4	used	use	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	13	advcl	_	_
5	to	to	PART	TO	_	6	mark	_	_
6	come	come	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	xcomp	_	_
7	to	to	ADP	IN	_	8	case	_	_
8	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	6	obl	_	_
9	in	in	ADP	IN	_	10	case	_	_
10	dreams	dream	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	6	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	_
12	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	13	nsubj	_	_
13	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
15	‘	'	PUNCT	``	_	17	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	Pretty	pretty	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	17	amod	_	_
17	mother	mother	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
19	pretty	pretty	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	20	amod	_	_
20	mother	mother	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	13	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	’	'	PUNCT	''	_	13	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **use** *in a quote* | past | ladies |  |  |  |  |  | vn use-105.1 «NP V NP S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 2 | **come** *in a quote* | to-infinitive | ladies *not said here* |  | dignity | dreams |  |  | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V PP.initial\_location»: agent=Theme to i=Initial\_Location |
| 3 | **say** *speech: assert* *in a quote* | past | dignity |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=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:** «Peter Pan» by J. M. Barrie, Project Gutenberg book 16 (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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