---
title: It happened to be a hol-i-day, and most of the English soldiers in t… — Fifty Famous Stories Retold · tree and pragmatics
description: It happened to be a hol-i-day, and most of the English soldiers in the cas-tle were eating and drinking and having a merry time. Who acts: It, most English soldiers. A sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, The Black Douglas., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/13/10/)

<!-- 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/) / [Fifty Famous Stories Retold](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/) / [The Black Douglas.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/13/) / 10

# Fifty Famous Stories Retold, The Black Douglas., sentence 10

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
It happened to be a hol-i-day, and most of the English soldiers in the cas-tle were eating and drinking and having a merry time.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** It, most English soldiers · **What happens:** happen, be, eat, drink, have · **To what, where:** i day

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, The Black Douglas.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (It, most English soldiers), 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:pg18442:13:10
# text = It happened to be a hol-i-day, and most of the English soldiers in the cas-tle were eating and drinking and having a merry time.
1	It	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	happened	happen	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	to	to	PART	TO	_	10	mark	_	_
4	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	10	cop	_	_
5	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
6	hol	hol	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	6	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	i	i	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	10	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	8	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	day	day	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
12	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	17	cc	_	_
13	most	most	ADJ	JJS	Degree=Sup	17	amod	_	_
14	of	of	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
15	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
16	English	English	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	17	amod	_	_
17	soldiers	soldier	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	24	nsubj	_	_
18	in	in	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
20	cas	ca	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	17	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	22	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	tle	tle	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	20	conj	_	_
23	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	24	aux	_	_
24	eating	eat	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	2	advcl	_	_
25	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	26	cc	_	_
26	drinking	drink	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	24	conj	_	_
27	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	28	cc	_	_
28	having	have	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	24	conj	_	_
29	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	31	det	_	_
30	merry	merry	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	31	amod	_	_
31	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	28	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
32	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **happen** | past | It |  |  |  |  |  | vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **is a** | to-infinitive |  | a i day |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 3 | **eat** | past · progressive | the most English soldiers in the cas and tle |  |  |  |  |  | vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 4 | **drink** | gerund | the most English soldiers in the cas and tle *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 5 | **have** | gerund | the most English soldiers in the cas and tle *not said here* |  |  |  | time |  | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: 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.

<!-- div src -->

**Text:** «Fifty Famous Stories Retold» by James Baldwin, Project Gutenberg book 18442 (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 9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/13/9/)
- next →: [sentence 11](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/13/11/)
- ↑ back to [The Black Douglas.](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg18442/13/)