---
title: As he stood wringing his hands and weeping, the god Mercury suddenly… — The Aesop for Children · tree and pragmatics
description: As he stood wringing his hands and weeping, the god Mercury suddenly appeared and asked what the trouble was. Who acts: he, god, trouble. A sentence of «The Aesop for Children» by Aesop, Mercury and the Woodman, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Aesop for Children, Mercury and the Woodman, sentence 7

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As he stood wringing his hands and weeping, the god Mercury suddenly appeared and asked what the trouble was.

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**Who acts:** he, god, trouble · **What happens:** stand, wring, appear, ask, be · **To what, where:** hands · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Aesop for Children» by Aesop, Mercury and the Woodman. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (he, god, trouble), 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:pg19994:93:7
# text = As he stood wringing his hands and weeping, the god Mercury suddenly appeared and asked what the trouble was.
1	As	as	SCONJ	IN	_	3	mark	_	_
2	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	3	nsubj	_	_
3	stood	stand	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	14	advcl	_	_
4	wringing	wring	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	3	xcomp	_	_
5	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	6	nmod:poss	_	_
6	hands	hand	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	4	obj	_	_
7	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	8	cc	_	_
8	weeping	weeping	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	3	punct	_	_
10	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
11	god	god	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	nsubj	_	_
12	Mercury	Mercury	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	11	appos	_	_
13	suddenly	suddenly	ADV	RB	_	14	advmod	_	_
14	appeared	appear	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
15	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	16	cc	_	_
16	asked	ask	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	14	conj	_	_
17	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	16	ccomp	_	_
18	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
19	trouble	trouble	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	nsubj	_	_
20	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	17	cop	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	14	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **stand** | past | he |  |  |  |  |  | vn admire-31.2 «NP V S\_ING»: agent=Experiencer clause=Stimulus |
| 2 | **wring** | gerund | he *not said here* | his hands and weeping |  |  |  |  | vn crane-40.3.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent hand=Patient |
| 3 | **appear** | past | the god |  |  |  |  | suddenly *property* | vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 4 | **ask** *speech: ask* | past | the god *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 5 | **is a** | past | the trouble |  |  |  |  |  | tree rules |

<!-- .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:** «The Aesop for Children» by Aesop, Project Gutenberg book 19994 (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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