---
title: "He was a very good King--oh, yes, really a very superior King in hi… — The Book of Dragons · tree and pragmatics
description: "He was a very good King--oh, yes, really a very superior King in his way, but he was a little--well, strange." Who acts: Lionel. A sentence of «The Book of Dragons» by E. Nesbit, Opening, part 1, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg23661/1/126/)

<!-- 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/) / [The Book of Dragons](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg23661/) / [Opening, part 1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg23661/1/) / 126

# The Book of Dragons, Opening, part 1, sentence 126

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
"He was a very good King--oh, yes, really a very superior King in his way, but he was a little--well, strange."

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** Lionel · **What happens:** be · **To what, where:** good King

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Book of Dragons» by E. Nesbit, Opening, part 1. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Lionel), 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:pg23661:1:126
# text = "He was a very good King--oh, yes, really a very superior King in his way, but he was a little--well, strange."
1	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	7	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	nsubj	_	_
3	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	7	cop	_	_
4	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	7	det	_	_
5	very	very	ADV	RB	_	6	advmod	_	_
6	good	good	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	7	amod	_	_
7	King	King	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	30	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	--	--	PUNCT	,	_	7	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	oh	oh	INTJ	UH	_	30	discourse	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	_
11	yes	yes	INTJ	UH	Polarity=Pos	17	discourse	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
13	really	really	ADV	RB	_	17	advmod	_	_
14	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
15	very	very	ADV	RB	_	16	advmod	_	_
16	superior	superior	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	17	amod	_	_
17	King	King	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	30	nsubj	_	_
18	in	in	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
19	his	his	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	20	nmod:poss	_	_
20	way	way	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	26	punct	_	_
22	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	26	cc	_	_
23	he	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	26	nsubj	_	_
24	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	26	cop	_	_
25	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	26	det	_	_
26	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	17	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
27	--	--	PUNCT	,	_	30	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
28	well	well	INTJ	UH	_	30	discourse	_	SpaceAfter=No
29	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	28	punct	_	_
30	strange	strange	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	30	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
32	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	30	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** *in a quote* | past | Lionel | a good King |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **is** *in a quote* | past | Lionel |  |  |  |  | little *property* | 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.

<!-- div src -->

**Text:** «The Book of Dragons» by E. Nesbit, Project Gutenberg book 23661 (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 125](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg23661/1/125/)
- next →: [sentence 127](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg23661/1/127/)
- ↑ back to [Opening, part 1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg23661/1/)