---
title: "Oh, well," said the mayor, "if anything should happen, you will alw… — The Book of Dragons · tree and pragmatics
description: "Oh, well," said the mayor, "if anything should happen, you will always be able to remember that your baby perished in a good cause." Who acts: mayor, anything, you. A sentence of «The Book of Dragons» by E. Nesbit, The Dragon Tamers], with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Book of Dragons, The Dragon Tamers\], sentence 123

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"Oh, well," said the mayor, "if anything should happen, you will always be able to remember that your baby perished in a good cause."

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**Who acts:** mayor, anything, you · **What happens:** say, happen, be, remember, perish · **To what, where:** baby, good cause · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Book of Dragons» by E. Nesbit, The Dragon Tamers\]. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (mayor, anything, you), 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:pg23661:12:123
# text = "Oh, well," said the mayor, "if anything should happen, you will always be able to remember that your baby perished in a good cause."
1	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	7	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Oh	oh	INTJ	UH	_	7	discourse	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	2	punct	_	_
4	well	well	INTJ	UH	_	2	discourse	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	2	punct	_	_
7	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
8	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	9	det	_	_
9	mayor	mayor	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
11	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	15	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	15	mark	_	_
13	anything	anything	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Ind	15	nsubj	_	_
14	should	should	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	15	aux	_	_
15	happen	happen	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	7	ccomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
17	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	21	nsubj	_	_
18	will	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	21	aux	_	_
19	always	always	ADV	RB	PronType=Tot	21	advmod	_	_
20	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	21	cop	_	_
21	able	able	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	15	conj	_	_
22	to	to	PART	TO	_	23	mark	_	_
23	remember	remember	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	21	xcomp	_	_
24	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	26	mark	_	_
25	your	your	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Person=2|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	26	nmod:poss	_	_
26	baby	baby	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	23	obj	_	_
27	perished	perish	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	26	acl	_	_
28	in	in	ADP	IN	_	31	case	_	_
29	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	31	det	_	_
30	good	good	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	31	amod	_	_
31	cause	cause	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	27	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
32	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	15	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
33	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	15	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | the mayor |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 2 | **happen** *a condition, not said to happen, in a quote* | should | anything |  |  |  |  |  | vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 3 | **is** *in a quote* | future | you |  |  |  |  | able, always *property* | tree rules |
| 4 | **remember** *in a quote* | to-infinitive | you *not said here* | your baby |  |  |  |  | vn characterize-29.2-1-1 «NP V NP S\_ING»: agent=Agent baby=Theme |
| 5 | **perish** *in a quote* | participle |  | your baby *not said here* |  | a good cause |  |  | vn break\_down-45.8 «NP V»: agent=Patient |

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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:** «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.

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