---
title: The baby could make up for its bad nights during the day if it liked… — The Book of Dragons · tree and pragmatics
description: The baby could make up for its bad nights during the day if it liked, but the poor mother couldn't. Who acts: baby, matter. A sentence of «The Book of Dragons» by E. Nesbit, The Dragon Tamers], 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/pg23661/12/18/)

<!-- 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/) / [The Dragon Tamers\]](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg23661/12/) / 18

# The Book of Dragons, The Dragon Tamers\], sentence 18

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
The baby could make up for its bad nights during the day if it liked, but the poor mother couldn't.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** baby, matter · **What happens:** make up, like

<!-- .vabout -->
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 (baby, matter), 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:pg23661:12:18
# text = The baby could make up for its bad nights during the day if it liked, but the poor mother couldn't.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	baby	baby	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	nsubj	_	_
3	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
4	make	make	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
5	up	up	ADP	RP	_	4	compound:prt	_	_
6	for	for	ADP	IN	_	9	case	_	_
7	its	its	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	9	nmod:poss	_	_
8	bad	bad	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	9	amod	_	_
9	nights	night	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	4	obl	_	_
10	during	during	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
11	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	12	det	_	_
12	day	day	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obl	_	_
13	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	15	mark	_	_
14	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	nsubj	_	_
15	liked	like	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	21	punct	_	_
17	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	21	cc	_	_
18	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
19	poor	poor	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	20	amod	_	_
20	mother	mother	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	21	nsubj	_	_
21	could	could	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	4	parataxis	_	SpaceAfter=No
22	n't	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	21	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **make up** | could | the baby |  |  |  | day; night |  | vn comprise-107.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **like** *a condition, not said to happen* | past | matter |  |  |  |  |  | vn want-32.1-1-1 «NP V NP S\_INF»: agent=Pivot |

<!-- .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 17](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg23661/12/17/)
- next →: [sentence 19](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg23661/12/19/)
- ↑ back to [The Dragon Tamers\]](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg23661/12/)