---
title: "See the dear creature," said the nurse, wiping away a tear. " — The Book of Dragons · tree and pragmatics
description: "See the dear creature," said the nurse, wiping away a tear. " Who acts: nurse. A sentence of «The Book of Dragons» by E. Nesbit, The Fiery Dragon], with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg23661/13/229/)

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# The Book of Dragons, The Fiery Dragon\], sentence 229

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"See the dear creature," said the nurse, wiping away a tear. "

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**Who acts:** nurse · **What happens:** see, say, wipe away · **To what, where:** dear creature, tear · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Book of Dragons» by E. Nesbit, The Fiery Dragon\]. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (nurse), 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:pg23661:13:229
# text = "See the dear creature," said the nurse, wiping away a tear. "
1	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	See	see	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	8	ccomp	_	_
3	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	5	det	_	_
4	dear	dear	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	5	amod	_	_
5	creature	creature	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	2	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	2	punct	_	_
8	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
9	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	10	det	_	_
10	nurse	nurse	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
12	wiping	wipe	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	8	advcl	_	_
13	away	away	ADV	RB	_	12	advmod	_	_
14	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	15	det	_	_
15	tear	tear	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	8	punct	_	_
17	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	8	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **see** *in a quote* | infinitive |  | the dear creature |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer creature=Stimulus |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | the nurse |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |
| 3 | **wipe away** | gerund | the nurse *not said here* | a tear |  |  |  | away *property* | vn wipe\_manner-10.4.1-1 «NP V NP.theme»: agent=Agent tear=Theme |

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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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