---
title: The little white Princess always woke in her little white bed when t… — The Book of Dragons · tree and pragmatics
description: The little white Princess always woke in her little white bed when the starlings began to chatter in the pearl gray morning. Who acts: little white Princess, starlings. 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/pg23661/13/4/)

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[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 Fiery Dragon\]](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg23661/13/) / 4

# The Book of Dragons, The Fiery Dragon\], sentence 4

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The little white Princess always woke in her little white bed when the starlings began to chatter in the pearl gray morning.

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**Who acts:** little white Princess, starlings · **What happens:** wake, begin, chatter · **To what, where:** little white bed

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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 (little white Princess, starlings), 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:pg23661:13:4
# text = The little white Princess always woke in her little white bed when the starlings began to chatter in the pearl gray morning.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
2	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	amod	_	_
3	white	white	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	amod	_	_
4	Princess	Princess	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	6	nsubj	_	_
5	always	always	ADV	RB	PronType=Tot	6	advmod	_	_
6	woke	wake	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
7	in	in	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
8	her	her	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Fem|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	11	nmod:poss	_	_
9	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	11	amod	_	_
10	white	white	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	11	amod	_	_
11	bed	bed	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	6	obl	_	_
12	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	15	advmod	_	_
13	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	14	det	_	_
14	starlings	starling	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	15	nsubj	_	_
15	began	begin	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	advcl	_	_
16	to	to	PART	TO	_	17	mark	_	_
17	chatter	chatter	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	15	xcomp	_	_
18	in	in	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	22	det	_	_
20	pearl	pearl	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	22	compound	_	_
21	gray	gray	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	22	amod	_	_
22	morning	morning	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **wake** | past | the little white Princess |  |  | Princess's little white bed |  | always *property* | vn other\_cos-45.4 «NP.patient V»: agent=Patient |
| 2 | **begin** | past | the starlings |  |  |  |  |  | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP V S\_INF»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 3 | **chatter** | to-infinitive | the starlings *not said here* |  |  |  | morning |  | vn animal\_sounds-38 «NP V»: agent=Agent |

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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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