---
title: People always say this when they have had something in their eyes. — The Book of Dragons · tree and pragmatics
description: People always say this when they have had something in their eyes. Who acts: People. A sentence of «The Book of Dragons» by E. Nesbit, Opening, part 5, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Book of Dragons, Opening, part 5, sentence 28

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People always say this when they have had something in their eyes.

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**Who acts:** People · **What happens:** say, have · **To what, where:** this, something, eyes · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Book of Dragons» by E. Nesbit, Opening, part 5. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (People), 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:pg23661:5:28
# text = People always say this when they have had something in their eyes.
1	People	people	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	3	nsubj	_	_
2	always	always	ADV	RB	PronType=Tot	3	advmod	_	_
3	say	say	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
4	this	this	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	3	obj	_	_
5	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	8	advmod	_	_
6	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	8	nsubj	_	_
7	have	have	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	8	aux	_	_
8	had	have	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	3	advcl	_	_
9	something	something	PRON	NN	Number=Sing|PronType=Ind	8	obj	_	_
10	in	in	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	_
11	their	their	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Number=Plur|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	12	nmod:poss	_	_
12	eyes	eye	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	9	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	3	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **say** *speech: assert* | present | People | this |  |  |  | always *property* | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP.topic»: agent=Agent this=Topic |
| 2 | **have** | present · perfect | people | something |  | people's eyes |  |  | vn birth-28.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent something=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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