---
title: It looks as if the fairies were planting little shining baby poplar… — The Book of Dragons · tree and pragmatics
description: It looks as if the fairies were planting little shining baby poplar trees and watering them with liquid light." Who acts: It, fairies. A sentence of «The Book of Dragons» by E. Nesbit, Opening, part 7, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Book of Dragons, Opening, part 7, sentence 41

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It looks as if the fairies were planting little shining baby poplar trees and watering them with liquid light."

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**Who acts:** It, fairies · **What happens:** look, plant, shine, water · **To what, where:** little, poplar trees, trees

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This is a sentence of «The Book of Dragons» by E. Nesbit, Opening, part 7. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (It, fairies), 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:pg23661:7:41
# text = It looks as if the fairies were planting little shining baby poplar trees and watering them with liquid light."
1	It	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	looks	look	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
3	as	as	SCONJ	IN	_	8	mark	_	_
4	if	if	SCONJ	IN	_	8	mark	_	_
5	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	6	det	_	_
6	fairies	fairy	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	8	nsubj	_	_
7	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	8	aux	_	_
8	planting	plant	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	2	advcl	_	_
9	little	little	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	8	obj	_	_
10	shining	shine	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	8	advcl	_	_
11	baby	baby	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	compound	_	_
12	poplar	poplar	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	compound	_	_
13	trees	tree	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	10	obj	_	_
14	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	15	cc	_	_
15	watering	water	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	8	conj	_	_
16	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	15	obj	_	_
17	with	with	ADP	IN	_	19	case	_	_
18	liquid	liquid	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	19	amod	_	_
19	light	light	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	2	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	2	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **look** | present | It |  |  |  |  |  | vn stimulus\_subject-30.4 «NP V PP.attribute»: agent=Stimulus |
| 2 | **plant** | past · progressive | the fairies | little |  |  |  |  | vn establish-55.5-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent little=Patient |
| 3 | **shine** | gerund | the fairies *not said here* | poplar trees |  |  |  |  | vn light\_emission-43.1 «NP V NP.theme»: agent=Agent tree=Theme |
| 4 | **water** | gerund | the fairies *not said here* | trees *= tree* |  |  |  | with liquid light | vn butter-9.9 «NP V NP PP.theme»: agent=Agent they=Destination with light=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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