---
title: Then the chief dwarf came quite close and said: "What's that on your… — The Book of Dragons · tree and pragmatics
description: Then the chief dwarf came quite close and said: "What's that on your head?" Who acts: chief dwarf. A sentence of «The Book of Dragons» by E. Nesbit, Opening, part 8, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Book of Dragons, Opening, part 8, sentence 99

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Then the chief dwarf came quite close and said: "What's that on your head?"

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**Who acts:** chief dwarf · **What happens:** come, say, be · **To what, where:** that, head · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Book of Dragons» by E. Nesbit, Opening, part 8. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (chief dwarf), 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:pg23661:8:99
# text = Then the chief dwarf came quite close and said: "What's that on your head?"
1	Then	then	ADV	RB	PronType=Dem	5	advmod	_	_
2	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	4	det	_	_
3	chief	chief	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	4	amod	_	_
4	dwarf	dwarf	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	nsubj	_	_
5	came	come	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
6	quite	quite	ADV	RB	_	7	advmod	_	_
7	close	close	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	5	xcomp	_	_
8	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	9	cc	_	_
9	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	5	conj	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	14	punct	_	_
11	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	14	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	What	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	14	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	's	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	14	cop	_	_
14	that	that	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	9	ccomp	_	_
15	on	on	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
16	your	your	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Person=2|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	17	nmod:poss	_	_
17	head	head	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **come** | past | the chief dwarf |  |  |  | then | close *property* | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **say** *speech: ask* | past | the chief dwarf *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **is a** *in a quote* | present |  | that |  | your head |  |  | tree rules |

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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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