---
title: Grown-up people will tell you that it is not moths but moths' childr… — The Book of Dragons · tree and pragmatics
description: Grown-up people will tell you that it is not moths but moths' children who eat fur--but this is only when they are trying to deceive you. Who acts: Grown people, snowflake, children, this. A sentence of «The Book of Dragons» by E. Nesbit, Opening, part 9, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics 
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg23661/9/10/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[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/) / [Opening, part 9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg23661/9/) / 10

# The Book of Dragons, Opening, part 9, sentence 10

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
Grown-up people will tell you that it is not moths but moths' children who eat fur--but this is only when they are trying to deceive you.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** Grown people, snowflake, children, this · **What happens:** grow up, tell, not be, eat, be, deceive · **To what, where:** you, moths, fur · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «The Book of Dragons» by E. Nesbit, Opening, part 9. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Grown people, snowflake, children, this), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**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:pg23661:9:10
# text = Grown-up people will tell you that it is not moths but moths' children who eat fur--but this is only when they are trying to deceive you.
1	Grown	grow	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	4	amod	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	3	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	up	up	ADP	RP	_	1	compound:prt	_	_
4	people	people	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	6	nsubj	_	_
5	will	will	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	6	aux	_	_
6	tell	tell	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	0	root	_	_
7	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Person=2|PronType=Prs	6	iobj	_	_
8	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	12	mark	_	_
9	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	12	nsubj	_	_
10	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	12	cop	_	_
11	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	12	advmod	_	_
12	moths	moth	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	6	ccomp	_	_
13	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	16	cc	_	_
14	moths	moth	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	16	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	'	's	PART	POS	_	14	case	_	_
16	children	child	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	12	conj	_	_
17	who	who	PRON	WP	PronType=Rel	18	nsubj	_	_
18	eat	eat	VERB	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	16	acl:relcl	_	_
19	fur	fur	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	18	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
20	--	--	PUNCT	,	_	28	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	28	cc	_	_
22	this	this	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	28	nsubj:outer	_	_
23	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	28	cop	_	_
24	only	only	ADV	RB	_	28	advmod	_	_
25	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	28	advmod	_	_
26	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	28	nsubj	_	_
27	are	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	28	aux	_	_
28	trying	try	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	6	advcl	_	_
29	to	to	PART	TO	_	30	mark	_	_
30	deceive	deceive	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	28	xcomp	_	_
31	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Person=2|PronType=Prs	30	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
32	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	6	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **grow up** | participle |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn appear-48.1.1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 2 | **tell** *speech: assert* | future | Grown people |  | you |  |  |  | vn transfer\_mesg-37.1.1-1-1 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent you=Recipient |
| 3 | **not** **is a** | present | snowflake | moths but moths's children |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 4 | **eat** | present | moths's children | fur |  |  |  |  | vn eat-39.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent fur=Patient |
| 5 | **is** | present · progressive | this |  |  |  |  | try *property* | tree rules |
| 6 | **deceive** *not said to happen* | to-infinitive | this *not said here* | you |  |  |  |  | vn trick-59.2 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent you=Patient |

<!-- .note -->
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.

<!-- div src -->

**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.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg23661/9/9/)
- next →: [sentence 11](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg23661/9/11/)
- ↑ back to [Opening, part 9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg23661/9/)