---
title: The heralds were almost in despair, when an old woman stepped out of… — The Crimson Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: The heralds were almost in despair, when an old woman stepped out of the crowd and came and spoke to them. Who acts: heralds, old woman. A sentence of «The Crimson Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Crimson Fairy Book, part 10, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Crimson Fairy Book, The Crimson Fairy Book, part 10, sentence 45

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The heralds were almost in despair, when an old woman stepped out of the crowd and came and spoke to them.

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**Who acts:** heralds, old woman · **What happens:** be, step out, come, speak · **To what, where:** despair, crowd, heralds · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «The Crimson Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Crimson Fairy Book, part 10. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (heralds, old woman), 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:pg2435:10:45
# text = The heralds were almost in despair, when an old woman stepped out of the crowd and came and spoke to them.
1	The	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	2	det	_	_
2	heralds	herald	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	6	nsubj	_	_
3	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	cop	_	_
4	almost	almost	ADV	RB	_	6	advmod	_	_
5	in	in	ADP	IN	_	6	case	_	_
6	despair	despair	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
7	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
8	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	12	advmod	_	_
9	an	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
10	old	old	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	11	amod	_	_
11	woman	woman	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	nsubj	_	_
12	stepped	step	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	6	conj	_	_
13	out	out	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
14	of	of	ADP	IN	_	16	case	_	_
15	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	16	det	_	_
16	crowd	crowd	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	12	obl	_	_
17	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	18	cc	_	_
18	came	come	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	12	conj	_	_
19	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	20	cc	_	_
20	spoke	speak	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	18	conj	_	_
21	to	to	ADP	IN	_	22	case	_	_
22	them	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	20	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 | **is** | past | the heralds |  |  | despair |  | almost *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **step out** | past | a old woman | the crowd |  |  |  |  | vn run-51.3.2 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Initial\_Location crowd=Theme |
| 3 | **come** | past | a old woman *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn escape-51.1-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 4 | **speak** *speech: other* | past | a old woman *not said here* |  | heralds *= herald* |  |  |  | vn talk-37.5 «NP V PP.co-agent»: agent=Agent to they=Co-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 Crimson Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, Project Gutenberg book 2435 (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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