---
title: It was just opening its mouth to bark, when Niels fired, and it fell… — The Crimson Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: It was just opening its mouth to bark, when Niels fired, and it fell dead on the spot. Who acts: dog, Niels. A sentence of «The Crimson Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Crimson Fairy Book, part 30, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# The Crimson Fairy Book, The Crimson Fairy Book, part 30, sentence 36

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It was just opening its mouth to bark, when Niels fired, and it fell dead on the spot.

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**Who acts:** dog, Niels · **What happens:** open, bark, fire, fall · **To what, where:** mouth, spot

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This is a sentence of «The Crimson Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Crimson Fairy Book, part 30. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (dog, Niels), 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:pg2435:30:36
# text = It was just opening its mouth to bark, when Niels fired, and it fell dead on the spot.
1	It	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
2	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	aux	_	_
3	just	just	ADV	RB	_	4	advmod	_	_
4	opening	open	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	0	root	_	_
5	its	its	PRON	PRP$	Case=Gen|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|Poss=Yes|PronType=Prs	6	nmod:poss	_	_
6	mouth	mouth	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	4	obj	_	_
7	to	to	PART	TO	_	8	mark	_	_
8	bark	bark	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	4	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
10	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	12	advmod	_	_
11	Niels	Niels	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	12	nsubj	_	_
12	fired	fire	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	parataxis	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	16	punct	_	_
14	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	16	cc	_	_
15	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	16	nsubj	_	_
16	fell	fall	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	12	conj	_	_
17	dead	dead	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	16	xcomp	_	_
18	on	on	ADP	IN	_	20	case	_	_
19	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	20	det	_	_
20	spot	spot	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	16	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
21	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	4	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **open** | past · progressive | dog | dog's mouth |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **bark** | to-infinitive | dog *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn animal\_sounds-38 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **fire** | past | Niels |  |  |  |  |  | vn throw-17.1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent |
| 4 | **fall** | past | dog |  |  | the spot |  | dead *property* | vn occur-48.3 «NP V PP»: agent=Theme on spot=Location |

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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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