---
title: Long, long ago, as far back as the time when animals spoke, there li… — The Crimson Fairy Book · tree and pragmatics
description: Long, long ago, as far back as the time when animals spoke, there lived a community of cats in a deserted house they had taken possession of not far from a large town. Who acts: animals. A sentence of «The Crimson Fairy Book» by Andrew Lang, The Crimson Fairy Book, part 36, with its dependency tree 
---

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# The Crimson Fairy Book, The Crimson Fairy Book, part 36, sentence 3

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
Long, long ago, as far back as the time when animals spoke, there lived a community of cats in a deserted house they had taken possession of not far from a large town.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** animals · **What happens:** speak, live, desert, take, possess · **To what, where:** community, deserted house, possession, large town · **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 36. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (animals), 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:pg2435:36:3
# text = Long, long ago, as far back as the time when animals spoke, there lived a community of cats in a deserted house they had taken possession of not far from a large town.
1	Long	long	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	_
3	long	long	ADV	RB	Degree=Pos	4	advmod	_	_
4	ago	ago	ADV	RB	_	1	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	11	punct	_	_
6	as	as	ADV	RB	_	7	advmod	_	_
7	far	far	ADV	RB	Degree=Pos	8	advmod	_	_
8	back	back	ADV	RB	_	11	advmod	_	_
9	as	as	ADP	IN	_	11	case	_	_
10	the	the	DET	DT	Definite=Def|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
11	time	time	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	1	conj	_	_
12	when	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	14	advmod	_	_
13	animals	animal	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	14	nsubj	_	_
14	spoke	speak	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	11	acl:relcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	17	punct	_	_
16	there	there	PRON	EX	PronType=Dem	17	expl	_	_
17	lived	live	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	11	advcl	_	_
18	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	19	det	_	_
19	community	community	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	obj	_	_
20	of	of	ADP	IN	_	21	case	_	_
21	cats	cat	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	19	nmod	_	_
22	in	in	ADP	IN	_	25	case	_	_
23	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	25	det	_	_
24	deserted	desert	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	25	amod	_	_
25	house	house	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	17	obl	_	_
26	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	28	nsubj	_	_
27	had	have	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	28	aux	_	_
28	taken	take	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part	25	acl:relcl	_	_
29	possession	possession	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	28	obj	_	_
30	of	of	ADP	IN	_	36	case	_	_
31	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	32	advmod	_	_
32	far	far	ADV	RB	Degree=Pos	36	advmod	_	_
33	from	from	ADP	IN	_	36	case	_	_
34	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	36	det	_	_
35	large	large	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	36	amod	_	_
36	town	town	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	29	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
37	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	1	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **speak** *speech: other* | past | animals |  |  |  |  |  | vn talk-37.5 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **live** | past |  | a community of cats |  | a deserted house; there |  |  | vn lodge-46 «NP V ADV»: agent=Theme community=Location |
| 3 | **desert** | participle |  |  |  |  |  |  | vn leave-51.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 4 | **take** | past · perfect | animals *= animal* | possession of a large town |  |  |  |  | vn bring-11.3 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent possession=Theme |
| 5 | **possess** |  |  | a large town |  |  |  |  | nom possession «act transitive»: of=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.

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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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