---
title: When it was mid-day, they saw a beautiful snow-white bird sitting on… — Grimms' Fairy Tales · tree and pragmatics
description: When it was mid-day, they saw a beautiful snow-white bird sitting on a bough, which sang so delightfully that they stood still and listened to it. Who acts: help, Hansel, beautiful snow white bird, bough. A sentence of «Grimms' Fairy Tales» by Jacob Grimm, Hansel and Gretel, with its dependency tree
---

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# Grimms' Fairy Tales, Hansel and Gretel, sentence 68

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
When it was mid-day, they saw a beautiful snow-white bird sitting on a bough, which sang so delightfully that they stood still and listened to it.

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** help, Hansel, beautiful snow white bird, bough · **What happens:** be, see, sit, sing, stand, listen · **To what, where:** mid-day, beautiful snow white bird, bough, help

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This is a sentence of «Grimms' Fairy Tales» by Jacob Grimm, Hansel and Gretel. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (help, Hansel, beautiful snow white bird, bough), 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:pg2591:20:68
# text = When it was mid-day, they saw a beautiful snow-white bird sitting on a bough, which sang so delightfully that they stood still and listened to it.
1	When	when	ADV	WRB	PronType=Int	4	advmod	_	_
2	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	4	nsubj	_	_
3	was	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	4	cop	_	_
4	mid-day	mid-day	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	4	punct	_	_
6	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	7	nsubj	_	_
7	saw	see	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
8	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	13	det	_	_
9	beautiful	beautiful	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	13	amod	_	_
10	snow	snow	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	13	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	10	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
12	white	white	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	13	amod	_	_
13	bird	bird	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	7	obj	_	_
14	sitting	sit	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	13	acl	_	_
15	on	on	ADP	IN	_	17	case	_	_
16	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	17	det	_	_
17	bough	bough	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	20	punct	_	_
19	which	which	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	20	nsubj	_	_
20	sang	sing	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	17	acl:relcl	_	_
21	so	so	ADV	RB	_	22	advmod	_	_
22	delightfully	delightfully	ADV	RB	_	20	advmod	_	_
23	that	that	SCONJ	IN	_	25	mark	_	_
24	they	they	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs	25	nsubj	_	_
25	stood	stand	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	20	advcl	_	_
26	still	still	ADV	RB	_	25	advmod	_	_
27	and	and	CCONJ	CC	_	28	cc	_	_
28	listened	listen	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	25	conj	_	_
29	to	to	ADP	IN	_	30	case	_	_
30	it	it	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	28	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
31	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	7	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** | past | help | mid-day |  |  |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **see** | past | Hansel | a beautiful snow white bird |  |  |  |  | vn comprehend-87.2-1-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Experiencer bird=Stimulus |
| 3 | **sit** | gerund | a beautiful snow white bird *not said here* |  |  | a bough |  |  | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V PP.location»: agent=Agent on bough=Location |
| 4 | **sing** *speech: express* | past | a bough |  |  |  |  | delightfully *property* | vn sound\_emission-43.2 «NP V»: agent=Theme |
| 5 | **stand** | past | Hansel |  |  |  | still |  | vn assuming\_position-50 «NP V»: agent=Agent |
| 6 | **listen** | past | Hansel *not said here* |  | help |  |  |  | vn peer-30.3 «NP V PP.theme»: agent=Agent to it=Theme |

<!-- .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:** «Grimms' Fairy Tales» by Jacob Grimm, Project Gutenberg book 2591 (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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